本刊试题研究中心

It sounds like something from science fiction—a space journey into the vast expanse of space， heading towards Mars. While were not quite ready to put a person on the land， the question we ask today is：    1    The space race saw the USA and the USSR compete to achieve firsts in the space flight. The Soviet Union released Sputnik 1， an artificial satellite， before anyone else.    2    Now it appears that Mars is the heaven body of desire. While the reputation and bragging （吹噓） rights to be the first nation to touch down is an obvious draw， there are other reasons we want to get there.

3    You only have to look at the fossilized remains of the dinosaurs to see the benefit of finding another habitable planet. While Mars doesnt have the right conditions to call it home just yet， theres always the concept of terraforming （地球化）—changing the environment of a planet to suit our needs.

However， not everyone agrees.    4    He has said the concept of changing habitability of another planet because of the damage we have done to Earth makes no sense when we can simply terraform it.

It seems the main reason is the search for extraterrestrial （地球外的） life.    5    Now seemingly dead， the potential fossils could answer questions about our own evolution and that of our planet. One theory is that bacterial life on our planet didnt start here， but was transferred via asteroids （小行星） from Mars.

A. And the US landed on the moon first.

B. Leading astrophysicist Neil Tyson is one of them.

C. One of these could be the survival of our species.

D. Why are so many countries interested in going to Mars？

E. It has been believed that， at one time， Mars was abundant with life.

F. Surely inspiring a new generation to visit the stars is reasonable enough.

G. May landing on Mars inspire more people to become interested in science？