In recent years a new farming revolution has begun, one that involves the manipulation of life at a fundamental level—the gene. The study of genetics has (51) a new industry called biotcehnology. As the name suggests, it (52) biology and modern technology through such techniques as genetic engineering. Some of the new biotech companies specialize in agriculture and are working feverishly to (53) seeds that give a high yield, that (54) diseases, drought and frost, and that reduce the need for hazardous chemicals, If such goals could be achieved, it would be most (55) . But some have raised concerns about genetically engineered crops. In nature, genetic diversity is created within certain (56) . A rose can be crossed with a different kind of rose, but a rose will never cross with a potato. Genetic engineering, (57) usually involves taking genes from one species and inserting them into another in an attempt to transfer a desired characteristic. This could mean, for example, selecting a gene which leads to the production of a chemical with anti-freeze (58) from an artic fish, and inserting it into a potato or strawberry to make it frost, resistant, in essence, then, biotechnology allows humans to (59) the genetic walls that separate species. Just like the green revolution, (60) some call the gene revolution contributes to the problem of genetic uniformity-some say even more so (61) geneticists can employ techniques such as cloning and (62) culture (培养) and processes that produce perfectly (63) copies. Concerns about the erosion of biodiversity, therefore, remain. Genetically altered plants, however, raise new (64) ,such as the effects that they may have on us and the environment. "We are tlying blindly into a new era of agricultural biotechnology with high hopes, few constraints, and little idea of the potential (65) ," said science writer Jeremy Rifkin.
A. difficulties
B. height
C. issues
D. goals
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A. to send goods to various pans of the worldB. at any time during the yearC. has greatly promoted tradeD. is it possible to produce on a large scaleE. the transport of goodsF. it is possible to produce on a large scale In the trade of modem society the transmission of information plays as important a role as ______.
Passage 2 Boston is a tiny place. Even when inner urban suburbs such as Cambridge, Brookline, Somerville, and Chelsea are included, Greater Boston is still unusually small in scale for a major population center. That gives Boston much of its special flavor. Unfortunately, during times of great prosperity it also creates special challenges. Perhaps the most pressing of these challenges is housing. As the Phoenix’s special package on housing shows, the apartment shortage in Greater Boston has reached crisis proportions. Since the mid 1990s, rents have gone up by 50 percent or more in some neighborhoods. And even at these grossly inflated prices, apartments are still nearly impossible to come by. Nevertheless, some modest steps can be taken. It’s the old not-in-my-backyard syndrome: everyone knows there’s a housing shortage, but no one wants to see new housing come into his or her own neighborhood. Such opposition can be eased by involving local residents in planning for new housing. The lesson is that bottom-up solutions invariably work better than top-down edicts. Boston University, Boston College, Northeastern University, and MIT have taken major steps toward building housing for their students on their own campuses. During the 1960s and 70s, student housing spread into neighborhoods such as the Fenway (near Northeastern) and Audubon Circle (near BU). Students kept such neighborhoods alive during those difficult years. But as neighborhoods become able to "thrive on their own" , universities should be encouraged, wherever possible, to pull back, thus opening up neighborhood housing to long-term residents. In his State of the City address in January, Mayor Tom Menino identified the housing crisis as his number-one priority, and named a respected legislator, Charlotte Richie, as his housing czar. In a recently published interview, Boston Redevelopment Authority head Tom O’ Brien spoke of the need to preserve the diversity of Boston’s neighborhoods, and identified the city’s residential character as one of its saving graces. Yet the city has been missing in action. At the very least. Menino should make a concerted effort to ease the housing shortage in neighborhoods where the problem is particularly acute. More important, Menino has to realize that he cannot deal with housing as an "in box" mayor, taking on an issue here, an issue there as they come up. He should work with officials in surrounding communities and convene a housing summit to consider a wide range of ideas. The author has suggested the following solutions to the housing crisis, EXCEPT ______.
A. involving grassroots
B. back to campus
C. improving transportation
D. governmental efforts
1. Digital Realm In the digital realm the next big advance will be voice recognition. The rudiments are already here but in primitive form. Ask a computer to "recognize speech," and it is likely to think you want it to "wreck a nice beach." But in a decade or so we’ll be able to chat away and machines will soak it all in. Microchips will be truly embedded in our lives when we can talk to them. Not only to ourcomputers; we’ll also able to chat our automobile navigation systems, telephone consoles, browsers, thermostats, VCRs, microwaves and any other devices we want to boss around. That will open the way to the next phase of the digital age: artificial intelligence. By our providing so many thoughts and preferences to our machines each day, they’ll accumulate enough information about how we think so that they’ll be able to mimic our minds and act as our agents. Scary, huh But potentially quite useful. At least until they don’t need us anymore and start building even smarter machines they can boss around. The law powering the digital age up until now has been Gordon Moore’s: that microchips will double in power and halve in price every 18 months or so. Bill Gates rules because early on he acted on the assumption that computing power—the capacity of microprocessors and memory chips—would become nearly flee; his company kept churning out more and more lines of complex software to make use of the cheap bounty. The law that will power the next few decades is that the bandwidth (the capacity of fiber-optic and other pipelines to carry digital communications) will become nearly free. Along with the recent advances in digital switching and storage technologies, this means a future in which all forms of content—movies, music, shows, books, data, magazines, newspapers, your aunt’s recipes and home videos—will be instantly available anywhere on demand. Anyone will be able to be a producer of any content; you’ll be able to create a movie or magazine, make it available to the world and charge for it, just like Time Warner! The result will be a transition from a mass. market world to a personalized one. Instead of centralized factories and studios that distribute or broadcast the same product to millions, technology is already allowing products to be tailored to each user You call subscribe to news sources that serve up only topics and opinions that fit your fancy. Everything from shoes to steel can be customized to meet individual wishes. Artificial intelligence means machines can act as our agents as they can think.
A. Right
B. Wrong
C. Not mentioned
It’s midnight. It’s high time you (go) ______ home.