A disastrous fire surrounded Notre Dame（巴黎圣母院）completely and destroyed large parts of the Gothic(哥特式的) architecture on Monday.

“Notre Dame is our history, our literature; part of our spirit, the place of all our great events, our wars, our liberations, the center of our lives" French President Emmanuel Macron told reporters in front of the still burning Paris landmark and promised to rebuild Notre Dame Cathedral.

“Notre Dame is burning, and know the sadness and this tremble felt by so many fellow French people. But tonight, I’d like to speak of hope too, "he said, announcing the launch of a fundraising campaign.

“Let’s be proud, because we built this cathedral more than 800 years ago, we’ve built it and, throughout the centuries, let it grow and improve it. So I gravely say tonight: we will rebuild it together, ”he added.

The disastrous fire engulfed(吞没) the upper reaches of Paris’ towering Notre Dame Cathedral as it was undergoing renovations(翻新)。

Tourists and Parisians looked on horrified from the streets below. France’s Interior Ministry said firefighters might not be able to save the structure.

The fire collapsed the cathedrals’ spire(尖顶) and spread to one of its landmark towers "Everything is burning; nothing will remain from the frame, "Notre Dame spokesman Andre Finot told French media. The 12th-century cathedral is home to incalculable works of art and is one of the world’s most famous tourist attractions, immortalized by Victor Hugo’s 1831 novel The Hunchback of Notre Dame.

The cause of the fire was not known, but French media quoted the Paris fire brigade(消防队) as saying the fire is “potentially linked" to a 6 million—euro($6. 88 million)renovation project on the church’s spire and its 250 tons of lead. Officials opened an investigation as Paris police said there were no reported deaths. Some 400 firefighters were battling the fire well into the night.

In their spare time, most young people like to enjoy themselves and play on their smartphones. But Li Ruxue is different. He joined a sky-walker gibbon. (天行长臂猿) protection organization, where one of his major responsibilities was picking up gibbon feces (猿粪).

The skywalker gibbon is a top-level State protected animal whose population is smaller than that of wild giant pandas. Through analyzing their DNA from their feces, researchers can protect them better. So over the past four and a half years, Li has followed gibbons and collected their feces for researchers. Li said the job relies heavily on luck and willpower. “Our work and rest completely depend on gibbons. Though the lifestyle is a little bit tiring, it’s meaningful.” But he has never regretted his choice or felt alone, as he has found more young people engaged in nature conservation.

Like Li, Chu Wenwen, 27, has also worked to protect animals. Listed as a first-class State protected animal in China, the Mengxin beaver (蒙新河狸) is found only along the Ulungur River in Xinjiang’s Altay county. To protect them, Chu launched the “beaver canteen” program in 2018, in which a huge “canteen” of about 400,000 salix shrubs (灌木柳苗) was built with the snack money by mostly young internet users. “I am lucky to live in such a great era when young people can realize their dreams while the country strongly supports nature conservation,” said Chu.

According to Fan Pengfei, a professor at Sun Yat-sen University in Guangzhou, ecological protection as an industry can provide only a few jobs, most of which are in research institutes and nongovernmental organizations. But he has seen more and more young people take part time jobs as journalists, photographers and so on to raise awareness of wildlife protection. “Young people are the future of the world and the future of global biodiversity conservation,” noted Xinhua.

San Francisco— After years of testing with a human backup(后补的) driver, General Motor’s Cruise is launching fully driverless cars onto public streets in San Francisco, the most complex urban environment robocars that have been tested, the company announced.

The company said on Wednesday it was deploying(部署) five self-driving vehicles in San Francisco’s Sunset District, an area that has many of the city’s typical traits: narrow and busy streets, steep inclines(坡度) and fog. Cruise said it was confident enough to launch the driverless trials after five years’ testing.

The company, which began the driverless testing in November, said it plans to expand to other neighborhoods. But the first tests will not put the driverless vehicle fully in control. Instead, the backup driver will be effectively moved to the passenger seat at early trials. Although those operations will not involve traditional driver controls, they will be able to stop the vehicle if there is an emergency.

Companies in Silicon Valley and elsewhere are working to make driverless vehicles a reality, saying that they will help decrease motor vehicle deaths, which number around 40, 000 annually, and allow cheaper ride-hailing(打车) trips by removing the need to pay a human driver.

Companies such as Cruise and competitor Zoox have set their sights on San Francisco, seeing the potential reward of conquering a complex urban environment and the country’s second-most populated major city, rather than starting small and gradually making progress.