2013年職稱英語理工類閱讀理解試題及答案(二)

　　Why Humans Walk on Two Legs

　　A team of scientists that studied chimpanzees trained to use treadmills has gathered new evidence suggesting that our earliest apelike ancestors started walking on two legs because it required less energy than getting around on all fours.

　　“When our earliest ancestors started walking on two legs，they took the first steps toward becoming human,” said lead researcher Michael Sockol of UC Davis1.“Our findings help an,swer why.” Sockol worked for two years to find an animal trainer willing to coax adult chimps to walk on two legs and to “knucklewalk” on all fours on the sort of treadmill found in most gyms.

　　The five chimps also wore face masks used to help the researchers measure oxygen consumption.While the chimps worked out，the scientists collected metabolic and other data that allowed them to calculate which method of locomotion used less energy and why.The team gathered the same information for four adult humans walking on a treadmill.

　　Tile researchers found that human walking used about 75 percent less energy and burned 75 percent fewer calories than quadrupedal and bipedal2 walking in chimpanzees. They also found that for some but not all of the chimps，walking on two legs was no more costly than knucklewalking.

　　“We were prepared to find that all of the chimps used more energy walking on two legs but that finding wouldn’t have been as interesting,” Sockol said.“What we found was much more telling. For three chimps，bipedalism3 was more expensive，but for the other two chimps，this wasn’t the case.One spent about the same energy walking on two legs as on four.The other used less energy walking upright.” These two chimps had different gaits and anatomy than their knucklewalking peers.

　　Taken together，the findings provide support for the hypothesis that anatomical differences affecting gait existed among our earliest apelike ancestors，and that these differences provided the genetic variation which natural selection could act on when changes in the environment gave bipeds an advantage over quadrupeds.

　　Fossil and molecular evidence suggests the earliest ancestors of the human family lived in forested areas in equatorial Africa in the late Miocene era some 8 to 10 million years ago，when changes in climate may have increased in distance between food patches.That would have forced our earliest ancestors to travel longer distances on the ground and favored those who could cover more ground using less energy.

　　“This isn't the complete answer,” Soekol said.“But it’s a good piece of a puzzle humans have always wondered about;How and why did we become human? And why do we alone walk on two legs?”

　　詞匯：

　　chimpanzee/5tFimpEn5zi:/n.黑猩猩 (又作 chimp )

　　biped/5baiped/n.二足動(dòng)物

　　gait/^eit/n.步態(tài)，步法

　　anatomic/7AnE5tCmik/adj.解剖 (學(xué))的

　　quadruped/5kwCdrJped/n.四足動(dòng)物的

　　Miocene/5maiEsi:n/n.&.adj.中新世 (的)

　　Calorie/5kAlEri/n.卡 (路里) ,小卡

　　treadmill/5tredmIl/n.踏輪;踏車;單調(diào)工作

　　coax/kEuks/v.哄，哄勸

　　knucklewalk v.用膝關(guān)節(jié)走路

　　metabolic/7metE5bClik/adj.(新陳) 代謝的

　　locomotion/lEJkE5mEJF(E)n/n.運(yùn)動(dòng) (力)

　　注釋：

　　1. UC Davis：加州大學(xué)戴維斯分校。UC是University of California(加利福尼亞大學(xué))的縮寫，該校有多個(gè)分校，UC Davis是其中一個(gè)。Davis以前是UC Berkeley分校的農(nóng)學(xué)院，后來獨(dú)立小來。Davis是一個(gè)大學(xué)城，很小的城市，Davis校園基本就構(gòu)成了這個(gè)城市。

　　2. quadrupedal andbipedal：quad-：構(gòu)詞詞素，是“四”的意思;bi-：構(gòu)詞詞素，是“二”的意思; ped-：構(gòu)詞詞素，是“腳”的意思;-al是構(gòu)成形容詞的后綴，表示“……的”。因此，quadrupedal 意為“凹足動(dòng)物的”，bipedal意為“二足動(dòng)物的”。

　　3. bipedalism：系bipedal(二足動(dòng)物的)的對應(yīng)名詞，這里后綴-ism表示“特征”、“特性”。

　　練習(xí)：

　　1. What did Michael Sockol and his team find out in their study of chimpanzees?

　　A Tile evidence why chimpanzees can be trained to use treadmills.

　　B The evidence why our apelike ancestors came to walk on four legs.

　　C The evidence why our apelike ancestors came to walk on two legs.

　　D The evidence why chimpanzees can be trained to walk on two legs.

　　2. Which of the following best interprets the meaning of “While the chimps

　　worked out .... ” (the first sentence of the third paragraph)?

　　A While the chimps worked in the lab ...

　　B While the chimps exercised in the gym ...

　　C While the chimps tried to figure out what they should do ...

　　D While the chimps tried to understand the instructions ...

　　3. What was the result of the finding，according to Paragraph 5?

　　A Three chimps used more energy walking on two legs.

　　B One chimp used less energy walking on two legs.

　　C One chimp used about the same energy walking on two legs as on four.

　　D All of the above.

　　4. What was true of the hypothesis of the research?

　　A Our apelike ancestors were anatomically different but had the same gaits.

　　B Bipeds with natural selection had an advantage over quadruped.

　　C Our apelike ancestors could adapt to different climate changes due to genetic variation.

　　D Bipeds had an advantage over quadrupeds due to changes in the environment.

　　5. What does fossil and molecular evidence tell us about our earliest ancestors?

　　A They experienced more climate changes than we do today.

　　B Due to changes in climate，they were forced to travel between food patches.

　　C They could cover more ground than their quadrupedal peers because they used less energy.

　　D They could travel longer distances on the ground than those who could use less energy.

　　答案與題解：

　　1. C 短文的第一段直接回答了這個(gè)問題。

　　2. B worked out在此是“運(yùn)動(dòng)，鍛煉”的意思，所以選擇B。

　　3. D 第五段的第三、第四和第五句提供了答案。bipedalism was more expensive的意思是：兩足行走消耗更多的體能。walking upright的意思是：直立行走，即兩足行走。

　　4. B 第六段告訴了我們研究的兩個(gè)假設(shè)：猿人祖先在解剖學(xué)意義上存在著差異，這一差異影響了它們的步態(tài);這些差異在自然選擇的過程中決定了遺傳變異，而環(huán)境變化使得兩足行走的猿人比起四足行走的猿人更有戰(zhàn)勢。A、C、D都不是正確的說法，只有B在該段中被提到。

　　5. C 倒數(shù)第二段提供了問題的答案。travel longer distances用的是比較級，這里是將兩足行走的猿人與上文中四足行走的猿人做比較。those who could cover more ground using less energy指的是上文提到的與四足行走的猿人相比，體能消耗較小的兩足行走猿人。其他選擇都不是正確說法。

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