Questões sobre Interpretação de texto | Reading comprehension

        Agriculture and fisheries are closely linked to climate, making them vulnerable to changes in temperature, CO2 levels, and extreme weather. While increased temperature and CO2 can enhance some crop yields, this depends on factors like nutrient levels, soil moisture, and water availability. More frequent droughts and floods could challenge food production and safety, while warming waters may shift fish habitats, disrupting ecosystems. Overall, climate change may complicate traditional methods of farming, livestock raising, and fishing.

         Crop responses to temperature changes depend on each crop's optimal growth temperature. Warmer conditions might benefit certain crops or enable the cultivation of new ones, but yields decline if temperatures exceed a crop's threshold. Increased CO2 can enhance plant growth under controlled conditions but may be offset by water, nutrient, and temperature constraints. Additionally, elevated CO2 reduces the protein and nitrogen content in crops like soybeans and alfalfa, lowering their quality and diminishing the forage value for livestock.

         Extreme weather events, such as floods and droughts, can harm crops and reduce yields. For example, high nighttime temperatures in 2010 and 2012 lowered U.S. corn yields, while premature budding caused $ 220 million in losses for Michigan cherries in 2012. Rising summer temperatures may also dry soils, complicating drought management. Increased irrigation could help, but reduced water availability might limit its feasibility.

         Climate change also favors weeds, pests, and fungi, which thrive in warmer, wetter conditions with higher CO2 levels. This could expose crops to new threats and increase farming costs. U.S. farmers already spend over $ 11 billion annually on weed control, and these challenges are likely to grow as weed and pest ranges expand.

         While rising CO2 stimulates plant growth, it also lowers the nutritional value of major crops like wheat, rice, and soybeans by reducing their protein and mineral content. This poses a potential risk to human health. Additionally, increased pest pressure may lead to higher pesticide use, further impacting health and reducing pesticide effectiveness. Climate change, therefore, presents multifaceted challenges to food production, nutrition, and ecosystems.

Internet::<climatechange.chicago.gov> (adapted). 

        For the first time, 2025 will see quantum computers leave labs and research institutions and actually deploy into the networks and data centers of real-world customers. For quantum computing companies, this will be a real test of steel.

        It’s one thing to have a groundbreaking, powerful quantum computer that only works on its very best day — when the lab conditions are perfect and when the team of PhDs operating it are at the top of their game. But the reality is that quantum computers need to work on their worst days too — in the real world, in real organizations. The quantum computing companies that land on top will be the ones that have built for this challenge since day one.

         People tend to hear the words “quantum computing” and jump straight to science fiction or the multiverse. And while it seems daunting, we’ve actually reached a point where the “quantum” part of quantum computing is the easiest bit — it’s the “computing” that is inherently complex. For those on the front lines of building powerful quantum computers, this means it’s no longer a physics challenge — it’s an engineering one.

         Companies won’t need to know the ins and outs of quantum computers in order to leverage its unprecedented power — they’ll simply benefit from its ability to solve the problems that could never be solved on classical computers.

Internet:<thequantuminsider.com>  (adapted). 

        Agriculture and fisheries are closely linked to climate, making them vulnerable to changes in temperature, CO2 levels, and extreme weather. While increased temperature and CO2 can enhance some crop yields, this depends on factors like nutrient levels, soil moisture, and water availability. More frequent droughts and floods could challenge food production and safety, while warming waters may shift fish habitats, disrupting ecosystems. Overall, climate change may complicate traditional methods of farming, livestock raising, and fishing.

         Crop responses to temperature changes depend on each crop's optimal growth temperature. Warmer conditions might benefit certain crops or enable the cultivation of new ones, but yields decline if temperatures exceed a crop's threshold. Increased CO2 can enhance plant growth under controlled conditions but may be offset by water, nutrient, and temperature constraints. Additionally, elevated CO2 reduces the protein and nitrogen content in crops like soybeans and alfalfa, lowering their quality and diminishing the forage value for livestock.

         Extreme weather events, such as floods and droughts, can harm crops and reduce yields. For example, high nighttime temperatures in 2010 and 2012 lowered U.S. corn yields, while premature budding caused $ 220 million in losses for Michigan cherries in 2012. Rising summer temperatures may also dry soils, complicating drought management. Increased irrigation could help, but reduced water availability might limit its feasibility.

         Climate change also favors weeds, pests, and fungi, which thrive in warmer, wetter conditions with higher CO2 levels. This could expose crops to new threats and increase farming costs. U.S. farmers already spend over $ 11 billion annually on weed control, and these challenges are likely to grow as weed and pest ranges expand.

         While rising CO2 stimulates plant growth, it also lowers the nutritional value of major crops like wheat, rice, and soybeans by reducing their protein and mineral content. This poses a potential risk to human health. Additionally, increased pest pressure may lead to higher pesticide use, further impacting health and reducing pesticide effectiveness. Climate change, therefore, presents multifaceted challenges to food production, nutrition, and ecosystems.

Internet::<climatechange.chicago.gov> (adapted). 

        For the first time, 2025 will see quantum computers leave labs and research institutions and actually deploy into the networks and data centers of real-world customers. For quantum computing companies, this will be a real test of steel.

        It’s one thing to have a groundbreaking, powerful quantum computer that only works on its very best day — when the lab conditions are perfect and when the team of PhDs operating it are at the top of their game. But the reality is that quantum computers need to work on their worst days too — in the real world, in real organizations. The quantum computing companies that land on top will be the ones that have built for this challenge since day one.

         People tend to hear the words “quantum computing” and jump straight to science fiction or the multiverse. And while it seems daunting, we’ve actually reached a point where the “quantum” part of quantum computing is the easiest bit — it’s the “computing” that is inherently complex. For those on the front lines of building powerful quantum computers, this means it’s no longer a physics challenge — it’s an engineering one.

         Companies won’t need to know the ins and outs of quantum computers in order to leverage its unprecedented power — they’ll simply benefit from its ability to solve the problems that could never be solved on classical computers.

Internet:<thequantuminsider.com>  (adapted). 

        Grain poisoning, also known as grain overload or lactic acidosis, is usually the result of stock consuming large quantities of grain or pellets to which they are unaccustomed. Pasture-fed cows or feedlot cattle not yet adapted to grain may become acutely ill or die after eating only moderate amounts of grain, whereas stock accustomed to diets high in grain content may consume large amounts of grain with little or no effect. Some circumstances under which grain poisoning can occur include: accidental access to grain stores; stock access to stubble paddocks containing excess grain after harvest; stock access to standing crops; cattle and sheep on feedlot rations without proper introduction; and grain feeding during drought without proper introduction.

         How is it caused? Grain and finely ground carbohydrate (such as found in pellets) is rapidly fermented by bacteria in the rumen, producing large quantities of lactic acid, which lowers the pH in the rumen. The build-up of acid has effects on the animal such as: there is a decrease in the numbers of useful bacteria in the rumen and an increase in the amount of acid-producing bacteria (causing further build-up of acid in the rumen), rumen contractions cease, lactic acid draws fluid into the rumen from the tissues and blood, resulting in dehydration, and, in severe cases, the blood may become more acid, resulting in heart failure, kidney failure and or even death.

         Grains with a higher fibre content, such as oats and sorghum, are safer to feed than, for example, wheat and barley, since the fibre slows the rate of digestion. Cracking grain increases the rate of digestion of the starch and consequently may increase the risk of grain poisoning. Any factor that causes variation in the intake of grain, or variation in the availability of carbohydrate, may lead to grain poisoning problems. For example, an unpalatable additive or inclement weather may put cattle off their feed on one day, but then they gorge the next day. The effects of grain poisoning may be worsened if the animal is also suffering from cold stress. It is a wise precaution to increase the proportion of roughage fed during particularly cold weather. Other sources of carbohydrates, such as apples, grapes, bread, baker’s dough and incompletely fermented brewer’s grain, can also cause poisoning if eaten in excess.

Internet:<dpi.nsw.gov.au> (adapted).