2018年可锐考研英语阅读真题范文
2018年可锐考研英语经典阅读试题
2018年可锐考研英语经典阅读试题（一）[经济学类]Recent years have brought minority-owned businesses in the United States unprecedented opportunities —as well as new and significant risks. Civil rights activists have long argued that one of the principal reasons why Blacks, Hispanics, and other minority groups have difficulty establishing themselves in business is that they lack access to the sizable orders and subcontracts that are generated by large companies. Now Congress, in apparent agreement, has required by law that businesses awarded federal contracts of more than $500,000 do their best to find minority subcontractors and record their efforts to do so on forms filed with the government. Indeed, some federal and local agencies have gone so far as to set specific percentage goals for apportioning parts of public works contracts to minority enterprises.Corporate response appears to have been substantial. According to figures collected in 1977, the total of corporate contracts with minority businesses rose from $77 million in 1972 to $1.1 billion in 1977. The projected total of corporate contracts with minority businesses for the early 1980’s is estimated to be over 53 billion per year with no letup anticipated in the next decade.Promising as it is for minority businesses, this increased patronage poses dangers for them, too. First, minority firms risk expanding too fast and overextending themselves financially, since most are small concerns and, unlike large businesses, they often need to make substantial investments in new plants, staff, equipment, and the like in order to perform work subcontracted to them. If, thereafter, their subcontracts are for some reason reduced, such firms can face potentially crippling fixed expenses. The world of corporate purchasing can be frustrating for small entrepreneurs who get requests for elaborate formal estimates and bids. Both consume valuable time and resources, and a small company’s efforts must soon result in orders, or both the morale and the financial health of the business will suffer.A second risk is that White-owned companies may seek to cash in on the increasing apportionments through formation of joint ventures with minority-owned concerns. Of course, in many instances there are legitimate reasons for joint ventures; clearly, White and minority enterprises can team up to acquire business that neither could acquire alone. But civil rights groups and minority business owners have complained to Congress about minorities being set up as “fronts”with White backing, rather than being accepted as full partners in legitimate joint ventures.Third, a minority enterprise that secures the business of one large corporate customer often run the danger of becoming- and remaining-dependent. Even in the best of circumstances, fierce competition from larger, more established companies makes it difficult for small concerns to broaden their customer bases: when such firms have nearly guaranteed orders from a single corporate benefactor, they may truly have to struggle against complacency arising from their current success.1. The primary purpose of the text is to[A] present a commonplace idea and its inaccuracies.[B] describe a situation and its potential drawbacks.[C] propose a temporary solution to a problem.[D] analyze a frequent source of disagreement.2. The text suggests that the failure of a large business to have its bids for subcontracts result quickly in orders might causes it to[A] experience frustration but not serious financial harm.[B] face potentially crippling fixed expenses.[C] have to record its efforts on forms filed with the government.[D] increase its spending with minority subcontractors.3. It can be inferred from the text that, compared with the requirements of law, the percentage goals set by “some federal and local agencies”are[A] more popular with large corporations.[B] more concrete.[C] less controversial.[D] less expensive to enforce.4. Which of the following, if true, would most weaken the author’s assertion that, in the 1970’s, corporate response to federal requirements was substantial?[A] Corporate contracts with minority-owned businesses totaled $2 billion in 1979.[B] Between 1970 and 1972, corporate contracts with minority-owned businesses declined by 25 percent.[C] The figures collected in 1977 underrepresented the extent of corporate contracts with minority-owned businesses.[D] The $1.1 billion represented the same percentage of total corporate spending in 1977 asdid $77 million in 1972.5. The author would most likely agree with which of the following statements about corporate response to working with minority subcontractors?[A] Annoyed by the proliferation of “front”organizations, corporations are likely to reduce their efforts to work with minority-owned subcontractors in the near future.[B] Although corporations showed considerable interest in working with minority businesses in the 1970’s, their aversion to government paperwork made them reluctant to pursue many government contracts.[C] The significant response of corporations in the 1970’s is likely to be sustained and conceivably be increased throughout the 1980’s.[D] Although corporations are eager to cooperate with minority-owned businesses, a shortage of capital in the 1970’s made substantial response impossible.二．The fossil remains of the first flying vertebrates, the pterosaurs, have intrigued paleontologists for more than two centuries. How such large creatures, which weighed in some cases as much as a piloted hang-glider and had wingspans from 8 to 12 meters, solved the problems of powered flight, and exactly what these creatures were —reptiles or birds —are among the questions scientists have puzzled over.Perhaps the least controversial assertion about the pterosaurs is that they were reptiles. Their skulls, pelvises, and hind feet are reptilian. The anatomy of their wings suggests that they did not evolve into the class of birds. In pterosaurs a greatly elongated fourth finger of each forelimb supported a winglike membrane. The other fingers were short and reptilian, with sharpclaws. In birds the second finger is the principal strut of the wing, which consists primarily of feathers. If the pterosaurs walked on all fours, the three short fingers may have been employed for grasping. When a pterosaur walked or remained stationary, the fourth finger, and with it the wing, could only turn upward in an extended inverted V shape along each side of the animal’s body.The pterosaurs resembled both birds and bats in their overall structure and proportions. This is not surprising because the design of any flying vertebrate is subject to aerodynamic constraints. Both the pterosaurs and the birds have hollow bones, a feature that represents a savings in weight. In the birds, however, these bones are reinforced more massively by internal struts.Although scales typically cover reptiles, the pterosaurs probably had hairy coats. T. H. Huxley reasoned that flying vertebrates must have been warm-blooded because flying implies a high rate of metabolism, which in turn implies a high internal temperature. Huxley speculated that a coatof hair would insulate against loss of body heat and might streamline the body to reduce drag in flight. The recent discovery of a pterosaur specimen covered in long, dense, and relatively thick hairlike fossil material was the first clear evidence that his reasoning was correct.Efforts to explain how the pterosaurs became airborne have led to suggestions that they launched themselves by jumping from cliffs, by dropping from trees, or even by rising into light winds from the crests of waves. Each hypothesis has its difficulties. The first wrongly assumes that the pterosaurs’hind feet resembled a bat’s and could serve as hooks by which the animal could hang in preparation for flight. The second hypothesis seems unlikely because large pterosaurs could not have landed in trees without damaging their wings. The third calls for high waves to channel updrafts. The wind that made such waves however, might have been too strong for the pterosaurs to control their flight once airborne.1. It can be inferred from the text that scientist now generally agree that the[A] enormous wingspan of the pterosaurs enabled them to fly great distances.[B] structure of the skeleton of the pterosaurs suggests a close evolutionary relationship to bats.[C] fossil remains of the pterosaurs reveal how they solved the problem of powered flight.[D] pterosaurs were reptiles.2. The author views the idea that the pterosaurs became airborne by rising into light winds created by waves as[A] revolutionary.[B] unlikely.[C] unassailable.[D] probable.3. According to the text, the skeleton of a pterosaur can be distinguished from that of a bird by the[A] size of its wingspan.[B] presence of hollow spaces in its bones.[C] anatomic origin of its wing strut.[D] presence of hooklike projections on its hind feet.4. The ideas attributed to T. H. Huxley in the text suggest that he would most likely agree with which of the following statements?[A] An animal’s brain size has little bearing on its ability to master complex behaviors.[B] An animal’s appearance is often influenced by environmental requirements and physical capabilities.[C] Animals within a given family group are unlikely to change their appearance dramatically over a period of time.[D] The origin of flight in vertebrates was an accidental development rather than the outcome of specialization or adaptation.5. Which of the following best describes the organization of the last paragraph of the text?[A] New evidence is introduced to support a traditional point of view.[B] Three explanations for a phenomenon are presented and each is disputed by means of specific information.[C] Three hypotheses are outlined and evidence supporting each is given.[D] Recent discoveries are described and their implications for future study are projected.。
2018年可锐考研英语作文1[精选5篇]
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2018年可锐考研英语作文1[精选5篇]第一篇：2018年可锐考研英语作文12018年可锐考研英语作文范文（一）1.推荐信： Directions:One of your friends wants to apply for a job working with foreign teenagers.Write a letter to recommend him/her, describe his/her past experience, and explain the reasons.Dear Sir or Madam，I am writing to recommend one of my best friends, Zhou Botong, for this post.With his outstanding leadership and cheerful personality, he was elected chairperson of the Student Union of Tsinghua University several times.Busy as he was, he completed his major, teenage psychology, with an outstanding school record.Upon graduation he was assigned to be a teacher in Tsinghua Middle School.What is more, he loves his job and enjoys working with children.This won him great popularity among his students.Therefore, I do not hesitate to recommend him as an ideal candidate for the post you advertised.I am sure you will make a wise decision in hiring him.Yours sincerely，Li Ming2.爱心/奉献 Directions:Among all the worthy feelings of mankind, love is probably the noblest, but everyone has his or her own understanding of it.There has been a discussion recently on the issue in a newspaper.Write an essay to the newspaper to1)Show your understanding of the symbolic meaning of the pictures below.2)Give a specific example, andWhen we use the word “love”, we do not simply mean an attraction to a person of the opposite sex, which is a very narrow definition of the word.The picture below illustrates the realmeaning of love, by stressing the fact that love is emotional strength, which can support us no matter how dark the world around us becomes.As a matter of fact, throughout history people of many different cultures have regarded love as the most sublime of human emotions.As an illustration of the power of love, we should remember how the Chinese people of all nationalities respond to the call to help the victims of the deadly earthquake in Sichuan Province.Although their incomes are still low by international standards, people all over the country do not hesitate to donate whatever they can——be it money or goods——to help their needy fellow citizens.Furthermore, they do this with no thought of gain for themselves.It is my view that the best way to show love is to help people who are more unfortunate than we are.We should always be ready to give a helping hand to those who are in trouble, no matter whether they are family members or complete strangers.Only by doing so can we help to make the world a better place, for, as the picture shows, the darker the shadows of sorrow become, the more brightly the lamp of love shines.3.感谢信： Directions: After being involved in an accident, you were looked after by Mr.Shakespeare.Write a special letter to express your thanks.Dear Mr.Shakespeare，I am writing to express my heartfelt gratitude.I am referring to that unfortunate accident the other day, when I was knocked off my bike by a taxi.If it had not been for your timely assistance in giving me first aid, I fear that the consequences might have been much serious.Everyone agrees that it was your quick-witted response in that emergency that has led to this satisfactory outcome.Although nowadays people in mounting numbers talk about the need to be unselfish, we see very few people practice what they preach.If there were morepeople like you, this world would be a much nicer place.Yours sincerely，Li MingDirections:You want to study at a certain foreign university.Write a letter to ask about the situation there as regards accommodation and fees, possible scholarships, and what qualifications one needs for acceptance.Dear Sir or Madam，I am a Chinese student who wishes to apply for admission into your prestigious university.My plan is to start my course next term, and I would be grateful if you would be kind enough to provide me with certain essential information.First, what qualifications do I need to follow a course of study at your university? I already have a bachelor’s degree from Beijing University, but I wonder if there are any further academic requirements.Second, how much are the tuition fees? Although I intend to be self-supporting, I would be interested to hear if there are any scholarships available for international students.Third, what is the situation as regards accommodation?I look forward to your reply, and to attending your esteemed institution.Yours sincerely，Li Ming5.责任/两代关系 Directions:care and unrelenting work of their parents, how could they have grown up healthy and successful? How could it possible for them to go about without the pricks of conscience?Everyone of us should live up to the virtues passed down to us by our ancestors Only in this way can we be worthy of the name of a Chinese.第二篇：2018年可锐考研英语阅读文章精选2018年可锐考研英语阅读文章精选（五）Gene therapy基因疗法Genetic mutations predict which cancers willrespond to treatment基因突变将预测某种治疗会对哪些癌症起作用THE International Cancer Genome Consortium, analliance of laboratories that is trying to produce adefinitive list of the genetic mutations that causecancer, is accumulating data at an astonishing rate.About 3,000 individual breast tumours,for example, have now had their genotypes published.But these data will not, bythemselves, help patients.For that, they have to be collected in the context of a drug trial.And this is just what Matthew Ellis and his colleagues at Washington University in St Louishave done for women suffering from breast cancer.Their methods, if they prove to work forother cancers too, may revolutionise treatment.国际癌症基因组协作组是试图建立一份会引起癌症的基因突变完整清单的实验室联盟，它积累数据的速度让人吃惊。
2018年可锐考研英语复习阅读文章推荐
2018年可锐考研英语复习阅读文章推荐（二）Starbucks星巴克Just add water加水即成The ailing giant turns to instant coffee for apick-me-up亏损巨头靠速溶咖啡来提神NO ONE can accuse Howard Schultz of inaction since he returned as chief executive ofStarbucks,没有人可以指责重回星巴克的首席执行官霍华德·舒尔茨的无所作为，the firm he built into a multinational only to watch it stumble under his successor.他只是没想到看着他一手建起的跨国公司绊倒在他的继任者脚下。
Barely a month has gone by over the past year without the firm announcing some newinitiative or other.在过去的一年公司没有公布任何新的咖啡饮料，仅仅不到一个月，The latest came on February 17th in New York, when Mr Schultz unveiled Via, an instantcoffee which, he claims,2月17日在纽约，舒尔茨先生推出Via，一种速溶咖啡，他声称，tastes just as good as Java brewed in the shop by one of the firm s baristas.其味道和星巴克咖啡大师在店里调配的Java一样香醇。
Mr Schultz hopes to win a share of the $17 billion or so the world spends on instant coffee —aproduct which, he sniffs, has not improved in decades.舒尔茨先生希望赢得全球花在速溶咖啡约170亿美元上的一点份额—速溶咖啡，他嗤之以鼻地说，在过去的几十年里一点儿没改进。
2018年可锐考研英语阅读真题范文
2018年可锐考研英语阅读真题范文（七）Don’t shoot the messengerThey poison the mind and corrupt the morals of the young, who waste their time sitting on sofas immersed in dangerous fantasy worlds. That, at least, was the charge levelled against novels during the 18th century by critics worried about the impact of a new medium on young people. Today the idea that novels can harm people sounds daft. And that is surely how history will judge modern criticism of video games, which are accused of turning young people into violent criminals. This week European justice ministers met to discuss how best to restrict the sale of violent games to children. Some countries, such as Germany, believe the answer is to ban some games altogether. That is going too far. Criticism of games is merely the latest example of a tendency to demonise new and unfamiliar forms of entertainment. In 1816 waltzing was condemned as a fatal contagion that encouraged promiscuity; in 1910 films were denounced as an evil pure and simple, destructive of social interchange in the 1950s rock ’n’roll music was said to turn young people into devil worshippers and comic books were accused of turning children into drug addicts and criminals. In each case the pattern is the same: young people adopt a new form of entertainment, older people are spooked by its unfamiliarity and condemn it, but eventually the young grow up and the new medium becomes accepted-at which point another example appears and the cycle begins again. The opposition to video games is founded on the mistaken belief that most gamers are children. In fact, twothirds of gamers are over 18 and the average gamer is around 30. But the assumption that gamers are mostly children leads to a double standard. Violent films are permitted and the notion that some films are unsuitable for children is generally understood. Yet different rules are applied to games. Aren’t games different because they are interactive? It is true that video games can make people feel excited or aggressive, but so do many sports. There is no evidence that videogaming causes longterm aggression. Games ought to be agerated, just as films are, and retailers should not sell adultrated games to children any more than they should sell them adultrated films. Ratings schemes are already in place, and in some countries restrictions on the sale of adultrated games to minors have the force of law. Oddly enough, Hillary Clinton, one of the politicians who has led the criticism of the gaming industry in America, has recently come round to this view. Last month she emphasised the need for parents to pay more attention to game ratings and called on the industry, retailers and parents to work together. But this week some European politicians seemed to be moving in the other direction: the Netherlands may follow Germany, for example, in banning some games outright. Not all adults wish to play violent games, just as not all of them enjoy violent movies. But they should be free to do so if they wish.二．Doughnut adjust your setHAVE you ever seen anything on television that made you shout or shake your fist in anger at the screen? Televisions are, of course, unable to respond to such reactions. But that could beabout to change. Controlling your television and other home entertainment devices using voice commands or gestures is starting to become possible thanks to a new generation of controllers.Consider, for example, the controller that went on sale last month with Nintendo’s Wii games console. In place of the usual combination of buttons and joysticks, the Wii has a motionsensitive controller. The console can determine how the controller is moving in space and what it is pointing at, and uses that information to control what is happening on screen. Depending on the game, the controller becomes a warrior’s sword or a golf club.For some games, the controller connects up via a cable to a second, smaller handset called the Nunchuk after the weapon favoured by Bruce Lee in his martial arts movies . It is then possible to use one controller for movement, and the other to fire weapons or use items. The number of buttons on both controllers has been reduced to a minimum, as Nintendo hopes to draw in new customers who find existing games consoles too complicated. But whether the Wii will introduce a generation of grandmothers to the joys of karate games remains to be seen.This living room overload is likely to get worse as telecoms operators launch a new generation of television over broadband services, using a technology called IPTV. This will make possible thousands of channels, downloadable programs and films, plus messaging, internet access and games. It will also involve the biggest and most complicated controllers ever seen. The experience isn’t as good as it could be, says Michael Cai of Parks Associates, a consultancy. So some companies believe a new approach is needed.Other companies have looked at using speech based controllers in the living room. One firm, Promptu, developed a voice control system for American cable operators and tested it in conjunction with Motorola, which makes set top boxes. But it has now decided to reposition the technology as a voice based navigation system for mobile phones. A simpler approach is taken by the In Voca voice activated remote control. It is a universal remote control that can recognise 50 separate commands spoken by up to four separate users, from lower volume to Cartoon Network .A recent entry to the field is Apple Computer, a firm renowned for designing elegant, easy to use products. In 2007 it will launch a new device, called the iTV, that acts as a bridge between a television and a computer. It has a deliberately simple remote control that, like Apple’s iconic iPod music player, involves just one button and one wheel. Steve Jobs, the company’s boss, boasts that it is very Apple . Might his company be the one to solve the remote control confusion?三．Behind the bleeding edgeMANKIND’S progress in developing new gizmos is often referred to as the march of technology . That conjures up images of constant and relentless forward movement orchestrated with military precision. In reality, technological progress is rather less orderly. Some technologies do indeed improve at such a predictable pace that they obey simple formulae such as Moore’s law, which acts as a battle plan for the semiconductor industry. Other technologies proceed by painful lurches-think of third generation mobile phones, or new versions of Microsoft Windows. And there are some cases, particularly in the developing world, when technological progress takes the form of a leapfrog.Such leapfrogging involves adopting a new technology directly, and skipping over the earlier, inferior versions of it that came before. By far the best known example is that of mobile phones in the developing world. Fixed line networks are poor or non existent in many developing countries, so people have leapfrogged straight to mobile phones instead. The number of mobile phones now far outstrips the number of fixed line telephones in China, India and sub Saharan Africa.There are other examples. Incandescent light bulbs, introduced in the late 1870s, are slowly being displaced in the developed world by more energy efficient lightemitting diodes , in applications from traffic lights to domestic lighting. LEDs could, however, have an even greater impact in parts of the developing world that lack mains power and electric lighting altogether. LEDs’greater energy efficiency makes it possible to run them from batteries charged by solar panels during the day.Being behind the bleeding edge of technological development can sometimes be a good thing, in short. It means that early versions of a technology, which may be buggy, unreliable or otherwise inferior, can be avoided. America, for example, was the first country to adopt colour television, which explains why American television still looks so bad today: other countries came to the technology later and adopted technically superior standards.The lesson to be drawn from all of this is that it is wrong to assume that developing countries will follow the same technological course as developed nations. Having skipped fixed line telephones, some parts of the world may well skip desktop computers in favour of portable devices, for example. Entire economies may even leapfrog from agriculture straight to hightech industries. That is what happened in Israel, which went from citrus farming to microchips; India, similarly, is doing its best to jump straight to a hightech service economy.Those who anticipate and facilitate leapfrogging can prosper as a result. Those who fail to see it coming risk being jumped over. Kodak, for example, hit by the sudden rise of digital cameras in the developed world, wrongly assumed that it would still be able to sell old fashioned film and film cameras in China instead. But the emerging Chinese middle classes leapfrogged straight to digital cameras-and even those are now outnumbered by camera phones.。
2018年可锐考研英语阅读文章精选
2018年可锐考研英语阅读文章精选（十）Fossil feathers羽毛化石Not just for the birds并非鸟类独有A trove of fossils sheds light on the evolution of feathers珍贵羽毛化石的发现能够更好地阐释羽毛的进化过程THE fossil record is, famously, full of holes.众所周知，化石记录总是漏洞百出。
One such lacuna has been the absence of well-preserved feathers from the Cretaceous-theperiod between 145m and 65m years ago that ended with the mass extinction that wipedout the dinosaurs.一个漏洞就是由于人们无法找到白垩纪时期保存完好的羽毛，因而该时期羽毛化石的记录一直处于空白状态。
白垩纪是距今1.45亿年到6500万年的一段时期，末期发生了导致恐龙消失的物种大灭绝。
Now, this gap has been partly filled.如今，这段空白得到了部分填充。
In this week s Science, a team led by Ryan McKellar from the University of Alberta report thediscovery of eleven feathers preserved in amber from the latter part of the Cretaceous,about 70m-85m years ago.本周，瑞安?麦凯乐领导的研究小组在《科学》杂志上发表报告称，他们发现了11种白垩纪后期封存在琥珀里的羽毛。
Intriguingly, not all of them seem to come from birds.有趣的是，这些羽毛并不都属于鸟类。
2018年可锐考研英语阅读文章精选
2018年可锐考研英语阅读文章精选第一篇：2018年可锐考研英语阅读文章精选2018年可锐考研英语阅读文章精选（三）Facebook and privacy Sorry, friends脸谱和用户隐私对不起，朋友The giant social network is castigated for serious privacy failings社交网巨头因严重隐私缺陷而遭受公众谴责FACEBOOK has been playing with fire and has got its fingers burned, again.脸谱一直在玩火，这次它又烧伤了自己的指头。
On November 29th America s Federal Trade Commission announced that it hadreached a draft settlement with the giant social network over allegations that it hadmisled people about its use of their personal data.11月29日美国联邦贸易委员会声明已和该社交网巨头关于公众对它欺骗用户、滥用用户个人信息的控诉初步达成解决方案。
The details of the settlement make clear that Facebook, which boasts over 800m users,betrayed its users trust.这份解决方案的细目明确说明，脸谱网背叛了它所声称的八亿用户的信任。
It is also notable because it appears to be part of a broader attempt by the FTC to craft anew privacy framework to deal with the swift rise of social networks in America.FTC有个更大的计划，那就是创建一个新的隐私框架以应对美国快速攀升的社交网用户。
2018年可锐考研英语阅读文章精选
2018年可锐考研英语阅读文章精选（六）Palaeontology Do the locomotion古生物学活动活动The earliest animal tracks yet found have been unearthed in Canada在加拿大出土了迄今为止发现的最早动物足迹ONE of the greatest mysteries of the history of life is the Cambrian explosion.寒武纪的大爆炸是生命史中最大的谜团之一。
Prior to 560m years ago, animal fossils are rare.5.6亿年以前的动物化石寥寥无几。
Then, in a geological eyeblink, they become common.然而，只过了地质史上一瞬间的功夫，它们便多得不足为奇了。
Shelly creatures such as trilobites and brachiopods, of whose ancestors there is little sign inthe rocks, are suddenly everywhere.像三叶虫、腕足动物此般壳类动物的祖先没有在岩层中留下什么痕迹，但它们的遗迹却突然间比比皆是。
Biologists would dearly love to know what happened.生物学家们迫不及待地想知道当时到底发生了什么。
Recent discoveries at the delightfully named Mistaken Point, in Newfoundland, serve to lift theveil slightly.纽芬兰岛上有个地方名字很有趣，叫“错误点”，正是最近在这里的一些发现轻轻掀起了这个神秘面纱的一角。
These findings are not of Precambrian animals themselves, but of their tracks. And these,paradoxically, may be more useful.发现的并不是寒武纪前的动物本身，而是它们的足迹。
2018年可锐考研英语阅读文章精选
2018年可锐考研英语阅读文章精选（五）Gene therapy基因疗法Genetic mutations predict which cancers willrespond to treatment基因突变将预测某种治疗会对哪些癌症起作用THE International Cancer Genome Consortium, analliance of laboratories that is trying to produce adefinitive list of the genetic mutations that causecancer, is accumulating data at an astonishing rate. About 3,000 individual breast tumours,for example, have now had their genotypes published. But these data will not, bythemselves, help patients. For that, they have to be collected in the context of a drug trial.And this is just what Matthew Ellis and his colleagues at Washington University in St Louishave done for women suffering from breast cancer. Their methods, if they prove to work forother cancers too, may revolutionise treatment.国际癌症基因组协作组是试图建立一份会引起癌症的基因突变完整清单的实验室联盟，它积累数据的速度让人吃惊。
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2018年可锐考研英语阅读真题范文（四）Microsoft brings instant chat to TV screen,through gamesMicrosoft planned to announce today that it will make its Windows Live Messenger service available on its Xbox 360 game consoles, bringing instant messaging from the computer to the television.The move was meant to help Microsoft stay ahead of Sony, its chief rival in the electronic games business, in delivering the richest online experience for game players. It is also an element of Microsofts overall strategy to connect people across PCs, televisions and mobile devices like cellphones.More than 200 million people use Windows Live Messenger to chat with friends, family members and colleagues. Separately, more than six million Xbox 360 owners are connected to the companys Xbox Live online community, an enhancement that lets people with broadband Internet connections communicate with one another.In the second week of May, those two worlds will begin to converge. Xbox Live members will be able to link their gamertag ,the online identity they use within the Xbox community, to an existing Windows Live Messenger account. Players will then be able to chat with their instant messaging contacts using a virtual on screen keyboard or a USB keyboard plugged into the game machine.Microsoft executives said they hoped to offer voice chat between Xbox and Live Messenger users later this year.We feel this is a huge step in driving social networking further into the family room by allowing Xbox 360 users to IM directly from their couch, said John Rodman, Microsofts group manager for the Xbox 360, in a telephone interview last week. Now you dont have to manage two separate groups of friends online.Microsoft and Sony are battling to dominate the high end of the console gaming market. In years past, game consoles stood out from one another mostly by their game offerings. But now it appears that top game publishers like Electronic Arts will release most of their biggest games for both the Xbox 360 and Sonys PlayStation 3.As a result, Microsoft and Sony are attempting to differentiate their game machines with other features, like film playback capabilities and online services.Microsoft has been ahead of Sony in online console game playing, but last month Sony announced that it was developing a new Internet service called PlayStation Home that could surpass some elements of Xbox Live. The instant messaging feature appears to be one part of Microsofts response.二．From Genes to GMOsToday, genes can be isolated, identified, and cloned, then inserted into other organisms to alter their traits. The process is called genetic engineering. For this technology to develop, a few tools were necessary. In the 1970s, scientists isolated bacterial plasmids. These are hula hoop shaped double stranded units of DNA that can be moved easily from one cell to another. They also discovered scissors, called restriction enzymes for cutting the DNA into predictable, reproducible patterns. These enzymes are used to snip apart plasmids at very specific DNA sequences, leaving free ends that can be rejoined as the scientist chooses. Restriction enzymes occur in bacteria as part of a natural defense mechanism to guard against invading viruses. Many different types are now available, each cutting DNA at a different sequence of base pairs.Once a plasmid is snipped open, a foreign piece of DNA, cut by the same enzyme scissors, can be taped, end to end, into the plasmid using another enzyme, DNA ligase. This is the glue that sticks all the pieces together. The new plasmid is inserted back into a cell, where numerous copies can be made. Introduction of specific genetic material into rapidly reproducing target bacteria can turn the cells into miniature factories for production of useful substances. For example, when the Exxon Valdez oil freighter ran aground in 1989 and spilled thirty eight million liters of oil, oil eating bacteria, created in just this manner, were used in the cleanup operation. The oil was broken down five times faster with help from the genetically modified organisms .Plasmid technology has also been developed for moving targeted genetic material into plants. In this technique, scientists use the plasmid from a bacterium that causes tumors on plants. In nature, this bacterium transfers genetic material into plant tissues by releasing plasmids onto damaged plant cells. The plasmids enter the plant tissue and produce a swelling, or tumor. Because of this special ability to invade plant tissue, these tumor inducing plasmids are now used routinely as taxi cabs to carry target genes into a wide variety of plant cells, including, for example, corn. The European corn borer is a common pest in this economically valuable crop. When pesticides are used against them, timing is critical. If sprayed too late, the corn borer will already have made a home inside the corn stem and will not be killed. CIBA Research was the first company to develop what has become commonly known as Bt corn. It contains genes that allow it to resist infestation by the corn borer. The Bt genes came from a bacterium called Bacillus thuring ensis . It produces a protein called Bt protoxin. When an insect larva eats these bacteria, the toxin contained in the bacterium attaches to the insect s gut and makes holes in it, and the larva starves to death. Bt corn can be grown using less pesticide, and sometimes even no pesticide.三．Seychelles: A president in paradiseBEST known as a destination for honeymooners in search of perfect white beaches andswaying palms, the Seychelles islands rarely make any sort of headlines. Few tourists would even have noticed the presidential election on July 30th, in which James Michel, leader of the Seychelles Peoples Progressive Front, was returned with 54% of the ballot. For Mr. Michel, it was the first time he had faced the islands 62,000 odd voters, having been promoted from vice president two years ago by his predecessor, Albert René, who had ruled the islands for 27 years since taking power in a coup in 1977.To the casual eye, Seychelles seems both fortunate and well governed. The 115 islands, most of them uninhabited, cover a mere 445 square kilometers of the Indian Ocean, north of Madagascar, and enjoy several advantages over most of the rest of Africa. The weather is never extreme. There is no malaria. The islanders have free education and health care. Their multiracial society is pretty harmonious. With GDP at around $8,000 a head, there is almost no discernible poverty.But this standard of living has come at a cost: the IMF says its public debt is too high and may be unsustainable. Mr. Michels main opposition, the Seychelles National Party, which scored 46% in the elections, claims that Seychelles, per person, is the worlds most indebted country; with some $590m of external debt for just 82,000 people, it is certainly one of them. A black market in foreign currency already exists as speculation persists that the government, unable to meet its obligations, may be forced to devalue. Basic consumer goods sometimes run out. If, as the IMF predicts, GDP falls by over 1% this year, Mr. Michel may find his next five years in power more testing than he had hoped.The country needs more ways of making money. In the cold war, it was easy. The Seychelles played each side off against the other, remaining a member of the Commonwealth as well as the Non Aligned Movement and taking military aid from the Soviet Union while leasing a satellite tracking station to the Americans. Since those streams of revenue dried up, the main Seychellois streams of revenue have been from tourism-leasing land to foreign hoteliers-and from tuna: the government earns about $200m a year from selling tuna fishing licenses to Spain, France and South Korea.But conflict in the Middle East has brought Seychelles an unexpected bonus: Western warships stop off in the islands, which offer rest and recreation. The soldiers and sailors scuba dive, sail and drink Seybrew, the local beer-and pay for it all in hard currency.。