✍️词汇：橙色熟词生义｜绿色生词｜红色短语
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Para.1
NASA HAS big plans for the Moon. By the end of the decade, it wants to send humans back to the lunar surface. Before then, though, it intends to send probes to look for ice at its south pole. This ice carries enormous scientific value. It could shed light on how Earth acquired its liquid water; it is also ripe for conversion into rocket propellant.
Propellant ： [prəˈpɛlənt]
n. 推进物
Propel：推进，推动
Para.2
Scientists were, therefore, left somewhat confused in July when the agency abruptly cancelled its almost-complete Volatiles Investigating Polar Exploration Rover (VIPER), a craft designed to look for this ice, and offered it to commercial companies instead. “It’s all a bit weird,” says Benjamin Fernando, a planetary scientist at Johns Hopkins University.
adv. 有点，稍微，有几分
n. 少量，某些部分，重要人物
Para.3
The rover, roughly the size of a Fiat 500, has already been built. It is undergoing final testing at NASA’s Johnson Space Centre in Houston ahead of a planned launch next year on a SpaceX Falcon Heavy rocket, carried by a lander built by Astrobotic, a Pennsylvania-based firm, that NASA has already paid for. In recent years, such outsourcing has been characteristic of NASA’s new approach to lunar exploration, in which it buys landers and launchers off private companies rather than building its own. Never before, though, has the agency given an almost-complete mission to a private company.
outsource： [ˈaʊtsɔrs]
v. 外包，外购
Para.4
One of VIPER’s main instruments is a drill, built to dig for ice up to a metrebeneath the lunar surface. VIPER was designed to deploy this drill in some of the craters at the Moon’s south pole, which, because of the configuration of the lunar orbit, never see direct sunlight. Temperatures at the floor of these craters do not rise above -160°C, and it is here that previous spacecraft have seen hints of ice. If a rover delivers hard proof, however, upcoming human lunar missions could then extract the ice, possibly splitting off its hydrogen atoms to make rocket fuel. Eventually, says NASA, the Moon could become a refuellingstop for human missions farther into the Solar System.
drill： [drɪl]
v./n. 钻机，训练，钻探
crater：[ˈkreɪtər]
n. 火山口，弹坑
upcoming：即将出现的，即将到来的
extract：[ˈekstrækt ]
v/n. 提取，提炼，摘录
Para.5
Lofty goals. Also, unsurprisingly, not cheap. According to NASA, the VIPER project has cost $433m so far, well above its initial budget of $250m, which is more than the agency—with many other missions to fund—says it can afford.
lofty：[ˈlɔːfti]
adj. 高耸的，巍峨的，高尚的
noble：高尚的，崇高的
Take command of：开始担任…的指挥，开始控制
further：[ˈfɜːrðər]
v. 促进，增进
Promote：促进，促销，晋升
Advance：促进，推动
Known to：已知的
Tip over：翻到，打翻
congress： [ˈkɑːŋɡrəs]
n. 代表大会，国会，议会
the National People’s Congress：全国人民代表大会
表“会议”的词有：Conference、meeting、session、rally、council、convention等
agency：[ˈeɪdʒənsi]
n. 服务/代理/经销机构；（政府）专门机构
Institution：机构，习俗
the institution of marriage：婚姻习俗
Institute：机构，研究院
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