Question

【題目】 Late blight (晚疫病) is a common disease of plants such as tomatoes and potatoes, capable of wiping out entire crops on commercial-sized fields. If conditions are favorable, it can quickly spread to other plants through wet soil and wind.

In history, late blight caused over 1 million deaths in Ireland. Today it still causes more than 6.7 billion dollars in annual losses worldwide. Small farms and growers are often the hardest hit, many stating losing almost two-thirds of their yearly production, because usually they don’t have money to identify and treat the disease.

But farmers may have a new weapon now. The technology, designed by researchers at North Carolina State University can recognize sick plants early by employing a piece of test paper that plugs into (接入) a reader on a smartphone.

Plants produce signaling chemicals from their leaves. “If a plant is diseased, the type and concentration of these chemicals changes,” said Wei Qingshan, an engineer at North Carolina State University. If the farmer suspects a late blight infection is underway, he can remove a leaf from a living plant and place it in a small, covered glass jar. After the leaf’s volatile (揮發(fā)性的) chemicals have accumulated for 15 minutes or so, the cap is removed and the air is pumped from the jar into a reader attached to the back of a smartphone. Inside the smartphone reader is a piece of paper specially treated with dyes (染料) by the researchers. Upon interacting (相互作用) with the plant’s volatile chemicals, the paper changes color to indicate the presence or absence of the late blight.

The researchers hope to tailor the technology for other crop diseases, which continue to appear as climate change and global trade increase the stress on agricultural systems. “This is an important step in the improvement of global food security,” Wei Qingshan said.

【1】What are the statistics in Paragraph 2 mainly about?

A.The damage caused by late blight.

B.The money put into late blight treatment.

C.The number of crops in a commercial-sized field.

D.The yearly production of small farms and growers.

【2】According to Wei Qingshan, how would a farmer find out if a plant was infected?

A.By treating the plant with special dyes.

B.By putting volatile chemicals on the plant.

C.By testing the air in the jar with a leaf inside.

D.By examining the land with a smartphone reader.

【3】What do the researchers expect of their new technology?

A.It’ll reach farmers soon.

B.It’ll get rid of late blight.

C.It’ll be beneficial to the climate.

D.It’ll be able to detect more crop diseases.

【4】What is the purpose of this passage?

A.To introduce a test method of late blight.

B.To explain the causes of late blight.

C.To discuss the effects of late blight.

D.To tell the history of late blight.

Answer 1

【答案】

【1】A

【2】C

【3】D

【4】A

【解析】

本文是一篇說明文。介紹了晚疫病及其危害，以及識別植物是否得晚疫病的一種檢測方法。

【1】推理判斷題。由第二段“In history, late blight caused over 1 million deaths in Ireland. Today it still causes more than 6.7 billion dollars in annual losses worldwide.”可知，晚疫病曾造成愛爾蘭100萬植物死亡。如今，世界每年因晚疫病損失67億多美元。由此判斷出這些數(shù)據(jù)都在說明晚疫病造成的危害。故選A項。

【2】細節(jié)理解題。由第四段內(nèi)容“If the farmer suspects a late blight infection is underway, he can remove a leaf from a living plant and place it in a small, covered glass jar. After the leaf’s volatile (揮發(fā)性的) chemicals have accumulated for 15 minutes or so, the cap is removed and the air is pumped from the jar into a reader attached to the back of a smartphone. Inside the smartphone reader is a piece of paper specially treated with dyes (染料) by the researchers. Upon interacting (相互作用) with the plant’s volatile chemicals, the paper changes color to indicate the presence or absence of the late blight.”可知，農(nóng)民想判斷植物有沒有得晚疫病，只需要將植物的一片葉子放在蓋著的玻璃罐子里。葉子上的化學物質在瓶子里聚集15分鐘以后，將蓋子移除，將罐子中的空氣抽出來注入閱讀器中。通過觀察閱讀器中紙張顏色的變化來判斷植物有沒有得病。所以最終是通過測試罐子里有葉子的空氣來判斷是否得晚疫病的。故選C項。

【3】細節(jié)理解題。由最后一段“The researchers hope to tailor the technology for other crop diseases, which continue to appear as climate change and global trade increase the stress on agricultural systems.”可知，科學家希望這門新技術可以運用到其他的植物病上面，可以幫助農(nóng)民識別更多的植物病。故選D項。

【4】推理判斷題。文章第一段引出晚疫病，第二段介紹了它的危害。從第三段開始到結尾大篇幅著重介紹了識別晚疫病的新技術以及這種技術的運用方法和前景。所以說作者寫這篇文章的主要目的是介紹一種晚疫病的檢測方法。故選A項。