单选题 {{I}}Questions 15 to 17 are based on a talk on student housing. You now have 15 seconds to read Questions 15 to 17.{{/I}}

单选题When it comes to the slowing economy, Ellen Spero isn't biting her nails just yet. But the 47-year-old manicurist isn't cutting, filling or polishing as many nails as she'd like to, either. Most of her clients spend $12 to $50 weekly, but last month two longtime customers suddenly stopped showing up. Spero blames the softening economy. "I'm a good economic indicator," she says, "I provide a service that people can do without when they're concerned about saving some dollars." So Spero is downscaling, shopping at middle-brow Dillard's department store near her suburban Cleveland home, instead of Neiman Marcus. "I don't know if other clients are going to abandon me, too." she says. Even before Alan Greenspan's admission that America's red-hot economy is cooling, lots of working folks had already seen signs of the slowdown themselves. From car dealerships to gap outlets, sales have been lagging for months as shoppers temper their spending. For retailers, who last year took in 24 percent of their revenue between Thanksgiving and Christmas, the cautious approach is coming at a crucial time. Already, experts say, holiday sales are off 7 percent from last year's pace. But don't sound any alarms just yet. Consumers seem only concerned, not panicked, and many say they remain optimistic about the economy's long-term prospects, even as they do some modest belt-tightening. Consumers say they're not in despair because, despite the dreadful headlines, their own fortunes still feel pretty good. In Manhattan, "there's a new gold rush happening in the $4 million to $10 million range, predominantly fed by Wall Street bonuses," says broker Barbara Corcoran. In San Francisco, prices are still rising even as frenzied overbidding quiets. "Instead of 20 to 30 offers, now maybe you only get two or three," says John Deadly, a Bay Area real-estate broker. And most folks still feel pretty comfortable about their ability to find and keep a job. Many folks see silver linings to this slowdown. Potential homebuyers would cheer for lower interest rates. Employers wouldn't mind a little fewer bubbles in the job market. Many consumers seem to have been influenced by stock-market swings, which investors now view as a necessary ingredient to a sustained boom. Diners might see an upside, too. Getting a table at Manhattan's hot new Alain Ducasse restaurant need to be impossible. Not anymore. For that, Greenspan & Co. may still be worth toasting.

单选题Questions 1--3 Choose the best answer.

单选题{{B}}Text 1{{/B}} There are no fossil remains of Stone Age hang gliders or trading records from pre-Columbian stock exchanges, but risk-taking behavior is as old as the sabertooth. Yet what compels modern adventurers to do such foolhardy things as jumping off dizzying cliffs or speculating in Internet stocks? Amateur analysts once psychobabbled about a death risk -- an old Freudian cliché that said risk takers were really driven by subconscious feelings of guilt. Nowadays scientists say the real roots of such behavior are as likely to be found in the convoluted chemistry of the genes as in the id or the superego. Long before genes were discovered, Darwin suspected that behavior was at least partly inherited. But only recently have scientists working in the burgeoning field of behavioral genetics begun to link specific stretches of DNA with personality traits. Studying the DNA of subjects who were identified as curious and excitable -- two of the common characteristics of those who look for novelty and thrills -- Israeli scientists found that these people had longer versions of a gene known as D4DR than did subjects who were typed as laid-hack and reflective. It quickly became known as the novelty-or thrill-seeking gene. Shortly thereafter, an American team found a second gene, on a different chromosome, that appears to regulate anxiety. Scientists have yet to figure out how such genes might work, other than to control the flow of certain chemicals in the bratty. The thrill-seeking gene, for example, seems to facilitate absorption by nerve cells of dopamine, one of the brain's chemical messengers and a key modulator of pleasure and emotion. Similarly, the anxiety gene appears to work by affecting levels of serotonin, a mood chemical linked with feelings of satisfaction. But can such genes actually determine behavior? More important, if we happen to possess them in our chromosomes, will we inevitably grow into high rollers or high divers? Not at all, says molecular biologist Dean Hamer, a pioneer in the new field of molecular psychology. Unlike the genes that control physical traits -- the color of our eyes, say, or the shape of our nose -- such DNA merely {{U}}predisposes{{/U}} us to certain behaviors. "Genes are not switches that say 'sky' or 'outgoing' or 'happy' or 'sad', "he and co-author Peter Copeland write in their book Living with Our Genes. "Genes are simply chemicals that direct the combination of more chemicals." But some chemicals, like dopamine, can have far-flung effects. Because dopamine creates sensations of pleasure, he says, those who inherit the thrill seeking gene might want to stimulate dopamine production by pushing the danger button, whether with edgy sports for long days or e-trading.

单选题Unit 5 This section is designed to test your ability to understand spoken English. You will hear a selection of recorded materials and you must answer the questions that accompany them. There are three parts in this section, Part A, Part B and Part C. Remember, while you are doing the test, you should first put down your answers in your test booklet, NOT on the ANSWER SHEET. At the end of the listening comprehension section, you will have 5 minutes to transfer your answers from your test booklet to ANSWER SHEET 1. If you have any questions, you may raise your hand NOW as you will not be allowed to speak once the test has started.Part A You will hear a talk on people's "felt images". As you listen, answer questions 1 to 10 by circling True or False. You will hear the talk ONLY ONCE. You now have 60 seconds to read questions 1—10.

单选题Earthquake survivors trapped in rubble could one day be saved by an unlikely rescuer: A robotic caterpillar that burrows its way through debris. Just a few centimeters wide, the robot relies on magnetic fields to propel it through the kind of tiny crevices that would foil the wheeled or tracked search robots currently used to locate people trapped in collapsed buildings. The caterpillar"s inventor, Norihiko Saga of Akita Prefectural University in Japan, will demonstrate his new method of locomotion at a conference on magnetic materials in Seattle. In addition to lights and cameras, a search caterpillar could be equipped with an array of sensors to measure other factors—such as radioactivity or oxygen levels—that could tell human rescuers if an area is safe to enter. The magnetic caterpillar is amazingly simple. It moves by a process similar to peristalsis, the rhythmic contraction that moves food down your intestine. Saga made the caterpillar from a series of rubber capsules filled with a magnetic fluid consisting of iron particles, water, and a detergent-like surfactant, which reduces the surface tension of the fluid. Each capsule is linked to the next by a pair of rubber rods. The caterpillar"s guts are wrapped in a clear, flexible polymer tube that protects it from the environment. To make the caterpillar move forwards, Saga moves a magnetic field backwards along the caterpillar. Inside the caterpillar"s "head" capsule, magnetic fluid surges towards the attractive magnetic field, causing the capsule to bulge out to the sides and draw its front and rear portions up. As the magnetic field passes to the next capsule, the first breaks free and springs forward and the next capsule bunches up. In this way, the caterpillar can reach speeds of 4 centimeters per second as it crawls along. Moving the magnetic field faster can make it traverse the caterpillar before all the capsules have sprung back to their original shapes. The segments then all spring back, almost but not quite simultaneously. Saga plans to automate the movement of the caterpillar by placing electromagnets at regular intervals along the inside of its polymer tube. By phasing the current flow to the electromagnets, he"ll be able to control it wirelessly via remote control. He also needs to find a new type of rubber for the magnetic capsules, because the one he"s using at the minute eventually begins to leak. But crawling is not the most efficient form of locomotion for robots, says Robert Full of the University of California at Berkeley, an expert in animal motion who occasionally advises robotics designers. "If you look at the energetic cost of crawling, compared to walking, swimming or flying, crawling is very expensive," he says. Walking, on the other every step, energy is conserved in the foot and then released to help the foot spring up. Saga acknowledges this inefficiency but says his caterpillar is far more stable than one that walks, rolls on wheels or flies. It has no moving parts save for a few fluid-filled rubber capsules. Biped robots and wheeled robots require a smooth surface and are difficult to miniaturize, and flying robots have too many moving parts. "My peristaltic crawling robot is simple and it works," he says.

单选题Questions 14—16 are based on the following talk about the bank credit card.

单选题The development of modem communications technology in developing countries may ______.

单选题 {{I}}Questions 11～13 are based on the following talk. You now have 15 seconds to read Questions 11～13.{{/I}}

单选题Which of the following official ranks is not introduced?

单选题{{B}}Part B{{/B}} In the following article some paragraphs have been removed. For questions 66—70, choose the most suitable paragraph from the lists A—F to fit into each of the numbered gaps. There is one paragraph which does not fit in any of the gaps. Mark your answers on ANSWER SHEET 1. The ten-year battle over baby-milk that has pitted the champions of breast feeding against more than a dozen powerful multinational companies will reach its climax next week. At a meeting of the World Health Organization, 157 governments will vote on a code backed by consumer groups, churches and health experts — which would prohibit companies from all direct advertising and promotion of baby milk, from issuing samples and gifts to health workers, from using company "nurses", and even from paying sales commission to their staff. Almost certainly, the code will be passed. The result, its backers hope, will reverse the trend away from breastfeeding — especially in the Third World, where it is reckoned that more than a million lives could be saved each year if mothers abandoned artificial substitutes. 66.____________ In the United States, they argue that a ban on advertising would be contrary to constitutional freedoms — which, they say, includes the "freedom of Commercial speech." But even the companies no longer dispute the medical facts. Infant formula — a powered mixture based on cow's milk — is indisputably inferior to human milk because it lacks the natural antibodies, which protect babies against many common diseases including measles and diarrheas. In Third World countries, where mothers without refrigerators or detergents are diluting the mixture with polluted water, baby milk is a risk to children's health. A leading world paediatrician, Dr. Derrick Jeliffe, estimates that about 10 million cases a year of infants malnutriton and infectious diseases can be attributed to improper bottle-feeding. The companies emphasize that baby milk has an important role for working mothers and for women who cannot breastfeed. 67.____________ The poorest are in any case those least able to afford commercial substitutes. For a typical Third World agricultural worker, feeding one child on baby milk requires between 20 and 50 percent of the family budget. The result, often, is that older children go hungry. For the companies, baby milk is big business. The Third World market, growing at 15 percent a year, is already worth about 700 million — double the sales in the US. For the poor countries the trade is a multimillion dollar drain on their foreign exchange, and the avoidable child diseases caused by baby milk increase the strains on the health services. 68.____________ They have used aggressive marketing throughout the Third World — creating, their critics claim, a "need" which in all but a handful of cases does not exist. Advertising is the central target of the Geneva code. It makes no attempt to ban the sale or use of baby milk, or to resist sales to chemists or government-controlled outlets. The companies say the code is therefore unnecessary, because in October 1979 their umbrella organization, the International Council for Food Industries, agreed on a voluntary code which included the adandonment of direct advertising in developing countries. Since that date, however, the International Baby Food Action Network claims to have documented more than 1,000 violations of the voluntary code. 69.____________ Some companies, including Cow and the US could still vote against the code. Above all, the companies fear that the code will apply equally to the lucrative Western market. This is far from certain because the WHO bowing to pressures from some industrialised countries and milk-surplus producers in the Common Market, has presented its code as a recommendation, not a legally-binding regulation. 70. ____________ [A] This means that it is up to individual governments whether or not to apply it. [B] The companies disclaim responsibilities for the misuse of their products and for their use in dangerous conditions. [C] The companies are lobbying strongly against the code because it would virtually eliminate legitimate competition and because it pays no attenion to different countries' conditions. [D] But detailed and international restrictions cannot be the answer. National measures based on a set of internationally agreed general principles is the realistic approach and one which has already been shown to work in countries like Malaysia and Singapore. [E] Besides, medical sales workers still do the rounds of hospitals and clinics, leaving piles of booklets, posters and free samples. [F] Yet recent research shows that only a minute percentage of mothers are unable to feed their babies, even among the badly under-nourished.

单选题According to the author, most of the world's fresh water is to be found in______ .

单选题 Shortages of flu vaccine are nothing new in America, but this year' s is a whopper. Until last week, it appeared that 100 million Americans would have access to flu shots this fall. Then British authorities, concerned about quality-control problems at a production plant in Liverpool, barred all further shipments by the Chiron Corp. Overnight, the U.S. vaccine supply dwindled by nearly half and federal health officials found themselves making an unusual plea. Instead of beseeching us all to get vaccinated, they' re now urging most healthy people between the ages of 2 and 64 not to. "This reemphasizes the fragility of our vaccine supply," says Dr. Martin Myers of the National Network for Immunization Information, "and the lack of redundancy in our system." Why is such a basic health service so easily knocked out? Mainly because private companies have had little incentive to pursue it. To create a single dose of flu vaccine, a manufacturer has to grow live virus in a 2-week-old fertilized chicken egg, then crack the egg, harvest the virus and extract the proteins used to provoke an immune response. Profit margins are narrow, demand is fickle and, because each year's flu virus is different, any leftover vaccine goes to waste. As a result, the United States now has only two major suppliers ( Chiron and Aventis Pasteur)--and when one of them runs into trouble, there isn' t much the other can do about it. "A vaccine maker can't just call up and order 40 million more fertilized eggs," says Manon Cox, of Connecticut-based Protein Sciences Corp. "There's a whole industry that's scheduled to produce a certain number of eggs at a certain time. " Sleeker technologies are now in the works, and experts are hoping that this year's fiasco will speed the pace of innovation. The main challenge is to shift production from eggs into cell cultures--a medium already used to make most other vaccines. Flu vaccines are harder than most to produce this way, but several biotech companies are now pursuing this strategy, and one culture-based product (Solvay Pharmaceuticals' Invivac) has been cleared for marketing in Europe. For Americans, the immediate challenge is to make the most of a limited supply. The government estimates that 95 million people still qualify for shots under the voluntary restrictions announced last week. That' s nearly twice the number of doses that clinics will have on hand, but only 60 million Americans seek out shots in a normal year. In fact, many experts are hoping the shortage will serve as an awareness campaign--encouraging the people who really need a flu shot to get one.

单选题Questions 18 to 20 are based on the following talk about Jim's health problem. You now have 20 seconds to read Questions 18 to 20.

单选题The National Republican Party is mentioned in line 7 as an example of a group ______ .

单选题What is the author's final judgment on how mass communications deal with intellectual matters?

单选题 {{B}} Questions 17～20 are based on the following talk. You now have 20 seconds to read Questions 17～20.{{/B}}

单选题Which of the following best summarizes the text?

单选题Koalas, an Australian tree-climbing animal, are very particular about what they eat, devoting themselves entirely to a diet of the leaves of eucalyptus trees. But there are problems associated with an exclusive diet of leaves, especially if, like the koala, you happen to be a relatively small animal. One of these problems is that the leaves of trees are rich in fibre, and so resist digestion. Eucalyptus leaves are worse than most, for they contain large amounts of lignin, the indigestible, woody material found in the cell walls of many plants. But there is another drawback for the koala. The ratio of an animal's gut volume to its energy requirements depends on body mass; the smaller it is, the lower the ratio. So tiny leaf-eaters are likely to have difficulty processing sufficient quantities of their poor-quality food to meet their metabolic needs. S. J. Cork and T. J. Dawson of the University of New South Wales and I. D. Hume of the University of New England have made a study of the koala's digestion. They have identified three major factors that allow koalas to exploit its fibre-laden diet. In the first place, the koala has a discerning digestive system; like the rabbit, it can regulate the passage of food through its gut in a way that discriminates between particles of different sizes. The alimentary canal retains and solutes smaller, more digestible particles, while expelling unwanted, coarser matter. This is probably a space-saving exercise; it has the effect of increasing the rate at which raw material can be fed into the system. The second factor behind the koala's success is that it has a low overall requirement for metabolic energy, compared to other Australian animals of similar size. So it saves on its fuel needs. In this respect, the koala is not dissimilar to another slow-moving, leaf eating mammal, the three-toed sloth. Thirdly, eucalyptus leaves have hidden qualities. Despite the large quantity of lignin, such leaves are rich in digestible energy -especially in the form of fatty substances. Not all such resources are available to the koala's metabolic machinery; essential oils are passed out, for example. But some fatty substances are available, as are sugar and starch. It is these compounds that satisfy the bulk of the koala's energy needs. Surprisingly, constituents of the eucalyptus's cell walls, such as cellulose, are less important. Some cellulose is digested, but the koala's accomplishments in this field do not rival those of other animals that reshow.

单选题 {{B}}Questions 14 ～ 16 are based on the following talk. You now have 15 seconds to read Questions 14 ～ 16.{{/B}}