Animal Minds: Parrot Alex: Test 1

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TEST 1

Animal Minds: Parrot Alex


A In 1977 Irene Pepperberg, a recent graduate of Harvard University, did something very bold. At a time when animals still were
considered automatons, she set out to find what was on another creature’s mind by talking to it. She brought a one-year-old African
gray parrot she named Alex into her lab to teach him to reproduce the sounds of the English language. “I thought if he learned to
communicate, I could ask him questions about how he sees the world.”

B When Pepperberg began her dialogue with Alex, who died last September at the age of 31, many scientists believed animals were
incapable of any thought. They were simply machines, robots programmed to react to stimuli but lacking the ability to think or feel.Any
pet owner would disagree. We see the love in our dogs’ eyes and know that, of course, they has thoughts and emotions. But such claims
remain highly controversial. Gut instinct is not science, and it is all too easy to project human thoughts and feelings onto another
creature. How, then, does a scientist prove that an animal is capable of thinking – that it is able to acquire information about the world
and act on it? “That’s why I started my studies withAlex,” Pepperberg said. They were seated – she at her desk, he on top of his cage – in
her lab, a windowless room about the size of a boxcar, at Brandeis University. Newspapers lined the floor; baskets of bright toys were
stacked on the shelves. They were clearly a team – and because of their work, the notion that animals can think is no longer so fanciful.

C Certain skills are considered key signs of higher mental abilities: good memory, a grasp of grammar and symbols, self-awareness,
understanding others’ motives, imitating others, and being creative. Bit by bit, in ingenious experiments, researchers have documented
these talents in other species, gradually chipping away at what we thought made human beings distinctive while offering a glimpse of
where our own abilities came from. Scrub jays know that other jays are thieves and that stashed food can spoil; sheep can recognize
faces; chimpanzees use a variety of tools to probe termite mounds and even use weapons to hunt small mammals; dolphins can imitate
human postures; the archerfish, which stuns insects with a sudden blast of water, can learn how to aim its squirt simply by watching an
experienced fish perform the task.AndAlex the parrot turned out to be a surprisingly good talker.

D Thirty years after the Alex studies began; Pepperberg and a changing collection of assistants were still giving him English lessons. The
humans, along with two younger parrots, also served as Alex’s flock, providing the social input all parrots crave. Like any flock, this one –
as small as it was – had its share of drama. Alex dominated his fellow parrots, acted huffy at times around Pepperberg, tolerated the
other female humans, and fell to pieces over a male assistant who dropped by for a visit. Pepperberg bought Alex in a Chicago pet store
where she let the store’s assistant pick him out because she didn’t want other scientists saying later that she’d particularly chosen an
especially smart bird for her work. Given that Alex’s brain was the size of a shelled walnut, most researchers thought Pepperberg’s
interspecies communication study would be futile.

E “Some people actually called me crazy for trying this,” she said. “Scientists thought that chimpanzees were better subjects, although, of
course, chimps can’t speak.” Chimpanzees, bonobos, and gorillas have been taught to use sign language and symbols to communicate
with us, often with impressive results. The bonobo Kanzi, for instance, carries his symbol-communication board with him so he can “talk”
to his human researchers, and he has invented combinations of symbols to express his thoughts. Nevertheless, this is not the same thing
as having an animal look up at you, open his mouth, and speak. Under Pepperberg’s patient tutelage, Alex learned how to use his vocal
tract to imitate almost one hundred English words, including the sounds for various foods, although he calls an apple a “beanery.”
“Apples taste a little bit like bananas to him, and they look a little bit like cherries, Alex made up that word for them,” Pepperberg said.

F It sounded a bit mad, the idea of a bird having lessons to practice, and willingly doing it. But after listening to and observing Alex, it
was difficult to argue with Pepperberg’s explanation for his behaviors. She wasn’t handing him treats for the repetitious work or rapping
him on the claws to make him say the sounds. “He has to hear the words over and over before he can correctly imitate them,”
Pepperberg said, after pronouncing “seven” for Alex a good dozen times in a row. “I’m not trying to see if Alex can learn a human
language,” she added. “That’s never been the point. My plan always was to use his imitative skills to get a better understanding of avian
cognition.”

G In other words, because Alex was able to produce a close approximation of the sounds of some English words, Pepperberg could ask
him questions about a bird’s basic understanding of the world. She couldn’t ask him what he was thinking about, but she could ask him
about his knowledge of numbers, shapes, and colors. To demonstrate, Pepperberg carried Alex on her arm to a tall wooden perch in the
middle of the room. She then retrieved a green key and a small green cup from a basket on a shelf. She held up the two items to Alex’s
eye. “What’s same?” she asked. Without hesitation, Alex’s beak opened: “Co-lor.” “What’s different?” Pepperberg asked. “Shape,” Alex
said. His voice had the digitized sound of a cartoon character. Since parrots lack lips (another reason it was difficult for Alex to
pronounce some sounds, such as ba), the words seemed to come from the air around him, as if a ventriloquist were speaking. But the
words – and what can only be called the thoughts – were entirely his.

H For the next 20 minutes, Alex ran through his tests, distinguishing colors, shapes, sizes, and materials (wool versus wood versus metal).
He did some simple arithmetic, such as counting the yellow toy blocks among a pile of mixed hues. And, then, as if to offer final proof of
the mind inside his bird’s brain, Alex spoke up. “Talk clearly!” he commanded, when one of the younger birds Pepperberg was also
teaching talked with wrong pronunciation. “Talk clearly!” “Don’t be a smart aleck,” Pepperberg said, shaking her head at him. “He knows
all this, and he gets bored, so he interrupts the others, or he gives the wrong answer just to be obstinate. At this stage, he’s like a
teenager; he’s moody, and I’m never sure what he’ll do.”

Questions 1-6
Do the following statements agree with the information given in Reading Passage?

In boxes 1-6 on your answer sheet, write


TRUE if the statement agrees with the information

FALSE if the statement contradicts the information

NOT GIVEN If there is no information on this

1   Firstly, Alex has grasped quite a lot of vocabulary.

2   At the beginning of study, Alex felt frightened in the presence of humans.

3   Previously, many scientists realized that animals possess the ability of thinking.

4   It has taken a long time before people get to know cognition existing in animals.

5   As Alex could approximately imitate the sounds of English words, he was capable of roughly answering Irene’s
questions regarding the world.

6   By breaking in other parrots as well as producing the incorrect answers, he tried to be focused.

Questions 7-10
Complete the following summary of the paragraphs of Reading Passage, using NO MORE THAN THREE WORDS from the Reading
Passage for each answer.

Write your answers in boxes 7-10 on your answer sheet.

After the training of Irene, Parrot Alex can use his vocal tract to pronounce more

than 7  , while other scientists believe that animals have no this

advanced ability of thinking, they would rather teach 8 

Pepperberg clarified that she wanted to conduct a study concerning 9   


but not to teach him to talk. The store’s assistant picked out a bird at random for her for

the sake of avoiding other scientists saying that the bird is 10   
afterwards.

Questions 11-13
Answer the questions 11-13 below.

Choose NO MORE THAN THREE WORDS AND/OR A NUMBER from the passage for each answer.

What did Alex reply regarding the similarity of the subjects showed to him?

11 

What is the problem of the young parrots except Alex?

12 

To some extent, through the way he behaved what we can call him

13 

Developing Courtiers
A The Ecotourism Society defines ecotourism as “a responsible travel to natural areas which conserves the environment and improves
the welfare of local people”. It is recognised as being particularly conducive to enriching and enhancing the standing of tourism, on the
basis that this form of tourism respects the natural heritage and local populations and are in keeping with the carrying capacity of the
sites.

B Cuba is undoubtedly an obvious site for ecotourism, with its picturesque beaches, underwater beauty, countryside landscapes, and
ecological reserves. An educated population and improved infrastructure of roads and communications adds to the mix. In the
Caribbean region, Cuba is now the second most popular tourist destination. Ecotourism is also seen as an environmental education
opportunity to heighten both visitors’ and residents’ awareness of environmental and conservation issues, and even to inspire
conservation action. Ecotourism has also been credited with promoting peace, by providing opportunities for educational and cultural
exchange. Tourists’ safety and health are guaranteed. Raul Castro, brother of the Cuban president, started this initiative to rescue the
Cuban tradition of herbal medicine and provide natural medicines for its healthcare system. The school at Las Terrazas Eco-Tourism
Community teaches herbal healthcare and children learn not only how to use medicinal herbs, but also to grow them in the school
garden for teas, tinctures, ointments and creams. In Cuba, ecotourism has the potential to alleviate poverty by bringing money into the
economy and creating jobs. In addition to the environmental impacts of these efforts, the area works on developing community
employment opportunities for locals, in conjunction with ecotourism.

C In terms of South America, it might be the place which shows the shortcoming of ecotourism. Histoplasma capsulatum, a dimorphic
fungus, is the most common endemic mycosis in the United States, and is associated with exposure to bat or bird droppings. Most
recently, outbreaks have been reported in healthy travelers who returned from Central and South America after engaging in recreational
activities associated with spelunking, adventure tourism, and ecotourism. It is quite often to see tourists neglected sanitation while
travelling. After engaging in high-risk activities, boots should be hosed off and clothing placed in airtight plastic bags for laundering.
HIV-infected travelers should avoid risky behaviors or environments, such as exploring caves, particularly those that contain bat
droppings.

D Nowhere is the keen eye and intimate knowledge of ecotourism is more amidst this fantastic biodiversity, as we explore remote
realms rich in wildlife rather than a nature adventure. A sustainable tour is significant for ecotourism, one in which we can grow hand in
hand with nature and our community, respecting everything that makes us privileged. Travelers get great joy from every step that take
forward on this endless but exciting journey towards sustainability. The primary threats to South America’s tropical forests are
deforestation caused by agricultural expansion, cattle ranching, fagging, oil extraction and spills, mining, illegal coca farming, and
colonization initiatives. Deforestation has shrunk territories belonging to indigenous peoples and wiped out more than 90% of the
population. Many are taking leading roles in sustainable tourism even as they introduce protected regions to more travelers.

E In East Africa, significantly reducing such illegal hunting and allowing wildlife populations to recover would allow the generation of
significant economic benefits through trophy hunting and potentially ecotourism. “Illegal hunting is an extremely inefficient use of
wildlife resources because it fails to capture the value of wildlife achievable through alternative forms of use such as trophy hunting and
ecotourism,” said Peter Lindsey, author of the new study. Most residents believed that ecotourism could solve this circumstance. They
have passion for local community empowerment, loves photography and writes to laud current local conservation efforts, create
environmental awareness and promote ecotourism.

F In Indonesia, ecotourism started to become an important concept from 1995, in order to strengthen the domestic travelling
movement, the local government targeting the right markets is a prerequisite for successful ecotourism. The market segment for
Indonesian ecotourism consists of: (i) “The silent generation”, 55-64 year-old people who are wealthy enough, generally well-educated
and have no dependent children, and can travel for four weeks; (ii) “The baby boom generation”, junior successful executives aged 35-54
years, who are likely to be travelling with their family and children (spending 2-3 weeks on travel) – travelling for them is a stress reliever;
and (iii) the “X generation”, aged 18-29 years, who love to do ecotours as backpackers – they are generally students who can travel for
3-12 months with monthly expenditure of US$300-500. It is suggested that promotion of Indonesian ecotourism products should aim to
reach these various cohorts of tourists. The country welcomes diverse levels of travelers.

G On the other hand, ecotourism provide as many services as traditional tourism. Nestled between Mexico, Guatemala and the
Caribbean Sea is the country of Belize. It is the wonderful place for Hamanasi honeymoon, bottle of champagne upon arrival, three
meals daily, a private service on one night of your stay and a choice of adventures depending on the length of your stay. It also offers
six-night and seven-night honeymoon packages. A variety of specially tailored tours, including the Brimstone Hill Fortress, and a trip to a
neighboring island. Guided tours include rainforest, volcano and off-road plantation tours. Gregory Pereira, an extremely knowledgeable
and outgoing hiking and tour guide, says the following about his tours: “All of our tours on St. Kitts include transportation by specially
modified Land Rovers, a picnic of island pastries and local fruit, fresh tropical juices, CSR, a qualified island guide and a full liability
insurance coverage for participants.

H Kodai is an ultimate splendor spot for those who love being close to mother nature. They say every bird must sing its own throat while
we say every traveller should find his own way out of variegated and unblemished paths of deep valleys and steep mountains. The
cheese factory here exports great quantity of cheese to various countries across the globe. It is located in the center of forest. Many
travelers are attracted by the delicious cheese. The ecotourism is very famous of this different eating experience.

Questions 14-18
Use the information in the passage to match the place (listed A-D) with opinions or deeds below.

Write the appropriate letters, A-D, in boxes 14-18 on your answer sheet.

NB You may use any letter more than once.

14   a place to improve local education as to help tourists

15   a place suitable for both rich and poor travelers

16   a place where could be easily get fungus

17   a place taking a method to stop unlawful poaching

18   a place where the healthcare system is developed


A Cuba

B East Africa

C South America

D Indonesia

Questions 19-22
Use the information in the passage to match the companies (listed A-C) with or deeds below.

Write the appropriate letters A, B, C or D in boxes 19-22 answer sheet.

A eating the local fruits at the same time

B find job opportunities in community

C  which is situated on the heart of jungle

D with private and comfortable service

19   Visiting the cheese factory

20   Enjoying the honeymoon

21   Having the picnic while

22   The residents in Cuba could

Questions 23-26
Complete the following summary of the paragraphs of Reading Passage, using NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS from the Reading Passage
for each answer.

Write your answers in boxes 23-26 on your answer sheet.

Ecotourism is not a nature 23   but a 24   tour. The


reason why South America promotes ecotourism is due to the destruction

of 25 
In addition, East Africa also encourages this kind of tourism for cutting

the 26   in order to save wild animals.

Ancient Societies Classification


A Although humans have established many types of societies throughout history sociologists and anthropologists tend to classify
different societies according to the degree to which different groups within a society have unequal access to advantages such as
resources, prestige or power, and usually refer to four basic types of societies. From least to most socially complex, they are: clans, tribes,
chiefdoms and states.

Clan

B These are small-scale societies of hunters and gatherers, generally of fewer than 100 people, who move seasonally to exploit wild
(undomesticated) food resources. Most surviving hunter – gatherer groups are of this kind, such as the Hadza of Tanzania or the San of
southern Africa. Clan members are generally kinsfolk, related by descent or marriage. Clans lack formal leaders, so there are no marked
economic differences or disparities in status among their members.

C Because clans are composed of mobile groups of hunter-gatherers, their sites consist mainly of seasonally occupied camps, and other
smaller and more specialised sites. Among the latter are kill or butchery sites – locations where large mammals are killed and sometimes
butchered – and work sites, where tools are made or other specific activities carried out. The base camp of such a group may give
evidence of rather insubstantial dwellings or temporary shelters, along with the debris of residential occupation.

Tribe
D These are generally larger than mobile hunter – gatherer groups, but rarely number more than a few thousand, and their diet or
subsistence is based largely on cultivated plants and domesticated animals. Typically, they are settled farmers, but they may be nomadic
with a very different, mobile economy based on the intensive exploitation of livestock. These are generally multi-community societies,
with the individual communities integrated into the large society through kinship ties. Although some tribes have officials and even a
“capital” or seat of government, such officials lack the economic base necessary for effective use of power.

E The typical settlement pattern for tribes is one of settled agricultural homesteads or villages. Characteristically, no one settlement
dominates any of the others in the region. Instead, the archaeologist finds evidence for isolated, permanently occupied houses or for
permanent villages. Such villages may be made up of a collection of free-standing houses, like those of the first farms of the Danube
valley in Europe. Or they may be clusters of buildings grouped together, for example, the pueblos of the American Southwest, and the
early farming village or small town of Catalhoyuk in modern Turkey.

Chiefdom

F These operate on the principle of ranking-differences in social status between people. Different lineages (a lineage is a group claiming
descent from a common ancestor) are graded on a scale of prestige, and the senior lineage, and hence the society as a whole, is
governed by a chief. Prestige and rank are determined by how closely related one is to the chief, and there is no true stratification into
classes. The role of the chief is crucial.

G Often, there is local specialisation in craft products, and surpluses of these and of foodstuffs are periodically paid as obligation to the
chief. He uses these to maintain his retainers, and may use them for redistribution to his subjects. The chiefdom generally has a center of
power, often with temples, residences of the chief and his retainers, and craft specialists. Chiefdoms vary greatly in size, but the range is
generally between about 5000 and 20,000 persons.

Early State

H These preserve many of the features of chiefdoms, but the ruler (perhaps a king or sometimes a queen) has explicit authority to
establish laws and also to enforce them by the use of a standing army. Society no longer depends totally upon kin relationships: it is
now stratified into different classes. Agricultural workers and the poorer urban dwellers form the lowest classes, with the craft specialists
above, and the priests and kinsfolk of the ruler higher still. The functions of the ruler are often separated from those of the priest: palace
is distinguished from temple. The society is viewed as a territory owned by the ruling lineage and populated by tenants who have an
obligation to pay taxes. The central capital houses a bureaucratic administration of officials; one of their principal purposes is to collect
revenue (often in the form of taxes and tolls) and distribute it to government, army and craft specialists. Many early states developed
complex redistribution systems to support these essential services.

I This rather simple social typology, set out by Elman Service and elaborated by William Sanders and Joseph Marino, can be criticised,
and it should not be used unthinkingly. Nevertheless, if we are seeking to talk about early societies, we must use words and hence
concepts to do so. Service’s categories provide a good framework to help organise our thoughts.
SECTION 3: QUESTIONS 27-39

Questions 27-33
Do the following statements agree with the information given in Reading Passage?

In boxes 27-33 on your answer sheet, write

TRUE if the statement agrees with the information

FALSE if the statement contradicts the information

NOT GIVEN If there is no information on this

27   There’s little economic difference between members of a clan.

28   The farmers of a tribe grow a wide range of plants.

29   One settlement is more important than any other settlements in a tribe.

30   A member’s status in a chiefdom is determined by how much land he owns.

31   There are people who craft goods in chiefdoms.

32   The king keeps the order of a state by keeping a military.

33   Bureaucratic officers receive higher salaries than other members.

Questions 34-39
Answer the questions below.
Choose NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS from the passage for each answer.

Write your answers in boxes 34-39 on your answer sheet.

What are made at the clan work sites?

34 

What is the other way of life for tribes besides settled farming?

35 

How are Catalhoyuk’s housing units arranged?

36 

What does a chief give to his subjects as rewards besides crafted goods?

37 

What is the largest possible population of a chiefdom?

38 

Which group of people is at the bottom of an early state but higher than the farmers?

39 
TEST 2

The psychology in Happiness


A In the late 1990s, psychologist Martin Seligman of the University of Pennsylvania urged colleagues to observe optimal moods with the
same intensity with which they had for so long studied pathologies: we would never learn about the full range of human functions
unless we knew as much about mental wellness as we do about mental illness. A new generation of psychologists built up a respectable
body of research on positive character traits and happiness-boosting practices. At the same time, developments in neuroscience
provided new clues to what makes us happy and what that looks like in the brain. Self-appointed experts took advantage of the trend
with guarantees to eliminate worry, stress, dejection and even boredom. This happiness movement has provoked a great deal of
opposition among psychologists who observe that the preoccupation with happiness has come at the cost of sadness, an important
feeling that people have tried to banish from their emotional repertoire. Allan Horwitz of Rutgers laments that young people who are
naturally weepy after breakups are often urged to medicate themselves instead of working through their sadness. Wake Forest
University’s Eric Wilson fumes that the obsession with happiness amounts to a “craven disregard” for the melancholic perspective that
has given rise to the greatest works of art. “The happy man” he writes, “is a hollow man.”

B After all people are remarkably adaptable. Following a variable period of adjustment, we bounce back to our previous level of
happiness, no matter what happens to us. (There are some scientifically proven exceptions, notably suffering the unexpected loss of a
job or the loss of a spouse. Both events tend to permanently knock people back a step.) Our adaptability works in two directions.
Because we are so adaptable, points out Professor Sonja Lyubomirsky of the University of California, we quickly get used to many of the
accomplishments we strive for in life, such as landing the big job or getting married. Soon after we reach a milestone, we start to feel
that something is missing. We begin coveting another worldly possession or eyeing a social advancement. But such an approach keeps
us tethered to a treadmill where happiness is always just out of reach, one toy or one step away. It’s possible to get off the treadmill
entirely by focusing on activities that are dynamic surprising, and attention- absorbing, and thus less likely to bore us than, say,
acquiring shiny new toys.

C Moreover, happiness is not a reward for escaping pain. Russ Harris, the author of The Happiness Trap, calls popular conceptions of
happiness dangerous because they set people up for a “struggle against reality”. They don’t acknowledge that real life is full of
disappointments, loss, and inconveniences. “If you’re going to live a rich and meaningful life,” Harris says, “you’re going to feel a full
range of emotions.” Action toward goals other than happiness makes people happy. It is not crossing the finish line that is most
rewarding, it is anticipating achieving the goal. University of Wisconsin neuroscientist Richard Davidson has found that working hard
toward a goal, and making progress to the point of expecting a goal to be realized, not only activates positive feelings but also
suppresses negative emotions such as fear and depression.

D We are constantly making decisions, ranging from what clothes to put on, to whom we should marry, not to mention all those flavors
of ice cream. We base many of our decisions on whether we think a particular preference will increase our well-being. Intuitively, we
seem convinced that the more choices we have, the better off we will ultimately be. But our world of unlimited opportunity imprisons us
more than it makes us happy. In what Swarthmore psychologist Barry Schwartz calls “the paradox of choice,” facing many possibilities
leaves us stressed out – and less satisfied with whatever we do decide. Having too many choices keeps us wondering about all the
opportunities missed.

E Besides, not everyone can put on a happy face. Barbara Held, a professor of psychology at Bowdoin College, rails against “the tyranny
of the positive attitude”. “Looking on the bright side isn’t possible for some people and is even counterproductive” she insists. “When
you put pressure on people to cope in a way that doesn’t fit them, it not only doesn’t work, it makes them feel like a failure on top of
already feeling bad.” The one-size-fits-all approach to managing emotional life is misguided, agrees Professor Julie Norem, author of
The Positive Power of Negative Thinking. In her research, she has shown that the defensive pessimism that anxious people feel can be
harnessed to help them get things done, which in turn makes them happier. A naturally pessimistic architect, for example, can set low
expectations for an upcoming presentation and review all of the bad outcomes that she’s imagining, so that she can prepare carefully
and increase her chances of success.

F By contrast, an individual who is not living according to their values, will not be happy, no matter how much they achieve. Some
people, however, are not sure what their values are. In that case Harris has a great question: “Imagine I could wave a magic wand to
ensure that you would have the approval and admiration of everyone on the planet, forever. What, in that case, would you choose to do
with your life?” Once this has been answered honestly, you can start taking steps toward your ideal vision of yourself. The actual answer
is unimportant, as long as you’re living consciously. The state of happiness is not really a state at all. It’s an ongoing personal
experiment.

Questions 1-6
Reading Passage has six paragraphs, A–F.

Which paragraph mentions the following?

Write the correct letter, A–F, in boxes 1–6 on your answer sheet.

NB You may use any letter more than once.

1   the need for individuals to understand what really matters to them


2   tension resulting from a wide variety of alternatives

3   the hope of success as a means of overcoming unhappy feelings

4   people who call themselves specialists

5   human beings’ capacity for coping with change

6   doing things which are interesting in themselves

Questions 7-8
Choose TWO letters, A-E.

Write the correct letters in boxes 7 and 8 on your answer sheet

Which TWO of the following people argue against aiming for constant happiness

A  Martin Seligman

B  Eric Wilson

C  Sonja Lyubomirsky

D  Russ Harris

E  Barry Schwartz

Questions 9-10
Choose TWO letters, A-E.

Write the correct letters in boxes 9 and 10.

Which TWO of the following beliefs are identified as mistaken in the text

A  Inherited wealth brings less happiness than earned wealth.

B  Social status affects our perception of how happy we are.

C  An optimistic outlook ensures success.

D  Unhappiness can and should be avoided.

E  Extremes of emotion are normal in the young.

Questions 11-13
Complete the sentences below.

Choose NO MORE THAN ONE WORD from the passage for each answer.

Write your answers in boxes 11-13 on your answer sheet.


In order to have a complete understanding of how people’s minds work, Martin Seligman suggested that research should examine our

most positive 11   as closely as it does our psychological problems.

Soon after arriving at a 12   in their lives, people become accustomed to what they have achieved and have a sense
that they are lacking something.

People who are 13   by nature are more likely to succeed if they make thorough preparation for a presentation.

Bio-mimetic Design
What has fins like a whale, skin like a lizard, and eyes like a moth? The future of engineering. Andrew Parker, an evolutionary biologist,
knelt in the baking red sand of the Australian outback just south of Alice Springs and eased the right hind leg of a thorny devil into a dish of
water.
A “Its back is completely drenched!” Sure enough, after 30 seconds, water from the dish had picked up the lizard’s leg and was
glistening all over its prickly hide. In a few seconds more the water reached its mouth, and the lizard began to smack its jaws with
evident satisfaction. It was, in essence, drinking through its foot. Given more time, the thorny devil can perform this same conjuring trick
on a patch of damp sand – a vital competitive advantage in the desert. Parker had come here to discover precisely how it does this, not
from purely biological interest, but with a concrete purpose in mind: to make a thorny-devil-inspired device that will help people collect
lifesaving water in the desert. “The water’s spreading out incredibly fast!” he said, as drops from his eyedropper fell onto the lizard’s
back and vanished, like magic. “Its skin is far more hydrophobic than I thought. There may well be hidden capillaries, channeling the
water into the mouth.”

B Parker’s work is only a small part of an increasingly vigorous, global biomimetics movement. Engineers in Bath, England, and West
Chester, Pennsylvania, are pondering the bumps on the leading edges of humpback whale flukes to learn how to make airplane wings
for more agile flight. In Berlin, Germany, the fingerlike primary feathers of raptors are inspiring engineers to develop wings that change
shape aloft to reduce drag and increase fuel efficiency. Architects in Zimbabwe are studying how termites regulate temperature,
humidity, and airflow in their mounds in order to build more comfortable buildings, while Japanese medical researchers are reducing the
pain of an injection by using hypodermic needles edged with tiny serrations, like those on a mosquito’s proboscis, minimizing nerve
stimulation.

C Ronald Fearing, a professor of electrical engineering at the University of California, Berkeley, has taken on one of the biggest
challenges of all: to create a miniature robotic fly that is swift, small, and maneuverable enough for use in surveillance or search-and-
rescue operations. Fearing made his own, one of which he held up with tweezers for me to see, a gossamer wand some 11 millimeters
long and not much thicker than a cat’s whisker. Fearing has been forced to manufacture many of the other minute components of his fly
in the same way, using a micromachining laser and a rapid prototyping system that allows him to design his minuscule parts in a
computer, automatically cut and cure them overnight, and assemble them by hand the next day under a microscope.

D With the micro laser he cuts the fly’s wings out of a two-micron polyester sheet so delicate that it crumples if you breathe on it and
must be reinforced with carbon-fiber spars. The wings on his current model flap at 275 times per second – faster than the insect’s own
wings – and make the blowfly’s signature buzz. “Carbon fiber outperforms fly chitin,” he said, with a trace of self-satisfaction. He pointed
out a protective plastic box on the lab bench, which contained the fly-bot itself, a delicate, origami-like framework of black carbon-fiber
struts and hairlike wires that, not surprisingly, looks nothing like a real fly. A month later it achieved liftoff in a controlled flight on a
boom.Fearing expects the fly-bot to hover in two or three years, and eventually to bank and dive with flylike virtuosity.

E Stanford University roboticist Mark Cutkosky designed a gecko-insured climber that he christened Stickybot. In reality, gecko feet
aren’t sticky – they’re dry and smooth to the touch – and owe their remarkable adhesion to some two billion spatula-tipped filaments
per square centimeter on their toe pads, each filament only a hundred nanometers thick. These filaments are so small, in fact, that they
interact at the molecular level with the surface on which the gecko walks, tapping into the low-level van der Waals forces generated by
molecules’ fleeting positive and negative charges, which pull any two adjacent objects together. To make the toe pads for Stickybot,
Cutkosky and doctoral student Sangbae Kim, the robot’s lead designer, produced a urethane fabric with tiny bristles that end in 30-
micrometer points. Though not as flexible or adherent as the gecko itself, they hold the 500-gram robot on a vertical surface.

F Cutkosky endowed his robot with seven-segmented toes that drag and release just like the lizard’s, and a gecko-like stride that snugs
it to the wall. He also crafted Stickybot’s legs and feet with a process he calls shape deposition manufacturing (SDM), which combines a
range of metals, polymers, and fabrics to create the same smooth gradation from stiff to flexible that is present in the lizard’s limbs and
absent in most man-made materials. SDM also allows him to embed actuators, sensors, and other specialized structures that make
Stickybot climb better. Then he noticed in a paper on gecko anatomy that the lizard had branching tendons to distribute its weight
evenly across the entire surface of its toes. Eureka.”When I saw that, I thought, wow, that’s great!” He subsequently embedded a
branching polyester cloth “tendon” in his robot’s limbs to distribute its load in the same way.

G Stickybot now walks up vertical surfaces of glass, plastic, and glazed ceramic tile, though it will be some time before it can keep up
with a gecko. For the moment it can walk only on smooth surfaces, at a mere four centimeters per second, a fraction of the speed of its
biological role model. The dry adhesive on Stickybot‘s toes isn’t self-cleaning like the lizard’s either, so it rapidly clogs with dirt. “There
are a lot of things about the gecko that we simply had to ignore,” Cutkosky says. Still, a number of real-world applications are in the
offing. The Department of Defense’s Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA), which funds the project, has it in mind for
surveillance: an automaton that could slink up a building and perch there for hours or days, monitoring the terrain below. Cutkosky
hypothesizes a range of civilian uses. “I’m trying to get robots to go places where they’ve never gone before,” he told me. “I would like
to see Stickybot have a real-world function, whether it’s a toy or another application. Sure, it would be great if it eventually has a
lifesaving or humanitarian role…”

H For all the power of the biomimetics paradigm, and the brilliant people who practice it, bio-inspiration has led to surprisingly few
mass-produced products and arguably only one household word – Velcro, which was invented in 1948 by Swiss chemist George de
Mestral, by copying the way cockleburs clung to his dog’s coat. In addition to Cutkosky ‘s lab, five other high-powered research teams
are currently trying to mimic gecko adhesion, and so far none has come close to matching the lizard’s strong, directional, self-cleaning
grip. Likewise, scientists have yet to meaningfully re-create the abalone nanostructure that accounts for the strength of its shell, and
several well-funded biotech companies have gone bankrupt trying to make artificial spider silk.

Questions 14-20
Do the following statements agree with the information given in Reading Passage?

In boxes 14-20 on your answer sheet, write

TRUE if the statement agrees with the information


FALSE if the statement contradicts the information

NOT GIVEN If there is no information on this

14   Andrew Parker failed to make effective water device which can be used in desert.

15   Skin of lizard is easy to get wet when it contacts water.

16   Scientists apply inspiration from nature into many artificial engineering.

17   Tiny and thin hair under gecko’s feet allows it to stick to the surface of object.

18   When gecko climbs downward, its feet release a certain kind of chemical to make them adhesive.

19   Famous cases stimulate a large number of successful products of biomimetics in real life.

20   Velcro is well-known for its bionics design.

Questions 21-23
Filling the blanks below.

Write NO MORE THAN THREE WORDS AND/OR A NUMBER from the passage for each question of robot below.

Ronald Fearing was required to fabricate tiny components for his robotic fly 21   by specialized techniques.

The robotic fly’s main structure outside is made of 22   and long and thin wires which make it unlike fly at all.

Cutkosky applied an artificial material in Stickybot’s 23   as a tendon to split pressure like lizard’s does.

Questions 24-26
Fill the blanks below.

Write NO MORE THAN THREE WORDS AND/OR A NUMBER from the passage for each answerabout facts of stickybot.

Stickybot’s feet doesn’t have 24   function which makes it only be able to walk on smooth surface.

DARPA are planning to use stickybot for 25 

Cutkosky assume that stickybot finally has potential in 26   or other human-related activities.

Bright children
A BY the time Laszlo Polgar’s first baby was born in 1969 he already had firm views on child-rearing. An eccentric citizen of communist
Hungary, he had written a book called “Bring up Genius!” and one of his favourite sayings was “Geniuses are made, not born”. An expert
on the theory of chess, he proceeded to teach little Zsuzsa at home, spending up to ten hours a day on the game. Two more daughters
were similarly hot-housed. All three obliged their father by becoming world-class players. The youngest, Judit, is currently ranked 13th in
the world, and is by far the best female chess player of all time. Would the experiment have succeeded with a different trio of children?
If any child can be turned into a star, then a lot of time and money are being wasted worldwide on trying to pick winners.

B America has long held “talent searches”, using test results and teacher recommendations to select children for advanced school
courses, summer schools and other extra tuition. This provision is set to grow. In his state-of-the-union address in 2006, President
George Bush announced the “American Competitiveness Initiative”, which, among much else, would train 70,000 high-school teachers to
lead advanced courses for selected pupils in mathematics and science. Just as the superpowers’ space race made Congress put money
into science education, the thought of China and India turning out hundreds of thousands of engineers and scientists is scaring America
into prodding its brightest to do their best.

C The philosophy behind this talent search is that ability is innate; that it can be diagnosed with considerable accuracy; and that it is
worth cultivating. In America, bright children are ranked as “moderately”, “highly”, “exceptionally” and “profoundly” gifted. The only
chance to influence innate ability is thought to be in the womb or the first couple of years of life. Hence the fad for “teaching aids” such
as videos and flashcards for newborns, and “whale sounds” on tape which a pregnant mother can strap to her belly.

D In Britain, there is a broadly similar belief in the existence of innate talent, but also an egalitarian sentiment which makes people
queasy about the idea of investing resources in grooming intelligence. Teachers are often opposed to separate provision for the best-
performing children, saying any extra help should go to stragglers. In 2002, in a bid to help the able while leaving intact the ban on most
selection by ability in state schools, the government set up the National Academy for Gifted and Talented Youth. This outfit runs
summer schools and master classes for children nominated by their schools. To date, though, only seven in ten secondary schools have
nominated even a single child. Last year all schools were told they must supply the names of their top 10%.

E Picking winners is also the order of the day in ex-communist states, a hangover from the times when talented individuals were plucked
from their homes and ruthlessly trained for the glory of the nation. But in many other countries, opposition to the idea of singling out
talent and grooming it runs deep. In Scandinavia, a belief in virtues like modesty and social solidarity makes people flinch from the idea
of treating brainy children differently.

F And in Japan there is a widespread belief that all children are born with the same innate abilities – and should therefore be treated
alike. All are taught together, covering the same syllabus at the same rate until they finish compulsory schooling. Those who learn
quickest are expected then to teach their classmates. In China, extra teaching is provided, but to a self-selected bunch. “Children’s
palaces” in big cities offer a huge range of after-school classes. Anyone can sign up; all that is asked is excellent attendance.

G Statistics give little clue as to which system is best. The performance of the most able is heavily affected by factors other than state
provision. Most state education in Britain is nominally non-selective, but middle-class parents try to live near the best schools. Ambitious
Japanese parents have made private, out-of-school tuition a thriving business. And Scandinavia’s egalitarianism might work less well in
places with more diverse populations and less competent teachers. For what it’s worth, the data suggest that some countries – like Japan
and Finland, see table – can eschew selection and still thrive. But that does not mean that any country can ditch selection and do as well.

H Mr Polgar thought any child could be a prodigy given the right teaching, an early start and enough practice. At one point he planned
to prove it by adopting three baby boys from a poor country and trying his methods on them. (His wife vetoed the scheme.) Some say
the key to success is simply hard graft. Judit, the youngest of the Polgar sisters, was the most driven, and the most successful; Zsofia, the
middle one, was regarded as the most talented, but she was the only one who did not achieve the status of grand master. “Everything
came easiest to her,” said her older sister. “But she was lazy.”

Questions 27-32
Do the following statements agree with the information given in Reading Passage?

In boxes 22-32 on your answer sheet, write

YES if the statement agrees with the views of the writer

NO if the statement contradicts the views of the writer

NOT GIVEN if it is impossible to say what the writer thinks about this

27   America has a long history of selecting talented students into different categories.

28   Teachers and schools in Britain held welcome attitude towards government’s selection of gifted students.

29   Some parents agree to move near reputable schools in Britain.

30   Middle-class parents participate in their children’s education.

31   Japan and Finland comply with selected student’s policy.

32   Avoiding-selection-policy only works in a specific environment.

Questions 33-34
 Hiện Notepad

Choose the correct letter, A, B, C or D.

Write your answers in boxes 33-34 on your answer sheet.

What’s Laszlo Polgar’s point of view towards geniuses of children

A  Chess is the best way to train geniuses.

B  Genius tend to happen on first child.

C  Geniuses can be educated later on.

D  Geniuses are born naturally.


What is the purpose of citing Zsofia’s example in the last paragraph
A  Practice makes genius.

B  Girls are not good at chess.

C  She was an adopted child.

D  Middle child is always the most talented.

Questions 35-39
Use the information in the passage to match the countries (listed A-E) with correct connection below.

Write the appropriate letters, A-E, in boxes 35-39 on your answer sheet.

A Scandinavia

B Japan

C Britain

D China 

E America

35   Less gifted children get help from other classmates

36   Attending extra teaching is open to anyone

37   People are reluctant to favor gifted children due to social characteristics

38   Both view of innate and egalitarian co-existed

39   Craze of audio and video teaching for pregnant women.


TEST 3

THE DAMS THAT CHANGED AUSTRALIA


SECTION ONE

Inland Australia has had a problem with drought from the time of white settlement in 1788 until today, and this is why the Snowy
Mountains Scheme was conceived and founded. Before the Snowy Scheme a large proportion of the snowfields on Australia's highest
mountains (the Snowy Mountains) melted into the Snowy River every year. Hence, Snowy River water flowed, ultimately, into the sea, not
toward the dry interior of the country, where people needed it so desperately. This was first recognised by the Polish geologist and
explorer Strezlecki in 1840, who commented that there could be no development of the inland without adequate water supply. The
rivers would have to be diverted if irrigation were to succeed.

Before Federation in 1901, Australia consisted of a group of colonies, all anxious to protect their own interests. After Federation the
states retained rights to the water, and thus to what might happen to the rivers. Arguments between New South Wales, Victoria and
South Australia led to a deadlocked Premiers' Conference in 1947. Despite this serious dispute, the Federal Parliament passed the Snowy
Mountains Hydro-electric Power Act just two years later, on July 7. The project was officially commenced on October 17 that year, barely
three months after the act had been passed.

The scheme set out to harness water for electricity and to divert it back to the dry inland areas for irrigation. To do this, thousands of
kilometres of tunnels had to be drilled through the mountains, and sixteen major dams and seven hydro-electric power stations built
over a period of nineteen years. The first of these was Guthega Power Station, which was commissioned in 1954. and the last one to be
finished was Tumut III.

SECTION TWO

The Snowy Mountains Scheme was to alter the face of Australia forever. One important change was the recruitment of people from
outside Australia to work on the scheme. In 1949, while the world was still recovering from the effects of World War II (1939 to 1945),
the Australian government needed immense numbers of people to work on the Snowy. It sought labour from overseas, and 60,000 of
the 100,000 people who worked on the scheme came from outside the country.

They came from thirty different countries: from Italy, Yugoslavia, and Germany, from sophisticated cities like Budapest, Paris and Vienna,
and from tiny hamlets. These European workers left countries which had fought against each other during the war, and which had vastly
different cultures, and they found themselves in a country which was still defining itself. They were adventurous young men, some highly
skilled, some not, and they came to a place which offered both enormous challenges and primitive conditions. Many were housed in
tents in the early days of the scheme, although some fortunate men were placed in barracks. The food was basic, female company
extremely scarce and entertainment lacking.

SECTION THREE

Many new arrivals spoke only limited English, and were offered English classes after work. The men needed primarily to understand
safety instructions, and safety lectures were conducted in English and other languages. In fact, a great deal of communication
underground was by sign language, especially when the conditions were noisy. The signs were peculiar to the business at hand: for
instance, a thumb placed near the mouth meant water, but did not indicate whether the water was needed on the drill the man was
using, or for a drink.

The constant reference to the men who worked on the Snowy is appropriate because few women worked on the scheme, and those who
were employed usually held office jobs. Women, however, were active in the community, and the members of the Country Women’s
Association gave English lessons. Other English instruction was provided by the Australian Broadcasting Commission, which ran daily
broadcasts to help the newcomers with the language.

SECTION FOUR

These circumstances could have caused great social trouble, but there were relatively few serious problems. The men worked long and
hard, and many saved their money with a view to settling in Australia or returning home. At a reunion in 1999 many were happy to
remember the hardships of those days, but it was all seen through a glow of achieve-ment. This satisfaction was felt not only by the men
who worked directly on the project, but by the women, many of whom had been wives and mothers during the scheme, and indicated
that they had felt very much part of it.

The children of these couples went to school in Happy Jack, a town notable for having the highest school in Australia, and the highest
birth rate. In one memorable year there were thirty babies born to the eighty families in Happy Jack. Older children went to school in
Cooma, the nearest major town.

SECTION FIVE

The scheme is very unlikely to be repeated. The expense of putting the power stations underground would now be prohibitive, and our
current information about ecology would require a different approach to the treatment of the rivers. Other hydro-electric schemes like
the Tennessee Valley Authority preceded the Snowy Mountains Scheme, and others have followed. The Snowy Mountains Scheme is the
only hydro-electric scheme in the world to be totally financed from the sale of its electricity.
As well as being a great engineering feat, the scheme is a monument to people from around the world who dared to change their lives.
Some are living and working in Australia, many have retired there, some have returned to their countries of origin. Every one of them
contributed to altering Australian society forever.

Questions 1-5

Reading Passage 1 contains five sections.

Choose the correct heading for Sections One to Five from the fist of headings below.

Write the correct number, i-x, in boxes 1-5 on your answer sheet.


List of Headings

i Using sign language on the Snowy Mountains

ii The workers and their families

iii Development of inland Australia

iv The cost of the Snowy Mountains Scheme

v The unique nature of the scheme

vi Housing the Snowy Mountains' workforce

vii Why the Snowy Mountains Scheme began

viii Learning new ways to communicate

ix Recruiting people for the Snowy Mountains Scheme

x Social problems of the workers

1  Section One

2  Section Two

3  Section Three

4  Section Four

5  Section Five

Questions 6-10

Complete the table below.

Choose ONE WORD AND/OR A NUMBER from Reading Passage 1 for each answer.

Write your answers in boxes 6-10 on your answer sheet.

Year Event

1788 White settlement begins

1840 Awareness that the 6   could not be developed


without irrigation

1901 Federation
Dispute between the states on the rivers' future, resulting in
1947
a 7   Premiers' Conference
Snowy Mountains Scheme begins Recruitment

of 9   people from abroad

1954 Work on Guthega Power Station begins


10 
Tumut III Power Station completed

Questions 11-13

Complete the sentences..

Choose NO MORE: THAN THREE WORDS from the passage for each answer.

Write your answers in boxes 11-13 on your answer sheet.

Communicating using 11   was necessary for the labourers because of the conditions.

The workers reminisced about the 12   endured in the early days at their reunion.

The Snowy Mountains Scheme was considered an 13   which altered Australian society thereafter.

POWER FROM THE EARTH


A

Geothermal power refers to the generation of electrical power by making use of heat sources found well below the earth's surface.

As is well-known, if a hole were to be drilled deep into the earth, extremely hot, molten rock would soon be encountered. At depths of
30 to 50 km, temperatures exceeding 1000 degrees Celsius prevail. Obviously, accessing such temperatures would provide a wonderful
source for geothermal power. The problem is, such depths are too difficult to access: drilling down some 30 or more kilometres is simply
too costly with today's technology.

Fortunately, sufficiently hot temperatures are available at considerably shallower depths. In certain areas, where the earth's surface has
been altered over time—through, for example, volcanic activity-temperatures exceeding 300 degrees Celsius can be found at depths of
a mere 1 to 3 km, which can be feasibly accessed. These particular areas are potentially ideal for the generation of electricity through
geothermal means.

It is possible to explain geothermal power generation as a steam power system that utilizes the earth itself as a boiler. When water is
sent down to the depths of 1 to 3 km, it returns to the surface as steam and is capable of generating electricity. Electricity generated in
this manner hardly produces any carbon dioxide or other waste materials. If the steam and hot water are routed back underground, the
generation of electricity can be semi-permanent in nature.

Furthermore, geothermal power can provide a stable supply of electricity unlike other natural energy sources such as solar power and
wind power, which both rely heavily on weather conditions. Accordingly, the generation of electricity through geothermal power is four
to five times more efficient than through solar power.

As for wind power, geothermal power is some two times more cost effective. Only the generation of hydroelectric power comes close—
the cost of power production from each is about the same.

Although geothermal power generation appears to be a most attractive option, development has been slow. The world's first successful
attempt at geothermal power generation was accomplished in Italy in 1904. Power generation in Japan first started in 1925 at Beppu
City. Since that time, countries as diverse as Iceland and New Zealand have joined the list of nations making use of this valuable source
of energy. In the year 2000, Beppu City hosted the World Geothermal Congress, whose goal was to promote the adoption of geothermal
energy production throughout the world.
F

The international geothermal community at the World Geothermal Congress 2000 called upon the governments of nations to make
strong commitments to the development of their indigenous geo-thermal resources for the benefit of their own people, humanity and
the environment. However, several factors are still hindering the development of geothermal power generation. Firstly, it has a low
density of energy which makes it unsuitable for large-scale production in which, for example, over 1,000,000 kilowatts need to be
produced. Secondly, the cost is still high when compared to today's most common sources of energy production: fossil fuels and atomic
energy.

A further consideration is the amount of risk involved in successfully setting up a new geothermal power production facility. The drill-ing
that must extend 2,000 to 3,000 m below the surface must be accurate to within a matter of just a few metres one side or the other of
the targeted location. To achieve this, extensive surveys, drilling expertise and time are needed. It is not uncommon for a project to
encompass ten years from its planning stage to the start of operations. The extent of the risks involved is clear.

Although it has long been considered a resource-poor nation, Japan, which is thought to have about 10% of the world's geothermal
resources, may well have considerable advantages for tapping into geothermal power. It does have one of the longest serving power
stations using geothermal energy. The station, built in 1966, pointed the way to the future when the country was affected by the two
global oil shocks in the 1970s. Now there are some 17 plants in operation throughout the country which are responsible for a total
output of over 530,000 kilowatts. This figure, though impressive, accounts for a mere 0.4% of Japan's total generation of electricity.

Clearly then, further progress needs to be made in the development of geothermal energy. As long as costs remain high in comparison
to other sources of energy, geothermal power wilt struggle to match the efficiency of existing power sources. Further research and inno-
vation in the field, as well as government support and a sense of urgency, are needed to help propel geothermal energy towards its
promising future.

Questions 14-19
Reading Passage 2 has nine paragraphs, A-l.

Which paragraph contains the following information?

Write the appropriate letter, A-l, in boxes 14-19 on your answer sheet.

14   the history of the development of geothermal power

15   one country’s use of geothermal power

16   a comparison between various energy sources

17   how geothermal energy can produce electricity

18   conditions which permit access to geothermal power

19   problems of geothermal exploration

Questions 20-26
Do the following statements agree with the writer s claims in Reading Passage 2?

In boxes 20-26 on your answer sheet, write:

YES if the statement agrees with the views of the writer

NO if the statement contradicts the views of the writer

NOT GIVEN if it is impossible to say what the writer thinks about this

20   Accessing geothermal energy at depths greater than 3 km is currently not possible.

21   The generation of geothermal power produces a considerable amount of by-products that can be damaging
to the environment.

22   The World Geothermal Congress has been able to raise money for research in this area.
23   Geothermal energy is still relatively expensive lo generate.

24   It can take a decade to develop a single geothermal power station.

25   Japan is capable of generating one quarter of its energy needs using geothermal energy.

26   The future of geothermal energy depends upon the decline of fossil fuel resources.

ARE WE MANAGING TO DESTROY SCIENCE?


The government in the UK was concerned about the efficiency of research institutions and set up a Research Assessment Exercise (RAE)
to consider what was being done in each university. The article hich follows is a response to the imposition of the RAE.

In the year ahead, the UK government is due to carry out the next Research Assessment Exercise (RAE ). The goal of this regular five-
yearly check-up of the university sector is easy to understand: to increase productivity within public sector research. But striving for such
productivity can lead to unfortunate consequences. In the case of the RAE, one risk attached to this is the creation of an overly
controlling management culture that threatens the future of imaginative science.

Academic institutions are already preparing for the RAE with some anxiety—understand-ably so, for the financial consequences of
failure are severe. Departments with a current rating of four or five (research is rated on a five point scale, with five the highest) must
maintain their score or face a considerable loss of funding. Meanwhile, those with ratings of two or three are fighting for their survival.

The pressures are forcing research management onto the defensive. Common strategies for increasing academic output include grading
individual researchers every year according to RAE criteria, pressurising them to publish anything regardless of quality, diverting funds
from key and expensive laboratory science into areas of study such as management, and even threatening to close departments.
Another strategy being readily adopted is to remove scientists who appear to be less active in research and replace them with new,
probably younger, staff.

Although such measures may deliver results in the RAE , they are putting unsustainable pressure on academic staff. Particularly insidious
is the pressure to publish. Put simply, RAE committees in the laboratory sciences must produce four excellent peer-reviewed
publications per member of staff to meet the assessment criteria. Hence this is becoming a minimum requirement for existing members
of staff, and a benchmark against which to measure new recruits.

But prolific publication does not necessarily add up to good science. Indeed, one young researcher was told in an interview for a
lectureship that, although your publications are excellent, unfortunately, there are not enough of them. You should not worry so much
about the quality of your publications.'

In a recent letter to Nature, the publication records of ten senior academics in the area of molecular microbiology were analysed. Each of
these academics is now in very senior positions in universities or research institutes, with careers spanning a total of 262 years. All have
achieved considerable status and respect within the UK and worldwide. However, their early publication records would preclude them
from academic posts if the present criteria were applied.

Although the quality of their work was clearly outstanding—they initiated novel and perhaps risky projects early in their careers, which
have since been recognised as research of international importance— they generally produced few papers over the first ten years after
completing their PhDs. Indeed, over this period, they have an average gap of 3-8 years without the publication or production of a cited
paper. In one case there was a five-year gap. Although these enquiries were limited to a specific area of research, it seems that this
model of career progression is widespread in all of the chemical and biological sciences.

It seems that the atmosphere surrounding the RAE may be stifling talented young researchers or driving them out of science altogether.
There urgently needs to be a more considered and careful nurturing of our young scientific talent. A new member of academic staff in
the chemical or biological laboratory sciences surely needs a commitment to resources over a five- to ten-year period to establish their
research. Senior academics managing this situation might be well advised to demand a long-term view from the government.

Unfortunately, management seems to be pulling in the opposite direction. Academics have to deal with more students than ever and the
paperwork associated with the assessment of the quality of teaching is increasing. On top of that, the salary for university lecturers starts
at only £32,665 (rising to £58,048). Tenure is rare, and most contracts are offered on a temporary contract basis. With the mean starting
salary for new graduates now close to £36,000, it is surprising that anybody still wants a job in academia.

It need not be like this. Dealings with the many senior research managers in the chemical and water industries at the QUESTOR Centre
(Queen's University Environmental Science and Technology Research Centre) provided some insight. The overall impression is that the
private sector has a much more sensible and enlightened long-term view of research priorities. Why can the universities not develop the
same attitude?

All organisations need managers, yet these managers will make sure they survive even when those they manage are lost. Research
management in UK universities is in danger of evolving into such an overly controlled state that it will allow little time for careful
thinking and teaching, and will undermine the development of imaginative young scientists.

Questions 27-34
Complete the summary.

Choose NO MORE THAN ONE WORD from the passage for each answer.

Write your answers in boxes 27-34 on your answer sheet.

In the UK, every five years, the Research Assessment Exercise (RAE) inspects research

institutions to determine their rate of 27   This tends to

cause 28  . in academic institutions because any failure would lead

to 29  - financial consequences. RAE’s purpose, however, is to increase

the academic output within research institutions. In response to the 30   


of RAE, the research institutions are changing the way they do things. Some are forcing

their research staff to 31   almost anything, while others are

moving 32   from a laboratory focus to that of management. Another

common approach utilised by management is to remove and 33   


underperforming research staff. The authors of this paper feel that the pressure on UK

research institutions is 34 


Do the following statements agree with the writer's claims in Reading Passage 3?

In boxes 35-38 on your answer sheet, write

TRUE if the statement agrees with the information

FALSE if the statement contradicts the information

NOT GIVEN If there is no information on this

35   Good researchers are usually prolific publishers.

36   People in industry seem to understand the long-term nature of research.

37   The private sector has produced more in the way of quality research than universities.

38   Management may be the only winners under the new system.

Questions 39-40

Choose the appropriate letter, A, B, C or D.

Write your answers in boxes 39-40 on your answer sheet.

The early publishing records of senior researchers would

A  prevent institutions from employing them.

B  rule out their chances of achieving any status using the current standards.

C  support their application for an academic posting under the present criteria.

D  hinder their academic prospects under the current criteria.


Gifted new scientists need to be

A  managed over a decade by senior academics.

B  guided over a ten-year period to develop their research.

C  supported with resources over a decade to establish their research.


D  advised of the government's long-term view on research.

TEST 4

It’s Only a Cockroach


I turn on the light in my kitchen that night, and then I see it. I draw back, and my first instinct is to scream. I control myself with difficulty,
but find myself shuddering, unable to deal with the creature before me. It’s only a cockroach, but its large size, long antennae, shiny
appearance, and spiny legs, all present a particularly disgusting appearance. And this is not just to me, but to everyone it seems, even to
the point of phobic responses.

This is certainly the over-riding reason I want these creatures totally eradicated from my apartment, but with their offensive odour,
passive transportation of microbes, and trails of droppings, they also pose a distinct threat to domestic hygiene. Clearly, cohabitation is
not possible. So, I do all I can to keep these pests away. Food is stored in sealed containers, garbage cans have tight lids, my kitchen is
kept spotlessly clean, and my apartment swept and mopped nightly. I have also sealed up possible entry points, but still, these
loathsome things find their way inside. I need a way to kill them.

The most precise cockroach killer is, typically, another insect. A specific species of wasp targets these creatures. With a quick accurate
swoop, it bites the cockroach at the main nerve centre of its body, which results in a temporary paralysis. This is very necessary, as we all
know just how fast cockroaches can run. The wasp has only a few minutes to prepare its next sting, in the exact area of the brain which
controls the cockroaches’ instinct to escape. After the paralysis departs, the cockroach is subdued and docile, and doomed. The wasp
bites off the antennae to further discourage flight, then drags its victim away.

Faced with such predation, cockroaches usually conceal themselves during the day, and with their ability to flatten their bodies, they can
disappear into just about any tiny nook, crevice, and cranny. There, they wait patiently for darkness before emerging to search for food,
and will usually run away when exposed to light. Given this, I am told that the slim and agile house centipede is probably the most
effective cockroach predator, able to track down and root out the most carefully hidden prey. Unfortunately, I would say that centipedes
are even more disgusting to have in one’s house, if that’s possible. I just can’t win this game.

Can anyone win? These insects are just about the hardiest, on the planet. Some can wait for up to three months before meals, some can
survive on the barest hint of nutrition (such as the glue on the back of postage stamps), and some can live without air for over half an
hour. They do not, however, handle cold weather well, preferring the warm conditions and security found within buildings.

Hidden there, the female lays egg capsules containing around 40 eggs, and with the insect’s relatively long lifespan (about a year), some
300 to 400 offspring can ultimately be produced. The result: once these insects have infested a building, they are very difficult to
eradicate.

Cockroaches do, however, have some subtleties. They leave chemical messages in their droppings, as well as emit airborne pheromones
to signal other cockroaches about sources of food and water, and alert them to their own presence. The latter is more important, for
these insects are actually somewhat gregarious. Research has shown that cockroaches make group-based decisions, and tend to co-
operate. One study placed a large number of cockroaches in a dish with three small shelters, and the insects divided themselves equally
between two of them, leaving the third one empty. When these shelters were exchanged for two very large ones, all the cockroaches
arranged themselves in just one. These creatures, it seems, prefer the company of others, and a rather fair al location of resources.

Should I therefore feel any admiration? It is hard - in fact, in Western culture, cockroaches are almost universally depicted as repulsive
and dirty pests. In the insect’s most famous literary appearance - Franz Kafka’s ‘The Metamorphosis’ - a man, Gregor, is transformed
overnight into a monstrous insect, probably a cockroach (although the story never quite makes that clear). Gregor’s transformation
results in very predictable responses from his family and friends, who can never accept him again. He eventually dies, outcast and lonely,
despised and mistreated - a potent symbol of alienation and rejection. Yet in the Pixar animated feature ‘Wall-E’, a cockroach provides
essential companionship to a lone robot living on a planet scorched by a nuclear holocaust.

Whatever the case, I am faced with a big problem: a large ugly cockroach crawling slowly across my sink, antennae waving as it explores
around. If I try to grab it, it will dart away, and I doubt whether I’ll be able to catch it before it disappears into the numerous cracks and
crevices of my old apartment. So, I carefully remove my slipper, determined to squash the insect, but then almost scream again as it lifts
on its legs, raises membranous wings, and with a loud buzzing noise, flies away. Oh, just what I need they can fly, too.

Questions 1-4
Answer the questions.

Choose NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS from the passage for each answer

What aspect of cockroaches makes the author want them removed from the home?

What human aspect do they endanger?


Which insect is the best cockroach killer?

What can cockroaches do to easily hide?

Questions 5-8
Do the following statements agree with the information given in Reading Passage One?

Write

TRUE if the statement agrees with the information

FALSE if the statement contradicts the information

NOT GIVEN If there is no information on this

5   The author finds cockroaches more repulsive than centipedes.

6   Cockroaches live longer than many other insects.

7   Cockroaches will fight over food.

8   Cockroaches are often the subject of research.

Questions 9-11
Complete the summary of the second half of the passage.

Choose ONE WORD from the passage for each answer.

Cockroaches use 9   in the air to communicate, and show a

willingness to 10  , yet the author struggles to

feel 11   for these insects.

Questions 12-13

Choose the correct letter, A, B, C, or D.

Gregor

A  becomes a cockroach.

B  is a famous character.

C  despises his friends.

D  needs companionship.
The author wants to

A  catch the cockroach.

B  kill the cockroach.

C  touch the cockroach.

D  fly like a cockroach.


Such a Fascinating Game

It is one of the world's most popular games, played by millions of people at home, in clubs, online, by correspondence, and
in tournaments. It is chess, a humble arrangement where two players stare at a checkered board with 64 squares arranged in
an eight-by-eight grid, eyeing their 16 pieces each as the first move is played. When the opponent's king is checkmated, the
game is over, but between the beginning and the end, a wealth of elegant, complicated, and fascinating moves and
combinations can unfold.

The origins of chess lie in Northwest India, around the 6th century. At that time there existed a game known as caturanga,
which means 'four division', those divisions being of the military, represented by the infantry, cavalry, elephants, and
chariotry. These pieces were aventually to become the pawn, knight, bishop, and rook, respectively, in the modern
descendant of the game. Around 600 AD, caturanga spread to Persia, then, after the Muslim conquest of that region
(beginning around that time), the game gained ground throughout the Islamic world, from where it eventually spread to
Europe.

Around 1200 AD, Southern Europe began modifying the rules, and within 300 years the game had become recognisably the
one we play today. The queen had long replaced the earlier vizier to become the most powerful piece, while the pawns were
given the option of advancing two squares on the first move in order to accelerate play. These new rules quickly spread
across Western Europe, creating the game now known as 'western chess' or 'international chess', to distinguish it from older
or regional variants of the game.

As for the players themselves, one world think that the best of them are necessarily smart, with extremely high IQs;
however, research has not been able to confirm this link. Some studies have shown that good chess players may have strong
IQs, but there appears to be no direct correlation between this and chess ability. Paradoxically, the academically brilliant
may even be less able at chess, and vice versa. Evidently, there are other factors involved, such as spacio-visual insight and
subliminal memory, not necessarily picked up by conventional intelligence tests, readily noticeable, or even useful in real
life.

But there are non-mental factors which clearly play a role. No one can doubt that raw talent is necessary, but even the best
and brightest must systematically undergo at least 10 to 15 years of theoretical study and competitive practice before
reaching world championship levels. The American chess genius, Bobby Fischer, was only 13 when he produced the 'Game
of the Century', but he was not world champion until he was 29. The Russian chess player, Garry Kasparov, was the
youngest world champion ever, at 22, but he began dedicated state-sponsored training from the age of ten onwards, complete
with personal chess coaches.

All this shows the fixed place chess has in western culture, meaning also that this region has, historically, produced all the
greatest players. However, interest in chess is now growing in the East, although there is one problem being the stiff
competition it faces with local board games, such as Xiangqi and Go. These are more popular by a wide margin, but
regarding China for example, with its huge population and state-sponsored training, it is fast becoming a major chess power.
The reigning women's world chess champion is Chinese, and the country performs well in chess Olympiads. The future for
the game in this country looks bright indeed.

Talking about the future inevitably leads to the subject of computer chess. Serious chess-playing machines began to emerge
in the 1970s and 1980s, but their abilities were far below that of the top human players. Progress, although slow, was steady,
and with increasing memory and faster processing, it was inevitable that one day a computer would be able to match
humans. Yet this is merely by brutally going through all the possible moves, millions per second, deeper and deeper into the
position. The final move-choices give the appearance of intuition and long-term strategy, when in actual fact they are simply
based on an unthinking and directionless material count.

In 1989, the computer 'Deep Thought' scored some wins against top human players, although the world champion at that
time, Garry Kasparov, easily defeated the machine in some arranged games. In 1996, however, IBM brought out the next
generation computer, 'Deep Blue' , Pitting it in s match with this same player. Although it managed to score the first win
against a reigning world champion, by losing three and drawing two of the remaining games, it lost the match. However, a
return match the following year saw Kasparov facing an even better machine, 'Deeper Blue'. This time, the computer
triumphed 3 1/2 - 2 1/2. And they are only getting better.

As impressive as these results seem, most people agree that it is similar to a forklift beating a weightlifter - somehow not a
valid contest, and of little significance. Yes, computers can win games, but creativity and intelligence are still the province of
human players. It is these factors, as well as the tense psychological struggle of minds and the personalities involved,
together with the limitless artistry of the positions themselves, which will always make chess such a fascinating game
Questions 14-16
Write

TRUE if the statement agrees with the information


FALSE if the statement contradicts the information

NOT GIVEN If there is no information on this

14   There are 32 pieces at the beginning of a chess game.

15   Caturanga was more complicated than modern chess.

16   The popularity of caturanga increased after the Muslims took control.

Questions 17-19
Answer the questions.

Choose NO MORE THAN THREE WORDS from the passage for each answer.

Which piece replaced the elephant?

17 

Why were pawns given an extra ability?

18 

Who was the youngest world champion?

19 

Questions 20-24
Give TWO examples of the following categories.

Choose NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS from the passage for each example.

Categories An Example Another Example

Mental abilities which great chess


spacio-visual insight 20 
players must have
21 
requirements, apart fromtalent, which
competitive practice
create great chess players
22 
reasons accounting for China's chess state-sponsored
success training

factors which enable computers to


increasing memory 23 
equal human chess players

assets which human players have, that


creativity 24 
computers do not

Questions 25-26

Choose the correct letter, A, B, C, or D.

Deep Blue

A  was stronger than Deeper Blue.

B  was stronger than Deep Thought.

C  won several games against Kasparov.

D  eventually triumphed over Kasparov.


Computers
A  have significant creativity.

B  provide tense psychological struggles.

C  are comparable to forklifts.

D  analyse billions of positions per second.

What’s in Blood?
A.Blood is the most specialised fluid within living animals, playing an absolutely critical role. It symbolises life (‘new blood’), health (‘get
your blood running’), personality (‘good or bad blood’), and family (‘your bloodline’). This red fluid itself is something which most people
would rather not see, yet it contains such a complex soup of proteins, sugars, ions, hormones, gases, and basic cellular components that
it is certainly worth considering in some detail.

B.By volume, half of blood is the liquid part, called plasma. The rest comprises specialised components, the main one being red blood
cells (technically known as erythrocytes). These transport oxygen molecules throughout the body, and also give blood its colour (from
the hemoglobin protein within, which turns red when combined with oxygen). Red blood cells, as with all cells in the human body, have
a limited operating life. They are produced within the marrow of bones, principally the larger ones, and live for about four months
before they fall inactive, to be then reabsorbed by the spleen and liver, with waste products absorbed into the urine.

C.This contrasts with the other main cells of human blood: the white blood cells, technically known as leukocytes. Similarly produced in
the bone marrow, they are active only for three or four days, yet they are essential in defending the body against infections. White blood
cells come in many different types, each designed to deal with a different sort of invader bacteria, virus, fungus, or parasite. When one of
these enters the body, the white blood cells quickly determine its nature, then, after mustering sufficient numbers of a specific type (the
period in which you are sick), they launch themselves into the fight, enveloping each individual invasive cell, and breaking it down
(leading to recovery).

D.That leaves the last main component of blood: platelets. Their technical name is thrombocytes, and they are much smaller than red
and white blood cells. Also circulating freely, they are responsible for clotting the blood, and this is necessary to heal both external and
internal injuries. Again, they are produced in the bone marrow, and have the interesting ability to change shape. There are several
diseases related to the breakdown in the regulation of their numbers. If too low, excessive bleeding can occur, yet if too high, internal
clotting may result, causing potentially catastrophic blockages in parts of the body and medical ailments we know as strokes, heart
attacks, and embolisms.

E.Blood’s complexity presents particular difficulties in the advent of emergency transfusions. These are avoided whenever possible in
order to lower the risk of reactions due to blood incompatibility. Unexpected antigens can trigger antibodies to attack blood
components, with potentially lethal results. Thus, if transfusions are to take place, a thorough knowledge and classification of blood is
essential, yet with 30 recognised blood-group systems, containing hundreds of antigens, this presents quite a challenge. The ABO
system is the most important. On top of this is the Rhesus factor, which is not as simple as positive or negative (as most people think),
but comprises scores of antigens. These can, however, be clustered together into groups which cause similar responses, creating some
order.

F.Of course, the simplest system to avoid adverse transfusion reactions is for patients to receive their own blood - for example, in a
series of blood donations in anticipation of an operation scheduled some months in advance. The second best system is to undertake
cross-matching, which involves simply mixing samples of the patients’ blood with the donors’, then checking microscopically for
clumping - a key sign of incompatibility. Both of these systems are obviously impractical in an emergency situation, which is why
meticulous testing, documentation, and labeling of blood are necessary.

G.In a true emergency, a blood bank is needed, with an array of various types of blood on hand. Hence, blood donations must be a
regular occurrence among a significant segment of the population. In the developed world, unpaid volunteers provide most of the
blood for the community, whereas in less developed nations, families or friends are mostly involved. In the era of HIV and other
insidious blood-borne diseases, potential donors are carefully screened and tested, and a period of about two months is recommended
before successive whole blood donations.

H.Given the vital role which blood plays, it is strange to think that for almost 2000 years bloodletting was a widespread medical practice.
It was based on the belief that blood carried ‘humours’, whose imbalances resulted in medical illnesses. Bleeding a patient was supposed
to remove an undesirable excess of one of these. Furthermore, the fact that blood circulated around the body was unknown. It was
instead assumed to be quickly created, and equally quickly exhausted of its value, after which it could stagnant unhealthily in the bodily
extremities. Although the logic was there, it goes without saying that very few patients responded positively to such treatment.

Questions 27-33
Reading Passage Three has eight paragraphs, A-H.

Choose the correct heading for Paragraphs B-H from the list of headings.

Write the correct number, i-x, for each answer.


List of headings
i Not as big, but needing just enough

ii Some attitudes to blood

iii Good, but not so quick

iv Two ideas see a wrong conclusion

v Complicated identification

vi An interesting treatment

vii A shorter life, but just as important

viii The Principal part that adds some colour

ix Bone marrow and blood

x Maintaining supplies

Example Answer

Paragraph A ii

Paragraph B 27 

Paragraph C 28 

Paragraph D 29 

Paragraph E 30 

Paragraph F 31 

Paragraph G 32 

Paragraph H 33 
Complete the table.

Choose NO MORE THAN THREE WORDS from the passage for each answer.

Blood Component Associated Fact

red cells upon dying, dealt with by 34 

white cells require 35   before attacking invaders

platelets Their numbers need careful 36 

37  Many varieties exist.

Questions 38-40
Write

TRUE if the statement agrees with the information

FALSE if the statement contradicts the information

NOT GIVEN If there is no information on this


38   Blood cross-matching can be done without special equipment.

39   In poorer countries, family members often donate blood.

40   Bleeding people was a painful process.


TEST 5

Pine Trees
I am looking at a very thick twisted trunk, rising to medium height, at which point appears a stumpy canopy of spiky needles. It's a tree,
but a very special one. Ron Simonson, a park ranger explains. "It's a bristlecone pine, and it's been given the name, Methuselah". I ask
the obvious question, and Ron replies, "Because like Methuselah from the bible, this tree is very old, one of the oldest living things on
Earth in fact." I ask the next obvious question, and Ron replies, "Basically Methuselah has existed throughout virtually all of recorded
human history." I look again at this quiet and unassuming tree, beginning to realise it is worthy of great respect.

Being in a cold climate, facing limited summer seasons, rooted in nutrient poor and dry soil, and subject to high winds and withering
winters, bristlecone pines mature very slowly indeed. Yet mature they do, as with all pines becoming fractionally thicker every year as
another growth ring is added to their truck. By counting these, we can accurately state that, as of 2011, Methuselah was4,842 years old,
meaning that it sprouted as a seedling in 2832 BC, centuries before the ancient Egyptians began building their pyramids. And that's just
one fascinating fact about that well-known species of tree - the pine.

Pines trees are native to most of the Northern Hemisphere. Several species have adapted to the harsh conditions of high elevations and
latitudes, including Methuselah himself, growing among the peaks of the White Mountains of Northern California.

Pines can be small, such as the Siberian Dwarf Pine, or huge, such as the Ponderosa Pine in the wilds of Oregon, and there are over 100
varieties in all. They have been introduced in to the more temperate portions of the Southern Hemisphere, where they are now grown
widely, becoming a familiar feature in parks and gardens. It would not be too much of an exaggeration to say that almost everyone
knows pines.

These trees certainly have many telltale characteristics. They are evergreen, usually with needle-like foliage and a sharp pleasant 'pine
smell. They are often large and imposing, with thick scaly bark, and always produce their signature pine cones. These formations are
certainly not simple. They can be male (small, inconspicuous, and shedding pollen) or female (large, woody, and containing seeds), even
when appearing on the same tree. They have numerous scales arranged in a spiral, with seeds (on the female) tucked within. As the cone
opens, the seeds eventually fall out, mostly to be dispersed by the wind, or sometimes by birds. In some varieties, the cones remain
closed until their binding resin is melted by forest fires.

This last fact - the need for wildfires for regeneration - is another fascinating aspect of many pine species. In fire-prone areas, it can
result in extensive stands of pines, a good example being in 'pine barrens'. These are eco-regions of sandy nutrient-poor soil dominated
by pines, since the frequency of natural (usually lightning-induced) fires weeds out the less fire-tolerant species. It is perhaps sad that
modern fire prevention methods have resulted in the decline of many pine species in the wild, and most ancient pine barrens are now
being taken over by other forest vegetation.

However, the situation is very different for home and commercial use, which has seen pines become a very common sight. As these trees
grow fast, can be planted in dense arrays, and produce attractive and easily moulded wood, they are favourites for commercial
plantations. The wood is fragrant, but prone to decay, so it is most suitable for indoor or dry carpentry, rather than outdoors, where
more durable varieties are necessary. As for other uses of pines, their branches are valued as Christmas trees, and their wood is also
pulped in factories for paper and chipboard production. Pine resin is a byproduct, and this is collected for distillation into turpentine, an
important industrial solvent.

In a more homely sense, perhaps what people most like are the cones, the largest of which are regularly used by children and craft
enthusiasts. With the widespread distribution of pines across the Northern Hemisphere, cones form part of the many traditional cultures
there, where they are used for decorative purposes, fire starters, bird feeders, or just intriguing natural playthings for young children.
Many people lament that modern manufactured toys in the more affluent of these countries have displaced cones, although some
Nordic communities still teach traditional 'cone-craft' in high schools.

For some reason, I always come back to Methuselah. Ron tells me a story. In 1964, a student was taking a coring sample from another
bristlecone pine in the area. His coring toll broke, so the tree was cut down to allow dating by an examination of a cross-section of its
trunk. Upon doing this, to the astonishment of all, 4,844 rings were counted, signifying that the tree was even older than Methuselah.
Ron smiles wryly at the thought. 'We deliberately killed the oldest life on Earth. That's one reason why we keep the location of
Methuselah a secret. This tree is precious, and must be kept free from all human interference.'

Questions 1-4
Complete the sentences.

Choose NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS from the passage for each answer.

Every year, pine trees gain another 1 

The pyramids were built hundreds of years after 2 

Typical of all pines are their 3 

The wood from pines is not very 4 


Questions 5-8
Do the following statements agree with the information given in Reading Passage One?

Write

TRUE if the statement agrees with the information

FALSE if the statement contradicts the information

NOT GIVEN If there is no information on this

5   Ponderosa pines are the largest.

6   Pines are familiar to most people.

7   Birds usually spread pine seeds.

8   Lightning storms benefit pine barrens.

Choose THREE answers from the list, and write the correct letter, A-F, next to the questions.

Which THREE groups of people, A-F, particularly like pine trees?

A  Plantation owners

B  Outdoor carpenters

C  People interested in craft

D  Certain native communities

E  Factory owners

F  Users of turpentine

Questions 12-13

Choose the correct letter, A, B, C, or D.

Pine cones are

A  complicated

B  male

C  mostly the same size.

D  often used as toys in affluent countries.


Methuselah is

A  4,842 years old.

B  the oldest tree ever.

C  visited by tourists.

D  not subject to much sunshine.

An Insanely Dangerous Activity


Agnes Milowka was one of the foremost cave divers in the world. Female, photogenic, and experienced, she had gained international
recognition for her exploratory work in many underground caverns around the world. In early 2011, she entered Tank Cave, near Mount
Gambier, a seven-kilometre maze of narrow tunnels - yet ones she had explored many times before. Deep inside, she parted company
from her dive buddy to explore a tight passageway through which only one person could pass. What happened next will never be
exactly known, but the nature of the cave suggests that she became disoriented during a ‘silt-out’. Unable to manoeuvre quickly, with
visibility almost zero, she could not find her way back, and her air ran out.

Thinking of these last moments is disturbing, but illustrates the obvious dangers of cave diving. When anything goes wrong, divers
cannot swim vertically to the surface, but must instead navigate the entire way back. The dive is immediately abandoned, but even with
the full team at hand, the return is complicated by narrow tunnels, often lined with sand, mud, or clay, all of which can be easily
disturbed - the dreaded ‘silt-out’ - where, in a few seconds, the diver is in a panic-inducing soup of sediment, virtually blind. Artificial
light is swallowed in the pitch blackness, and there always needs to be sufficient breathing gas. In short, cave diving seems an insanely
dangerous activity.

Yet the cave-diving community disputes this, arguing that their sport is actually safer than normal open-sea recreational diving. This is
due to the much greater degrees of experience and training, and the special equipment used. Most fatalities that have occurred are a
result of breaking accepted protocols, where improperly trained and inadequately equipped divers take on caves well beyond their
capabilities. Cave divers maintain that, if the rules and guidelines are followed, their sport becomes acceptably safe. In the rare cases
where deaths have happened while following these, there have typically been unusual circumstances, such as unexpected currents or
rock falls.

So, what are those protocols? There are five major ones, all decided upon after extensive accident analysis (the breaking down of
accident reports to find their most common causes). Firstly, a cave diver should be trained and experienced. This is done in carefully
documented components, each dealing with increasingly complex facets of cave diving, and accompanied with relevant, dive time
before progression onwards is allowed. The next rule is the same as with all diving, whether open-sea or cave. It concerns the maximum
depths and the decompression stops needed to allow the release of dissolved nitrogen from the blood. This is all carefully calculated in
a dive plan before entering the water, and every diver must strictly adhere to this.

The next two protocols each concern a vital piece of equipment. Firstly, a guide rope is an absolute necessity. This is secured at the cave
entrance, and fed into the cave by the lead diver. Sufficient tension is always maintained, and often the rope is tied up at regular lengths
within the cave interior to ensure this. In the event of a silt-out, all divers, in theory, can find this rope, using it to guide their way back to
the cave entrance. Equally crucial are the lights. A diver without lights is effectively marooned, unable to go anywhere. Each diver is
therefore required to have three independent sources: a primary, and two backups. These are checked under the water when entering
the cave, and the protocol states that if even one of these fails, the dive is abandoned for all members of the team.

The final protocol is, in some ways, the most basic, and concerns the breathing gas. With no quick escape, the ‘rule of thirds’ prevails.
Here, one third of the gas is reserved for exploring into the cave, one third for retreating out of it, and one third as a reserve in the event
of an emergency, or to support fellow divers. Most protocols suggest keeping each third in a separate air system, so that the loss of one
- for example, due to a valve rupture - will not imperil the other two. Another variation is to ensure that these three separate systems are
used equally, so that the remaining air is kept balanced. Again, this is a defence against the loss of one system, maximising the amount
of air remaining for the return.

By following all such protocols, the risk is minimised, so that cave diving, as far as can be proven with the limited statistics available, is
said to be safer than driving a car. Yet, as the sad death of Agnes Milowka shows, lethal mishaps can always occur. The question to be
asked then is why anyone would want to dive into cold, confined, pitch-dark, subterranean cave systems in the first place. The answer is
supplied by a cave-diving leader: ‘You get to see things that human beings have never seen before. Nothing on Earth can compare to
that.’

Questions 14-16

Choose the correct letter, A, B, C, or D.

Agnes Milowka was

A  famous for her photography.

B  familiar with Tank Cave.

C  diving alone.

D  manoeuvring too quickly.


In cave-diving emergencies,

A  the return is difficult.

B  there is vertical escape.

C  divers often experience silt-outs.

D  some team members stay behind.


Cave-diving accidents usually happen
A  when equipment breaks.

B  more than in open-sea diving.

C  with bad equipment.

D  with a lack of equipment.

Questions 17-23
Complete the table.

Choose NO MORE THAN THREE WORDS from the passage for each answer

Protocol Detail
Progression not permitted unless there
have sufficient training and
1st experience is 17 

18   must be
2nd followed.
must have sufficient 19 

must use

3rd a 20 
must keep 21 

must have at least three


4th independent lights Dives do not go ahead if 22 

each system usually kept separate, sometimes

5th must obey rule of thirds


breathed 23 

Questions 24-26
Complete the summary,

Choose NO MORE THAN THREE WORDS from the passage for each answer.

After she 24   from her diving companion, Agnes Milowka died,

illustrating the dangers involved in cave diving, yet there are 25   which

prove it is acceptably safe, and the attraction of seeing sights 26   before


lures people on.

Criminal Rehabilitation: A Difficult Issue


When convicted criminals have served long terms of imprisonment, it is obvious that, upon their release, one cannot necessarily expect
them to be reformed and able to reintegrate into society. In the potentially rough and violent ganglands of prisons, quite the opposite
may occur, which raises a difficult dilemma in the criminal justice system. To maintain social order, those who break the law are expected
to be punished, yet that same maintenance of order means that rehabilitation must be given a high emphasis.

The ethic of rehabilitation is based on the assumption that criminal tendencies are not necessarily permanent, and that former inmates
can successfully lead lives in which they contribute positively to society. The ultimate goal is to prevent them from reoffending, an event
technically known as criminal recidivism. Prisons therefore contain systems of education or therapy, as well as assessment to determine
whether inmates have truly developed remorse for past misdeeds, an ability to reintegrate into society, and intentions to do so.
Assessing this accurately is a difficult issue, and it must be accepted that there are some people who can never be rehabilitated, however
much we try.

The term psychopath is often used here, one of the key determiners of this condition being an inability to learn from past mistakes.
Techniques towards improving their behaviour are thus unlikely to work. Obviously, recidivism is highly correlated with this condition,
yet studies have shown that psychopathie prisoners are equally likely to be released from prisons as non-psychopathic ones. This is
often explained by the fact that psychopathic individuals develop better strategies at disguising their intentions, and become more
adept at tricking others. Treatment and therapy merely give them knowledge of penal and judicial procedures, which they can then twist
to their advantage, colloquially known as ‘system cracking’.

Cases such as these reveal the biggest problem with rehabilitation: the difficulty of reading the deepest intentions of human beings.
Nevertheless, inmates will be released, and consequently need assistance for their reintegration into society. This is most commonly
done through parole, which involves serving the remainder of a sentence outside of prison. This is different from probation, which is
used instead of prison sentences, and consequently places greater restrictions upon the subject. A similar system is supervised release,
where the subject faces the same restrictions as probation, but only after serving the entire prison sentence. Whatever the case, the
parole officer will monitor the released inmate, offering support and assistance wherever possible.

The decision about whether to grant parole usually lies with a parole board. Members may be judges, psychiatrists, criminologists, and
appointed citizens from the local community. The common factor is that they all have a good education, and are judged to be of high
moral standing. Yet again, trying to assess the inmate’s psychological state and what intentions lie within is problematic at best. Good
conduct while inside the prison system is the most obvious prerequisite, but other factors based on the support networks existing
outside also play a role. Having already established a permanent residence, and having gained employment, is usually mandatory.

Upon being released on parole, there are still a variety of regulatory conditions to be met. These include the obvious, such as obeying
the law, and contacting the parole officer at specified intervals, but may be more individual and specific, such as the non-use of drugs
and alcohol, and return to the home residence before a certain time (known as a curfew). Upon ignoring any of these, an arrest warrant
is issued, parole time is stopped, and there follows a parole violation hearing. The parole board then makes a decision about whether to
revoke the parole (which sees the subject reincarcerated) or to allow parole to continue. As mentioned, such decisions are not a hard
science, and mistakes can be made.

it is this which can make parole a controversial and politically charged issue. It only takes one highly publicised crime from a person on
parole to sway public opinion violently against this system. Thus, the political will is often lacking, which has seen, for example, some US
states abolish the parole system completely, and others having done so for specific offences. This is often a response to public pressure,
rather than a considered assessment of the pros and cons. As always, the same argument applies without parole as an intermediate step,
released inmates may face an uphill battle to avoid recidivism, costing society much more in the longer term.

A more innovative method to encourage rehabilitation is ‘time off for good behaviour’. For each year of imprisonment, it automatically
allots inmates who exhibit good behaviour a certain number of days. This means that, year after year, the ‘good time’ is accrued,
resulting in an eventual release perhaps one third of the sentence earlier. However, if the inmates commit more than a certain number of
infractions, or particularly serious ones, they then forfeit their time, and must complete the full, duration of their sentence.

Questions 27-31
Write

TRUE if the statement agrees with the information

FALSE if the statement contradicts the information

NOT GIVEN If there is no information on this

27   Many prison inmates can become worse in prison.

28   Prisons usually have good education and therapy systems.

29   Psychopathic prisoners often reoffend after being released.

30   Supervised release is stricter than parole.

31   The abolition of the parole system is usually done after much thought.

Questions 32-35

Complete the flow chart.

Choose NO MORE THAN THREE WORDS from the passage for each answer

Questions 36-40
Write the specific term for each definition.
Choose NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS from the passage for each answer.

Specific Term Definition

36  reoffending, after being released from prison

37  manipulating prison officials and procedures

38  an alternative to prison sentences

39  having to be at one’s home by a predetermined time

40  time deducted from the sentences of well-behaved prisoners


TEST 6

Make That Wine!


Australia is a nation of beer drinkers. Actually, make that wine. Yes, wine has now just about supplanted beer as the alcoholic drink of
choice, probably because of the extensive range of choices available and the rich culture behind them. This all adds a certain depth and
intimacy to the drinking process which beer just cannot match. In addition, although wine drinkers seldom think about it, moderate
consumption seems to be beneficial for the health, lowering the incidence of heart disease and various other ailments.

Wine is the product of the fermentation of grape juice, in which yeast (a fungus) consumes the natural sugars within, producing alcohol
and carbon dioxide as waste. Yeast grows naturally on many varieties of grapes, often visible as a white powder, and causing
fermentation directly on the plant. Thus, the discovery of wine-making was inevitable at some stage in human history. The evidence
shows that this was at least 8,000 years ago in the Near East. From there, wine-making spread around the ancient Mediterranean
civilisations, where the liquid was extensively produced, drunk, and traded. To this day, the biggest drinkers of wine remain the
Mediterranean countries, with France leading the way.

This leads to the classification of wines, which is quite complex. It often begins with the colour: red or white. Most people do not know
that the colour of wine is not due to the grapes used (whose skins are either green or purple), but to the wine-making process itself. All
grape juice is clear. Red wines are produced by leaving the grape skin in contact with the juice during fermentation; white wines by not
doing so. Thus, white wine can be made from dark-coloured grapes, provided that the skin is separated early, although the resultant
wine may have a pinkish tinge.

A similar wine classification is based more specifically on the grape species used, giving such well-known names as Pinot Noir and
Merlot. Chardonnay grapes remain one of the most widely planted, producing an array of white wines, rivaling the cabernet sauvignon
grape, a key ingredient in the world’s most widely recognised, and similarly named, red wines. When one grape species is used, or is
predominant, the wine produced is called varietal, as opposed to mixing the juices of various identified grapes, which results in blended
wines. The latter process is often done when wine-makers, and the people who drink their product, want a consistent taste, year after
year. Far from being looked down upon, it often results in some of the world’s most expensive bottles, such as the Cote Rotie wines in
France.

Increasingly, however, market recognition is based on the location of the wine production, resulting in labels such as Bordeaux in France,
Napa Valley in California, and the Barossa Valley in Australia. Traditional wines made in these places carry trademarks, respected by
serious wine drinkers. However, an example of the blurred lines is the term ‘champagne’. This was once expected to be made from
grapes grown in the Champagne region of France, with all the expertise and traditions of that area, but, despite legal attempts to
trademark the term, it has become ‘semi-generic’, allowing it to be used for any wine of this type made anywhere in the world.

Finally, we come to the vinification method as a means of classification. One example is, in fact, champagne, known as a ‘sparkling’ wine.
By allowing a secondary fermentation in a sealed container, it retains some of the waste carbon dioxide. Another variation is to stop the
fermentation before all the natural sugars are consumed, creating dessert wines, ranging from slight to extreme sweetness. Yet again,
grapes can be harvested well beyond their maximum ripeness, creating 'late harvest wines’, or allowed to become partially dried (or
‘raisoned’), creating ‘dried grape wines’. Clearly, there are many possibilities, all producing uniquely flavoured products.

One of the best-known terms relating to wine is ‘vintage’. This signifies that the product was made from grapes that were grown in a
single labeled year. If that year is eventually acknowledged to have produced exceptionally fine grapes and resultant wines (‘a good
vintage’), bottles from that period are often saved for future consumption. Of course, the appreciation and assessment of wine is an
inexact science, meaning that the significance of a particular vintage often promotes much speculation and disagreement. A non-
vintage wine is usually a blend from the produce of two or more years, which is done, as mentioned before, for consistency and quality
control.

This leads to the rich and varied world of wine assessment, and its descriptive terminology. Wine has such a variety of aromas, flavours,
textures, and aftertastes that serious wine drinkers demand an agreed vocabulary so that the drinking sensations can be reliably
described in writing. From bouquet to biscuity, mellow to musky, vivid to vegetal, the conceited connoisseur can perplex the listener
with some really purple prose. Perhaps the opportunity to posture pretentiously with all this jargon is the main reason why wine
enthusiasts are so taken with this product. Cheers!

Questions 1-4
Do the following statements agree with the information given in Reading Passage One?

Write

TRUE if the statement agrees with the information

FALSE if the statement contradicts the information

NOT GIVEN If there is no information on this

1   Wine is popular in Australia because it is healthy.


2   Yeast is white-coloured.

3   Wine is popular in the Near East.

4   Blended wines are usually cheaper.

Questions 5-10
Complete the table.

Choose NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS from the passage for each answer.

Classification based
Associated Fact Related Example
on


colour Red wines use 5   in
fermentation.

grape species can be 7   or blended Cote Rotie wines

location Drinkers of wine 8    Barossa Valley


this.

can allow 10   to dessert wine



remain

Questions 11-13

Choose the correct letter, A, B, C, or D.

Vintage wines are

A  mostly better.

B  often preferred.

C  often discussed.

D  more costly.
The author thinks that wine terminology is

A  unnecessary.

B  serious.

C  good.

D  bad.
Wine

A  is more popular than beer, in Australia.

B  is most popular in France.

C  can be simply classified.

D  is often ‘raisoned’.

Reading Passage 2
You should spend about 20 minutes on Questions 14-26, which are based on Reading Passage Two.
That Vision Thing
In the past, management took a minor role in influencing motivation. It was generally considered that if the correct tools, training, and
environment were provided, individuals would do their jobs, and that this was sufficient in itself. People in organisations were
considered 'personnel'. But look how it has now changed. 'Personnel' have become 'human resources'. and staff are now seen in terms
of strategic potential, and with appropriate development, are one of the most important assets organisations may have.

A key aspect of this is motivation, and to achieve it, the latest buzzword is envisioning. We often hear management gurus propounding
the thesis that any leader of worth must have a vision. This can unite, inspire, and direct the energies of the staff in the right direction. In
the absence of such a 'visionary leader', the organisation necessarily flounders in complete aimlessness - or at least, that is what we are
led to believe. And yet I strongly disagree that this 'vision thing' (as famously referred to by former American President, George Bush
Senior) is worth much at all. I'd even go further, stating that it can be distinctly bad for the organisation.

The first fact to realise is that 'envisioning' fails to acknowledge the true human nature of organisations. These places are not composed
of lemmings., all with a simplistic and single-minded dedication towards one goal. They are most obviously composed of groups of
human beings, and with their rich variety of personalities and experiences, no such community can be homogenous and share exactly
the same sat of personal values. These people are, in fact, merely loosely-bound cohorts pursuing different objectives (status, money,
power, or individually defined agendas), in different manners. Thus a truly shared and meaningful vision is very difficult, and often
impossible, to generate.

Yet the 'visionary' manager attempts to do just this. The trouble is, the high-minded dictates of his fresh MBA do not mention becoming
bogged down in a long, laboured excess of word-smithing, or how, in order to reach a consensus, the vision necessarily loses all
individuality. The books do not mention the passionless and sterile written exhortation which is ultimately produced, of working towards
'unshakeable integrity'. As admirable in content as these may be, they are merely corporate mantras rather than words to be lived by.
Few will believe in something imposed from above, instead merely complying at a superficial level.

The unfortunate fact is, when turning from rhetoric to reality, the contradictions can be overwhelming. Deep down, all staff members
know that envisioning is attempted not to create a more egalitarian company, but only as a means of enriching the company directors.
But what about those staff member? Few of them work merely for the love of their job. In a materialistic and consumer-driven world,
they work for hard and tangible rewards. This can take many forms, but certainly involves the company giving back profit in the form of
salary, overtime, TOIL, bonuses, perks and extra days off. Personal visions never, ever, mention these.

Here's another reason why envisioning is dubious at best. Workers do not like to be treated as products in the service of profits, or cogs
in the organisational machine, yet envisioning ranks them as even worse - as animals in a sociological experiment. The assumption is
that they lack their own personal vision and are helplessly adrift, deficits which can only be remedied by a great leader who can herd the
lost sheep in the right direction. This is not a feeling likely to enhance commitment to the cause, and often make staff feel the very
opposite, a fact about which I can personally testify from my own experiences of working in big companies where the envisioning farce
was played out.

Personal visions are, in fact, necessarily complex. Almost everyone would surely have difficulties in articulating their deepest motivations,
as well as in being honest about this to themselves. They would similarly have some reluctance to openly talk on the subject, often with
people who might be competitors for that next promotion. Furthermore, envisioning begs the question of whether a vision is even
necessary. Some people are not driven by a determination to stridently blaze a trail through life. This may merely show a spiritual calm,
and a desire to appreciate the present. It may also be a smarter and more strategic approach to life's inpredictable turns, applying
equally well to the business world. In short, a lack of vision may be better - much better.

George Bush, as with many presidents, occasionally did not articulate his thoughts clearly, but his famously dismissive comment about
envisioning speaks volumes. 'That vision thing' is remarkable in its concision. In just three words, it encapsulates the trendy, contrived,
pigeon-holing, simplistic, top-down, and often insulting and hypocritical nature of the process. Mr Bush, you have my vote.

Questions 14-17

Answer the questions.

Choose NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS from the passage for each answer

Broadly, what do staff need in order to most benefit a company?

14 

Which people advise envisioning?

15 

What do they believe a lack of vision might cause?

16 

What aspect can groups of people never have in common?

17 

Questions 18-23

Complete the flow chart.

Choose NO MORE THAN THREE WORDS from the passage for each answer.

Questions 24-26

Choose the correct letter, A, B, C, or D.


Most people

A  can define what makes them want to succeed.

B  will discuss their personal visions with others.

C  are interested in promotions.

D  express their deeper feelings truthfully.


Personal visions

A  take people forward in life.

B  result in the absorption of immediate details.

C  provide defence against unexpected events.


D  help calm people’s minds.
With regard to envisioning, the author feels

A  critical.

B  contemptuous.

C  impartial.

D  suspicious.

Destination Mars
Mars is the closest potentially habitable planet. It has solid ground, protective surface features, a thin atmosphere, more closely mimics
the gravitational and lighting conditions on Earth, and is reachable - just. Most importantly, studies have found that this planet has vast
reserves of frozen water, and there are other basic minerals as well. In contrast, the closest heavenly body - the moon - is dusty, barren,
hostile, and dark. Settlement of the moon would be much easier, but since there are no resources there, it would ultimately be more
costly and of little use. If there is any extraterrestrial site where humankind will ultimately settle, it must be Mars.

Yet this planet is much more distant than the moon, making the logistics daunting. Food, water, oxygen, and life-support systems for
such a journey would be too heavy for current rocket science. Technological innovations would be necessary, and the timing of the trip
absolutely critical. The different orbits of Mars and Earth mean that they most closely approach each other every 26 months, but this
event itself fluctuates on a 15-year cycle. This means that only once in that time does a launch window open. That is quite few and far
between, yet missions must necessarily leave at these times.

The trouble is, even then, the journey to Mars and back would take over a year, and the human body suffers profoundly when left in
micro-gravity for that length of time. Without the need to stand, there is almost no flexing or pressure on the back or the leg muscles.
These gradually shrink and weaken, while bones lose their density, and lungs their aerobic capacity. When left long enough in space,
astronauts are unable to function properly. Yet these people will need their full physical strength and alertness for the many operational
duties required. These include docking in space, approaches and landing on Mars, remote manipulation of machines, and dealing with
any emergencies that arise.

Another hazard of such duration in a hermetically sealed spacecraft is disease. Human bodies constantly shed waste material (sweat,
skin-flakes, hair, moisture, mucus, and the products of digestion), all of which allow microbes to breed prolifically. Coughs and sneezes
spray fluids into the air, which, without gravity to pull them down to surfaces, simply float as airborne particles in those cramped
confines, causing easy microbial exchange between crew members. Bacterial infections and fungal attacks can be prevalent, and human
immune systems are weakened in micro-gravity. Thus, a long mission to Mars would require the best air-cleansing system available,
rigorous disinfecting and hygiene procedures, plus an excellent supply of antibiotics.

On reaching Mars, the problems only increase. Staying on the planet for any significant length of time will be difficult. In the absence of
a thick protective atmosphere or magnetosphere to burn up or deflect objects, respectively, astronauts will be exposed, to potentially
lethal UV radiation, micro-meteoroids, solar flares, and high-energy particles, all of which regularly bombard the surface. Spacecraft and
land-based capsules will need special shielding, which adds to the weight and expense. Construction of living quarters will be time-
consuming, difficult, and dangerous. For a longer stay on Mars, the only solution, it seems, is to go underground.

One of the most interesting discoveries in this respect is of possible cave entrances on the side of Arsia Mons, a large Martian volcano.
Seven such entrances have been identified in satellite imagery, showing circular holes resembling the collapse of cave ceilings. The hope
is that these may lead to more extensive cave formations, or perhaps lava tubes, offering the protection necessary in such a hostile
terrain. An additional benefit is the potential access to vital minerals, and most importantly of all, the possibility of frozen water. These
sites therefore open up the possibility of independent and permanent settlement on this planet.

The most exciting option is to attempt that on the very first trip - in other words, making it a oneway journey. The advantage is that the
duration of space travel is immediately halved, reducing the technological, biological, and financial challenges. This very strong
argument is somewhat offset by the difficulties in establishing a permanent presence, as well as the necessary ongoing commitment to
it - for example, in the delivery of food and supplies via unmanned spacecraft. Similarly, the psychological effects on these pioneers of
permanent isolation from Barth and its community, as well as being crowded into confined Martian living quarters with the same
companions, raise issues of whether such a settlement is humanly feasible.

This begs the question of why undertake such missions at all. The answer, according to proponents, is that it is our destiny. Throughout
history, explorers have regularly embarked on journeys in the full knowledge that death may await them, or that even if they succeeded,
their health and wellbeing would be severely compromised. And today, people regularly practise extreme sports, or work in dangerous
occupations, all of which significantly lower their life expectancy. The risks involved in being a Martian pioneer are no different, and so, it
is argued, there is no reason why they should deter us now.

Questions 27-30
Write

TRUE if the statement agrees with the information


FALSE if the statement contradicts the information

NOT GIVEN If there is no information on this

27   The greatest advantage of Mars is that it has many basic minerals.

28   Settlement of the moon would be more expensive.

29   The magnetosphere burns up objects.

30   A one-way expedition to Mars is better.

Questions 31-35
Complete the table.

Choose NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS from the passage for each answer.

Problems involved in travelling to


Associated Fact
Mars

inadequate rocketry Scientists would need 31 

infrequent 32  once every 15 years

effect of space on 33  Bones 34 

Lack of gravity
disease
facilitates 35 

Questions 36-40
Give TWO examples of the following categories.

Choose NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS from the passage for each example.

Categories An Example Another Example


36 
human attributes needed for important
Physical strength
space activities
37 
specific medical conditions which could
fungal attack
occur in space
38 
solid objects which could strike
high-energy particles
astronauts on Mars
39 
useful substances inside Martian caves vital minerals

40 
high-risk activities happening now on
extreme sports
Earth

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