题目内容
Four people in England, back in 1953, stared at photo 51. It wasn’t much –a picture showing a black X. But three of these people won the Nobel prize for figuring out what the photo really showed—the shape of DNA. The discovery brought fame and fortune to scientists James Watson, Francis crick, and Maurice Wilkins. The fourth, the one who actually made the picture, was left out.
Her name was Rosalind Franklin. “she should have been up there,” says historian Mary Bowden. “if her photo hadn’t been there, the others couldn’t have come up with the structure.” One reason Franklin was missing was that she had died of cancer four years before the Nobel decision. But now school doubt that Franklin was not only robbed of her life by disease but robbed of credit by her competitors.
At Cambridge university in the 1950s, Watson and Crick tried to make models by cutting up shapes of DNA’s parts and then putting them together. In the meantime, at king’s college in London Franklin and Wilkins shone X-rays at the molecule(分子). The rays produced patterns reflecting the shape.
But Wilkins and Franklin’s was a lot rockier than the celebrated teamwork of Watson and Crick. Wilkins thought Franklin was hired to be his assistant. But the college actually employed her to take over the DNA project.
What she did was produce X-ray picture that Watson and Crick that one of their models was inside out. And she was not shy about saying so. That angered Watson, who attacked her in return, “mere inspection suggested that she would not easily bend. Clearly she had to go or be put in her place.
As Franklin’s competitors, Wilkins, Watson and Crick had much to gain by cutting her out of the little group of researchers, says historian Pnina Abir-Am. In 1962 at the Nobel prize awarding ceremony, Wilkins thanked 13 colleagues by name before he mentioned Franklin. Watson wrote his book laughing at her. Crick wrote in 1974 that “Franklin was only two steps away from the solution.”
No, Franklin was the solution. “She contributed more than any other player to solving the structure of DNA. She must be considered a co-discoverer,”Abir-Am says. This was backed up by Aaron Klug, who worked with Franklin and later won a Nobel Prize himself. Once described as the “Dark Lady of DNA”, Franklin is finally coming into the light.
1. What is the text mainly about?
A. The disagreements among DNA researchers.
B. The unfair treatment of Franklin.
C. The process of discovering DNA.
D. The race between two teams of scientists.
2. Watson was angry with Franklin because she ______.
A. took the lead in the competition
B. Kept her results from him
C. proved some of his findings wrong
D. shared her data with other scientists
3. Why is Franklin described as “Dark Lady of DNA”?
A. She developed pictures in dark labs.
B. She discovered the black X---- the shape of DNA.
C. Her name was forgotten after her death.
D. Her contribution was unknown to the public.
4. What is the writer’s attitude toward Wilkins, Watson and Crick?
A. Disapproving
B. Respectful.
C. Admiring
D. Doubtful
BCDA
Washington, April 4----- The United States has more than 90 million families for the first time, but each contains fewer people on average than ever, the Census Bureau(统计局) reported today.
The 90,031,000 families in the United States averaged 2.64 members each as of last July 1.“The reason is, in effect, changes in the age structure,” explained Campbell Gibson, a population researcher for the bureau. Most Americans born in the great explosion of births are now in their 20’s and 30’s when they most likely to set up families, he said.
The fact that many are doing so increased the number of families from 80.4 million in 1980 t0 88.8 million in 1986 and past the 90 million mark last summer.
At the same time, the average number of people per family dropped from 2.75 in 1985 to 2.65 in 1986 and then to 2.64, Mr Gibson said.
By comparison, the 1970 Census found the average family contained 3.14 people. Families averaged more than four people in 1939 and more than five in 1880.
The growing number of ever---- smaller families is still going on, but Mr Gibson pointed out that family growth was not the same as population increase in the 1970’s.
The same age factors that are increasing the number of families also happened then, but in the 1970’s the proportion(比例) of families in each age group was also growing.
That hasn’t continued in the 1980’s for a number of possible reasons, Mr Gibson said. For example, in the 1980’s more young people have chosen to remain home with their parents instead of setting up housekeeping on their own, as many did in the 1970’s.
This could be caused by the increasing cost of housing, he said. Delays in marriage while young people go to work and school, have also been widely reported as a factor, but it was not the only factor for the family changes.
1.The smaller figure of families reported here is _________.
|
A．1980 |
B．80,400,000 |
C．2.64 |
D．90 million |
2.What’s the reporter’s attitude towards the present situation?
A. People should get married at later age.
- The average number of family members should be 2.64.
- It’s not clear in the report.
- Young people should set up housekeeping on their own, as many did in the 1970’s.
3.From the last paragraph we may infer that________.
A. delay in marriage will not help the number of the families
- delay in marriage is the major factor of the family changes
- the writer felt sorry that many young people now delay their marriages
- there must be some other factors which have led to the slower growth in the 1980’s
4. The underlined word “factor” in the passage means_________.
|
A．reason |
B．something that proves be true |
|
C．advantage |
D．something that helps to bring about a result |