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篇一：
Solar-Powered Airplane Lands in Spain
太阳能飞机在西班牙着陆
An airplane powered totally by the sun landed in Seville, Spain early Thursday after completing a 71-hour flight across the Atlantic Ocean.
一架完全以太阳能为动力的飞机周四早些时候在西班牙塞维利亚着陆，它刚完成了一次71小时的横穿大西洋飞行。
The plane, a Solar Impulse 2 model, has just one seat. It left from John F. Kennedy International Airport in New York Monday morning.
这架阳光动力2号模型飞机只有一个座位。它于周一早晨离开纽约的约翰·F·肯尼迪国际机场。
This was the plane’s 15th stop in its planned around-the-world trip. The trip began in Abu Dhabi in March of 2015.
这一站是它按计划环球飞行的第十五站。此次飞行始于2015年三月的阿布扎比市。
Swiss aviator Bertrand Piccard operated the solar-powered plane on this leg of the tour. The Solar Pulse 2 had an average speed of 70 kilometers an hour during his flight.
瑞士飞行员伯特兰·皮卡德驾驶这架太阳能飞机飞完了此次旅程的这一站。在他的此次飞行中，这架太阳动力2号的平均飞行速度为70 km/h。
The plane’s power comes from 17,000 solar cells built into the wings. The cells capture the sun’s energy, which is stored in batteries on the plane.
这架飞机的'动力来源于安装在机翼上的17000个太阳能电池。这些电池捕捉太阳能量，将其储存于飞机上的蓄电池中。
The Solar Pulse 2 has a 72-meter wingspan. That is longer than the wingspan of a Boeing 747 passenger plane. The solar-powered plane weighs about as much as an automobile.
该飞机的翼展为72米，比一家波音747客机的翼展还要长。这架太阳能飞机的重量大约相当于一辆汽车。
Piccard’s friend and business partner Andre Borschberg will operate the plane on the final part of the trip. He plans to fly from Seville to Abu Dhabi in the United Arab Emirates.
皮卡德的朋友及商业伙伴安德烈·博尔施伯格将驾驶这架飞机飞完剩下的旅程。他打算从塞维利亚飞往阿联酋的阿布扎比市。
I’m Anne Ball.
安妮·鲍尔报道。
篇二：
The U.S. Supreme Court says the University of Texas can consider race when deciding which students to admit. The case was one of the most closely watched because it deals with the issue of affirmative action.
Affirmative action is a policy designed to help those who suffer from discrimination, especially regarding employment or education.
The decision has nationwide implications because other American universities use similar affirmative action policies. However, eight U.S. states do not allow race to be used when considering public college admissions. The states are Arizona, California, Florida, Michigan, Nebraska, New Hampshire, Oklahoma and Washington.
By law, the University of Texas guarantees admission to students who graduate in the top 10 percent of their high school class. But when considering applications from about 25 percent of students, the University of Texas also considers the student’s race, along with other factors.
The 4-3 Supreme Court decision means the university’s admissions policy can remain.
Abigail Fisher, a white woman, filed the case against the University of Texas. She said the school denied her admission based on her race.
Fisher’s grades were not good enough to get her automatic admission under the top 10 percent rule. She was denied admission to the University of Texas in 2008.
When she found out that minority students with lower grades than hers were accepted, she sued the school for discrimination. The University of Texas said Fisher would not have been admitted with or without race as a factor.
The university says its race-based selection policies are necessary to maintain adiverse campus community. Fisher’s attorneys argued that the top 10 percent program is enough to make sure that adequate minority students are included in the admissions process.
Justice Anthony Kennedy gave the majority opinion for the court. “The university has thus met its burden of showing that the admissions policy it used... was narrowlytailored,” he wrote.
Kennedy also said that “it remains an enduring challenge to our nation's education system to reconcile the pursuit of diversity with the constitutional promise of equal treatment and dignity.”
Three other judges - Chief Justice John Roberts, Justice Samuel Alito and Justice Clarence Thomas – disagreed.
Alito said he thought the decision was an example of “affirmative action goneberserk.” He said he felt the university had relied "on a series of unsupported andnoxious racial assumptions."
In a separate dissent, Thomas expressed his view that the U.S. Constitution makes it illegal to use race as part of the admissions process in higher education.
U.S. President Barack Obama praised the Supreme Court’s decision for upholding “the basic notion that diversity is an important value in our society, and that this country should provide a high quality education to all our young people, regardless of their background.”
I’m Bryan Lynn.
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Words in This Story
factor – n. something that produces or influences a certain result
automatic – adj. happening by itself with little human involvement
diverse – adj. showing a lot of differences and variety
adequate – adj. acceptable in quality or quantity
tailor – v. adapt for a particular purpose or person
reconcile – v. restore friendly relations
dissent – n. the expression of opinions different from others
berserk – adj. out of control with anger or excitement
noxious – adj. harmful or unpleasant
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