Over the past few years, cars have become smarter and smarter. Some of them can even drive themselves. Now, our roads have followed suit （跟着做）. In the United Kingdom alone, there are around 650 kilometers of “smart roads” in use. Across the world, many more are being built. Some new technologies are being put to use.

Roads that recharge（充电）

Global warming has made us search for new energy sources. Why not look to the roads? With the right technologies, cars around the world could be producing energy as they go. Piezoelectricity ads mix traditional asphalt（柏油）with new material. They use vibrations（振动）from passing cars to produce electricity. In fact, piezoelectricity is nothing new. It was invented in 1880. However, it has never been widely used before now. The UK’s Lancaster University is going to change that. It has been improving the technology, including developing roadside batteries that can store the electricity.

Roads that never freeze

________ A tech company in Israel has developed the Snowless roads. When they detect snow or ice on their surfaces, the roads will heat themselves up, melting the snow or ice away. The project has been successfully tested on a few Canadian roads and in some of its car parks.

Built-in brain

Roads of the future may be able to know how many people are on them. They could send them updates（实时信息）on weather and traffic jams, and recharge electric cars as they drive. This seems to be a dream, but one American company has almost made it come true. By sensing the weight of a vehicle, the company’s smart roads can track（跟踪）the speed of each wheel. “We are basically making very large touchpads,” says Tim Sylvester, CEO of the company. “but instead of looking for fingers, our roads look for tires.” After having collected traffic data, the roads will send it to the drivers.

Most teenagers are still trying to find their passion and purpose in life. However, not Gitanjali Rao. The 15-year-old sophomore at STEM School Highlands Ranch has been coming up with innovative solutions lo worldwide problems since she was ten. It is, therefore, not surprising that the youngster was selected from 5,000 equally impressive nominees—aged 8 to 16—for TIME Magazine’s first-ever “Kid of the Year.”

The young girl, who knew she wanted to bring change and positivity to her community since 3^rd grade, was just ten years old when she heard about the lead-tainted (含铅的) water in Flint, Michigan, in 2015. After spending two months researching how the area’s drinking water became polluted, Rao began designing a device called Tethys, which attaches to a cellphone and informs the resident via an APP if their drinking water contains traces of the harmful metal. The prototype (模型) earned her the Young Scientist Challenge Award in 2017. A start-up entrepreneur is working with scientists and medical professionals to test Tethys’ potential and hopes the device will be ready for commercial use by 2022.

In 2019, Rao took on another social issue—opioid addiction. The app she designed won the Pillar Prize at the Innovation Student Challenge, which helps to catch drug addiction in young adults before it’s too late. Rao said. “I wanted to come up with a way to diagnose such addiction at an early stage so you can take action earlier.”

More recently, the teenager has created another inspiring app. “I stared to hard-code (编写硬编码) in some words that could be considered bullying, and then the computer search engine took those words and identified words that are similar. You type in a word or phrase, and it’s able to pick it up if it’s bullying, and it gives you the option to edit it or send it the way it is.” Rao told editor Angelina in an interview. “The goal is not to punish. Instead, it gives you the chance to rethink what you’re saying so that you know what to do next time around.”

Summer heat can be dangerous, and heat leads to tragedy far too often. According to Kidsandcars Organization, an average of 37 young children per year die of car heat in the US, when they are accidentally left in a hot vehicle.

For Bishop Curry, a fifth grader from McKinney, Texas, one such incident hit close to home. A six-month-old baby from his neighborhood died after hours in a hot car. After hearing about her death, Curry decided that something needed to be done. Young Curry drew up a sketch(草图) of a device he called "Oasis."

The device would be attached to car seats and watch the temperature inside the car. If it reached a certain temperature in the car, and the device sensed a child in the car seat, it would begin to circulate cool air. Curry also designs the device using GPS and Wi-Fi technology, which would alarm the child's parents and, if there was no response from them, the police.

Curry's father believes that the invention has potential. "The cool thing about Bishop's thinking is none of this technology is new," he said. "We feel like the way he's thinking and combining all these technologies will get to production faster." His father even introduced the device to Toyota, where he works as an engineer.

In January, Curry's father launched a campaign for the invention. They hope to raise money to finalize the patent, build models, and find a manufacturer. They have raised more than twice that--over $46,000.

"I was so proud of him for thinking of a solution," the father said. "We always just complain about things and rarely offer solutions."