The air is thin and we have to rest several times on the short trip from camp. On the plain (平原), we can just see many wild animals. This is why we're here to observe Tibetan antelopes.

Tibetan antelopes live on the plains of Tibet,Xinjiang and Qinghai.Watch them move slowly across the green grass. I'm attracted by the lovely animals.I'm also reminded of the danger they are in. They are being killed for their valuable fur.

My guide Zhaxi works at the Changtang National Nature Reserve. The reserve is a place for the animals and plants of northwestern Tibet. To Zhaxi, protesting the wildlife is a way of life."We're not tying to save the animals.” he says,"Actually, we're trying to save ourselves."

Between the 1980s and 1990s, the population of the Tibetan antelope dropped by over 50 percent. People were shooting antelopes to make profits. Their living places were becoming smaller as new roads and railways were built.

In order to save the animals, the Chinese government placed them under national protection. Zhaxi and other volunteers watched over the antelopes day and night to keep them safe from attacks. Bridges and gates were added to let the antelopes move easily and keep them safe from cars and trains.

The measures were effective. The antelope population has recovered and in June 2015.the Tibetan antelope was removed from the list of animals in danger. The government, however,does not intend to stop the protection programs, since the threats (威胁) to the Tibetan antelope have not yet disappeared.

Much is being done to protect wildlife but if we really want to save the planet, we must change our way of life. We can stop being a threat to wildlife and to our planet only when we learn to exist in peace with nature.

Everybody hates rats. But in the earthquake capitals of the world-Japan, Los Angeles, Turkey-rats will soon be man's new best friends.

What happens after an earthquake? We send in rescue dogs. Why? Because they can smell people. Dogs save lives. They help rescuers to find living people. But dogs are big and they can't get into small spaces. So now a new research project is using a smaller animal to save lives: the rat.

How does it work? First，the rat is trained to smell people. When this happens, the rat's brain gives a signal. This is sent to a small radio on its back, and then the rescuers follow the radio signals. When the rat's brain activity jumps, the rescuers know that someone is alive. The rat has smelled that person.

Although there are already robots which can do this job, rats are better. Christian Linster at Cornell University-New York says, “Robots' noses don't work well when there are other smells around. Rats are good at that.” Rats can also see in the dark.They are cheaper and quicker to train than dogs, and unlike robots, they don't need electricity!

The “rat project” is not finished, but Julie Ryan of International Rescue Corps in Scotland says, “It would be fantastic. A rat could get into spaces we couldn't get to and a rat would get out if it wasn't safe.” Perhaps for the first time in history, people will be happy to see a rat in a building (but only after an earthquake, of course).

In October 2022 a bird with the code name B6 set a new world record. Over the course of 11 days, B6, a young Bar-tailed Godwit, flew from its hatching ground in Alaska to its wintering ground in Tasmania, covering 8, 425 miles without taking a single break. During its journey, B6 did not land, did not eat, did not drink and did not stop flapping, sustaining an average ground speed of 30 miles per hour 24 hours a day as it winged its way to the other end of the world.

B6’s long exciting journey is also a success of the remarkable mechanical features of some of the most easily recognized yet mysterious structures in the biological world: feathers. Feathers kept B6 warm overnight while it flew above the Pacific Ocean. Feathers formed the flight surfaces of the wings that kept B6 in the air for long.

One might expect that, considering all the time humans have spent admiring, using and studying feathers, we would know all their tricks by now. Yet insights into these amazing structures continue to emerge. Over the past decade scientists and researchers have been taking a fresh look at feathers. Collectively they have made surprising new discoveries about almost every aspect of their biology.

Starting in the 1990s, a series of surprising fossil finds showed that feathers were widespread among several families of meat-eating dinosaurs known as theropods and that birds had inherited these structures from their theropod ancestors. The discovery of feathered nonbird dinosaurs help researchers understand the origin and evolution (进化) of feathers.

Feathers are a fantastic model system for understanding how complex structures evolve. The field of applied science has taken note of feathers’ many brilliant features, which have already led to successful technological innovations. For instance, the surface texture (质感) and boundary-layer-control principles of penguin feathers have made their way into robotics.

No doubt feathers will give rise to more clever inventions in the future. We have only to let our creativity take flight.