Question

【题目】C

Robots are common in today's world. They manufacture cars, work in space, explore oceans, clean up oil spills and investigate dangerous environments. And now, scientists at the University of Manchester are using a robot as a laboratory partner.

The researchers at the university created the robot in 2009 and named it Adam. Despite the name, Adam is not a humanoid robot. It is about the size of a car.

Adam was built to do science and make discoveries. Ross King is the leader of the University of Manchester research team. He says the robot made a discovery about yeast(酵母), a kind of fungus(真菌) used in science as a model for human cells.

"Adam hypothesized certain functions of genes within yeast and experimentally tested these hypothesizes and confirmed them. So it both hypothesized and confirmed new scientific knowledge."

Adam's success as a scientist led to the creation of another robot scientist named Eve. Researchers developed Eve to design and test drugs for tropical and neglected diseases. These diseases kill and infect millions of people each year.

Drug development is slow and costly. Experts say it can take more than 10 years and about $1 billion to discover and develop new medicines. Drug manufacturers are unlikely to get their investment money back.

So the University of Manchester developed a low-cost test that shows whether or not a chemical is likely to be made into an effective medicine. Mr. King says that other drug testing methods were not very effective.

"How it works conventionally is you use robotics as well and you have a large collection of possible drugs. You test every single compound. And you start at the beginning of your library and continue until the end, and stop. So it's not a very intelligent process. The robotics doesn't learn anything as it goes along, even if it's tested a million compounds, it still doesn't have any expectation of what will happen next when it tests a new compound."

Mr. King says that Eve is different because the robot learns as it tests different compounds. He says the robot is designed to ignore compounds that it thinks unlikely to be good. It will only test the compounds which have a good chance of working.

Eve has discovered that a compound known to be effective against cancer might also be used to fight against malaria and other tropical diseases.

Mr. King says he hopes to completely automate the drug testing process with robots like Eve to create and test new chemicals. But he says humans remain in control of the manufacturing process.

【1】Scientists now are using a robot to__________.

A. manufacture cars

B. work in the laboratory

C. work in space

D. explore oceans

【2】The purpose of building Adam is to________.

A. do science and make discoveries

B. help people in poor health

C. do operations on patients

D. bring happiness to scientists

【3】Which is NOT true according to the passage__________?

A. Adam looks like a car

B. Adam's success led to the creation of Eve

C. tropical and neglected diseases diseases kill and infect millions of people

D. Drug manufacturers can get their investment money back

【4】Why was a low-cost test developed__________?

A. Because scientists want to know whether a chemical is likely to be made into an effective medicine

B. Because other drug testing methods were not very effective

C. Because drug development is slow and costly.

D. Because drug manufacturers ask scientists to do so.

【5】What's the main idea of the passage_________?

A. the uses of robots

B. robot is used in science researches

C. scientists are replaced by robots

D. how to make a robot

Answer 1

【答案】

【1】B

【2】A

【3】D

【4】C

【5】B

【解析】

【文章大意】文章主要介绍的是科学家利用机器人来帮助开发新药物。曼彻斯特大学的科学家开发了一款用于协助科学家进行科学研究的机器人，并给它取名“亚当”。

【1】B 细节理解题。根据第一段“And now, scientists at the University of Manchester are using a robot as a laboratory partner.”可知，现在，曼彻斯特大学的科学家把机器人作为实验室搭档。

【2】A 细节理解题。根据第三段“Adam was built to do science and make discoveries”可知，组建机器人亚当是为了让它帮助科学家进行实验研究和科学发现。

【3】D 推理判断题。根据第二段“Adam is not a humanoid robot. It is about the size of a car.”和第五段“Adam's success as a scientist led to the creation of another robot scientist named Eve...tropical and neglected diseases. These diseases kill and infect millions of people each year.”可知A、B、C正确，根据第六段“Drug manufacturers are unlikely to get their investment money back.”可知D项错误。

【4】C 细节理解题。根据“Drug development is slow and costly. Drug manufacturers are unlikely to get their investment money back...So the University”可知，科学家研发低廉的测试方法是因为药物开发既费时又费力。

【5】B 主旨大意题。根据“And now, scientists at the University of Manchester are using a robot as a laboratory partner...Adam's success as a scientist led to the creation of another robot scientist named Eve...Eve has discovered that a compound known to be effective against cancer...automate the drug testing process with robots”可知，文章主要讲的是机器人被用于科学研究之中。