首页
外语
计算机
考研
公务员
职业资格
财经
工程
司法
医学
专升本
自考
实用职业技能
登录
外语
You should spend about 20 minutes on Questions 14-26 which are based on Reading Passage 2 below. THE SEEDHUNTERS With Quarter of
You should spend about 20 minutes on Questions 14-26 which are based on Reading Passage 2 below. THE SEEDHUNTERS With Quarter of
admin
2015-05-04
23
问题
You should spend about 20 minutes on Questions 14-26 which are based on Reading Passage 2 below.
THE SEEDHUNTERS
With Quarter of the world’s plants set to vanish within the next 50 years, Dough Alexander reports on the scientists working against the clock to preserve the Earth’s botanical heritage.
They travel the four corners of the globe, scouring jungles, forests and savannas. But they’re not looking for ancient artefacts, lost treasure or undiscovered tombs. Just pods. It may lack the romantic allure of archaeology, or the whiff of danger that accompanies going after big game, but seed hunting is an increasingly serious business. Some seek seeds for profit — hunters in the employ of biotechnology firms, pharmaceutical companies and private corporations on the lookout for species that will yield the drugs or crops of the future. Others collect to conserve, working to halt the sad slide into extinction facing so many plant species.
Among the pioneers of this botanical treasure hunt was John Tradescant, an English royal gardener who brought back plants and seeds from his journeys abroad in the early 1600s. Later, the English botanist Sir Joseph Banks — who was the first director of the Royal Botanic Gardens at Kew and travelled with Captain James Cook on his voyages near the end of the 18th century — was so driven to expand his collections that he sent botanists around the world at his own expense.
Those heady days of exploration and discovery may be over, but they have been replaced by a pressing need to preserve our natural history for the future. This modern mission drives hunters such as Dr Michiel van Slageren, a good-natured Dutchman who often sports a wide-brimmed hat in the field — he could easily be mistaken for the cinematic hero Indiana Jones. He and three other seed hunters work at the Millennium Seed Bank, an £80million international conservation project that aims to protect the world’s most endangered wild plant species.
The group’s headquarters are in a modern glass-and-concrete structure on a 200-hectare estate at Wakehurst Place in the West Sussex countryside. Within its underground vaults are 260 million dried seeds from 122 countries, all stored at -20 Celsius to survive for centuries. Among the 5,100 species represented are virtually all of Britain’s 1,400 native seed-bearing plants, the most complete such collection of any country’s flora.
Overseen by the Royal Botanic Gardens, the Millennium Seed Bank is the world’s largest wild-plant depository. It aims to collect 24,000 species by 2010. The reason is simple: thanks to humanity’s efforts, an estimated 25 per cent of the world’s plants are on the verge of extinction and may vanish within 50 years. We’re currently responsible for habitat destruction on an unprecedented scale, and during the past 400 years, plant species extinction rates have been about 70 times greater than those indicated by the geological record as being ’normal’. Experts predict that during the next 50 years a further one billion hectares of wilderness will be converted to farmland in developing countries alone.
The implications of this loss are enormous. Besides providing staple food crops, plants are a source of many medicines and the principal supply of fuel and building materials in many parts of the world. They also protect soil and help regulate the climate. Yet, across the globe, plant species are being driven to extinction before their potential benefits are discovered.
The World Conservation Union has listed 5,714 threatened plant species worldwide, but it admits this is only scratching the surface. With only four per cent of the world’s described plants having been evaluated, the true number of threatened species is sure to be much higher. In the UK alone, 300 wild plant species are classified as endangered. The Millennium Seed Bank aims to ensure that even if a plant becomes extinct in the wild, it won’t be lost forever. Stored seeds can be used to help restore damaged or destroyed environments or in scientific research to find new benefits for society — in medicine, agriculture or local industry — that would otherwise be lost.
Seed banks are an ’insurance policy’ to protect the world’s plant heritage for the future, explains Dr Paul Smith, another Kew seed hunter. "Seed conservation techniques were originally developed by farmers," he says. "Storage is the basis of what we do, conserving seeds until you can use them —just as in farming." Smith says there’s no reason why any plant species should become extinct, given today’s technology. But he admits that the biggest challenge is finding, naming and categorising all the wood’s plants. And someone has to gather these seeds before it’s too late. "There aren’t a lot of people out there doing this," he says. "The key is to know the flora from a particular area, and that knowledge takes years to acquire."
There are about 1,470 seed banks scattered around the globe, with a combined total of 5.4 million samples, of which perhaps two million are distinct non-duplicates. Most preserve genetic material for agricultural use in order to ensure crop diversity; others aim to conserve wild species, although only 15 per cent of all banked plants are wild.
Many seed banks are themselves under threat due to a lack of funds. Last year, Imperial College, London, examined crop collections from 151 countries and found that while the number of plant samples had increased in two thirds of the countries, budgets had been cut in a quarter and remained static in another 35 per cent. The UN’s Food and Agriculture Organisation and the Consultative Group on International Agricultural Research has since set up the Global Conservation Trust, which aims to raise US$260 million(£156 million)to protect seed banks in perpetuity.
Questions 14-18
Complete the summary below using NO MORE THAN THREE WORDS from the passage.
Write your answers in boxes 14-18 on your answer sheet.
People collect seeds for different purposes: some collect to protect certain species from【R1】______; others collect seeds for their potential to produce【R2】______.
They are called the seed hunters. The【R3】______of them included both gardeners and botanists, such as【R4】______, who sponsored collectors out of his own pocket.
The seeds collected are often stored in seed banks. The most famous among them is known as the Millennium Seed Bank, where seeds are all stored in the【R5】______at low temperature.
【R2】
选项
答案
drugs or crops
解析
利用顺序性原则定位于原文第一段最后两句话“Some seek seeds for profit…onthe lookout for species that will yield the drugs or crops of the future.Others collect toconserve,working to halt the sad slide into extinction facing so many plant species”。原文意思是说有人收集种子是为了牟利,寻找那些具有药用和经济价值的物种,另外一些人是为了保护种子,防止灭绝。所以正确答案为drugs or crops。
转载请注明原文地址:https://jikaoti.com/ti/i1EYFFFM
本试题收录于:
雅思阅读题库雅思(IELTS)分类
0
雅思阅读
雅思(IELTS)
相关试题推荐
Whilechemiststrytoassemblemoleculesusingacombinationoftheoreticalprinciplesandpracticalexperiencetomoldm
Peopleshouldnottakegoodconstitutionforgranted,forhumangeneticcodeis______thedevelopmentof______.
Afool,especiallyifhehasthemisfortuneofknowinganything,should______itaswellashecan.
Wedidnotdiscoverthathisapprehensionconcerningourhypothesiswas______untilwellafterward,followingaseriesofrigorou
Directions:Eachofthefollowingreadingcomprehensionquestionsisbasedonthecontentofthefollowingpassage.Readthepas
Researchhasproventhatunliketheirsober______whosloweddownaftermakingamistaketotrytocorrecttheiractions,menwho
Althoughthescientist’srecommendationsmayhavebeen(i)______,thestudentshadtroublefollowinghis(ii)______presentation
Governmentofficialsauthorized______becausetheywanttohaveacompleteenumerationofthecountry’spopulation.
Althoughchildren’sbooksaboutanimalsandplantsareoften(i)______ratherthanaccurateintheirdescriptions,askillfulele
Abird’splumage,whilecontributingtostructuralintegrityandparticipatinginaeriallocomotion,completelyobscuresabird’
随机试题
下列哪些工具的选项栏中有混合模式选项?
根据国家法律、法规和行政规章,对特定用途的资金进行专项使用和管理而开立的账户是()
周弟弟,3岁,1周前因急性化脓性扁桃体炎入院治疗,发病后患儿出现高热、烦躁不安、哭闹,在扁桃体、颊黏膜等多处出现化脓性病灶,昨日下肢又出现新的化脓病灶,病原学检测同扁桃体处的化脓灶,均由表皮葡萄球菌引起,下肢新部位的化脓病灶是属于()
患者,男性,53岁。口渴多饮3月余。查空腹血糖6.8mmol/L,无糖尿病家族史。为诊断该患者最应该做的实验室检查是
下列不属于大气常规监测项目的是()。
幼儿美术创作基本处于涂鸦期,喜欢用笔随意涂画,处于一个从无表现意图的涂鸦向有表现意图绘画转化的过程。符合这一特征的年龄班是()
2016年6月-8月,某镇连续发生夜间入室盗窃案件,案发时间多在夜深人静之时,被盗地点多是视频监控没有覆盖的出租屋,求助保安的时间严重滞后于发案时间,破案线索极少。如果你是侦查员,下列做法正确的有()。
目前,第五代移动通信(5G)已成为当前和未来全球业界的焦点,将________移动互联网进入新时代,美国高通公司指出,5G技术将成为和电力、互联网等发明一样的通用技术,________未来的转型变革,重新定义工作流程并________经济竞争优势规则,到2
性格结构包括的特征有()
以下端口范围中,(60)是知名端口。
最新回复
(
0
)