Section C Reading in Depth
Read the following passages carefully and then finish the tasks below．
PASSAGE 1
Notre Dame de Paris，which houses the crown of thorns relic and sits on theÎle de la Cité，an island in the center of the Seine，is perhaps France’s most famous landmark：standing tall at the heart of the city for centuries，accepting the people’s respect one day，then facing their rejection on another．However，around 6：50 p．m．，local time in Paris，April 15th，2019，a massive fire broke out in the cathedral，although this antique Gothic building survived centuries of France’s turbulent past．
The 12th-century Bishop of Paris，Maurice de Sully，admired the work of the pioneering architects，who were building the new Gothic style of soaring ceilings and abundant light．Sully decided to create a cathedral in the heart of Paris，which would be the wonder of Christendom and dedicated to the Virgin Mary．
Building Notre Dame took nearly two centuries from start to finish．The cathedral became a lifelong project for Sully．Work on the sanctuary and nave began first．In 1182，under the reign of the new king，Philip II，the high altar was consecrated（圣化）．Sully was able to celebrate the first Mass（弥撒）in the cathedral but would die in 1196，nearly 150 years before the main structures of the cathedral would be finished in the 1300s．
Culturally，Notre Dame was never important to the French monarchy．It was returned to glory in the mid-19th century，owing in no small part to the novelist Victor Hugo．Hugo，a leading light of French romanticism，spearheaded the return of interest in the medieval past and Gothic art．He wrote his blockbuster novel in 1831—later published in English as The Hunchback of Notre Dame．
A restoration of the cathedral was launched when the architect Eugène Viollet-le-Duc was appointed in 1844 to lead the work．For nearly 25 years，he strove to revive Notre Dame’s strength and beauty，who restored the west façade（正面）and the Gallery of Kings，and also added new features：a towering spire（塔尖），sculptures of the Twelve Apostles，and the now famous gargoyles（怪兽状滴水嘴）and chimeras（怪物）who perch on the stone walls．In the
1850s，the city planner Baron Haussmann had houses and other buildings around the cathedral pulled down，in order to open up a new square in front of the main facade．For the first time，Parisians could stand back and contemplate the cathedral in all its splendor．
Since then，the image of Notre Dame has become inseparable part of Paris．The building is celebrated in the paintings of Matisse and Picasso，while The Hunchback of Notre Dame has inspired several films．Hugo himself would not have been surprised by the building’s universal appeal，describing Notre Dame as“a central mother church…It has the head of one，the limbs of another，the haunches（腰胯部）of another，something of all．”
1．How do people feel about Notre Dame？
A．They dislike and reject it．
B．They all love and respect it．
C．They have mixed feeling to it．
D．They treat it as a landmark．
2．What is the purpose of building Notre Dame？
A．To honor Christianity．
B．To admire pioneering architects．
C．To create a grand Gothic building．
D．To commemorate Bishop of Paris，Maurice de Sully．
3．Why have people become interested in Notre Dame again since the 19th century？
A．Because of Hugo’s The Hunchback of Notre Dame．
B．Because of the fashion industry in Paris．
C．Because of the efforts of French monarchy．
D．Because of the revolution in France．
4．Why did the city planner in 19th century pulled down some buildings around Notre Dame？
A．Because the buildings were old and shabby．
B．Because they were expanding the cathedral．
C．Because visitors could appreciate its grandeur better．
D．Because they needed a square to build the main façade．
5．What is the implication of Notre Dame in today’s world？
A．It is a museum of fashion items．
B．It is a museum of architecture and artwork．
C．It is a symbol of public power．
D．It is a symbol of monarchical power．
PASSAGE 2
Big Is Beautiful
［A］In 1977，Richard Peto，an epidemiologist at Oxford University，observed a contradiction．Cancer begins as a mutation in a single cell．Organisms with more cells should therefore have a higher risk of developing it．Elephants，which have 100 times as many cells as human beings do，should swarm with malignancies．Whales，with ten times more again，should be barnacled（布满）with tumours．In fact，the planet’s giant animals are blessed with extremely low rates of cancer．Titanic bodies and tumour resistance have evolved at the same time．The secret of suppressing cancer may therefore be hidden in the genes of giants．
［B］Inspired by Peto’s paradox，as this contradiction has come to be known，researchers are exploring rates of cancer and resistance to cancer in thousands of animal species，with an emphasis on heavyweights．Their hope is to translate the animals’cancer-fighting talents into treatments for people．
［C］In one recent study，published in Molecular Biology and Evolution and entitled“Return to the sea，get huge，beat cancer”，Marc Tollis of Northern Arizona University and his colleagues sequenced the genome of the humpback whale and began searching through it for tumour-suppressor genes．Previous research had revealed that，around 50m years ago，creatures which looked something like a cross between a rat and a wolf dog paddled into the sea and eventually evolved into whales．These animals remained fairly small until about 3m years ago．Then they rapidly ballooned into whoppers the size of buses．
［D］Dr Tollis found that as ancestral whales grew，numerous alterations to their tumoursuppressor genes hopped on board．He and his colleagues identified 33 known tumoursuppressing genes in humpback whales that showed evidence of advantageous changes．These included atr，which detects damage to DNA and halts the cycle of cell division that cancer-promoting mutations encourage；amer1，which stifles cell growth；and reck，which reins in metastasis（转移），the tendency of cancer cells to peel off their natal（原生的）tumour and wander around the body looking for other sites to colonise．Humpback whales also have duplications in genes that promote apoptosis，the process that commands mutated cells to commit suicide．All this suggests that the evolution of gigantism in cetaceans（鲸目动物）is associated with strong selective pressure in favour of genes that conquer cancer．
［E］Cancer biologists are familiar with atr，amer1 and reck because people have them too．But whales may also harbour tumourfighting genes unknown to science．The next step is therefore to irradiate laboratory-grown lines of whale cells，in order to encourage cancer-causing mutations and thus find out which genes become active in an attempt to clamp down on those mutations．The eventual goal is to discover which strategies whale genes use to combat cancer．Researchers will do this by transferring whale genes into human cell lines，killing those cells with radiation，then seeing if the whale genes attempt to repair the DNA damage—as human genes often do—or opt for the often more effective method of triggering apoptosis．
［F］Similar studies are already being done using cancer-fighting proteins from another group of giants—elephants．These have a cancer-mortality rate of about 5%，compared with 11%-25% in human populations．Some participants in the whale study were previously involved in sequencing African and Asian elephant genomes．They found that an important weapon in the elephants’arsenal is tp53，a gene that encodes an apoptosisinducing protein called p53．This protein is known colloquially as“the guardian of the genome”．
［G］Human beings have two copies of tp53 in their chromosomes（染色体）—one from each parent．Those in whom one of these does not work manifest a condition called Li-Fraumeni syndrome，and are almost certain to develop cancer．Elephants’chromosomes，by contrast，sport 40 versions of tp53—part of the explanation，surely，of why elephant tumours are so rare．
［H］Joshua Schiffman，a paediatric oncologist（肿瘤学家）at the Huntsman Cancer Institute in Utah who was involved in the elephant study，is investigating how elephants’multiple copies of tp53 co-ordinate an attack on mutated cells．He is also studying how slight differences in the composition of elephant p53 make it a more efficient mutant-cell killer than its human counterpart．The power of elephant p53 led Dr．Schiffman to co-found PEEL Therapeutics，based in Utah and Israel（the firm’s name is derived from the Hebrew word for elephant）．PEEL’s purpose is to translate discoveries in comparative oncology into human patients．The firm’s researchers are experimenting with minuscule lipid spheres loaded with proteins，including synthetic elephant p53．Their most promising experimental drug is designed to deliver this directly to a patient’s tumour cells．Details are still under wraps，but Dr．Schiffman says that，in a laboratory，introducing synthetic elephant p53 to human cancer cells induces“incredibly rapid and robust cell death”．
Questions 1-3
Do the following statements reflect the claims of the writer in the reading passage？
YES if the statement reflects the claims of the writer
NO if the statement contradicts the claims of the writer
NOT GIVEN if it is impossible to say what the writer thinks about this
1．Human beings have more anti-cancer chromosomes than elephants．
2．The size of some animals is negatively related with their chances of having cancer．
3．The introduction of whales’anti-cancer genes into human cells will be realized soon．
Questions 4-6
The Passage has twelve paragraphs labelled A-L．
Which paragraphs contain the following information？
Write the correct letter A-L．
NB You may use any letter more than once．
4．The ancestor of whales may be a cross between a rat and a wolf dog．
5．Apoptosis is the process which orders mutated cells to kill themselves．
6．The death rate of cancer among elephants is much lower than that among human beings．
Look at the following statements（Question 7-10）and the people in the box below．
Match each statement with the correct person A-C．
NB You may use any letter more than once．
7．The evolution of humpback whales is accompanied by the increase of tumour-suppressor genes．
8．The introduction of man-made elephant p53 to cancer cells in human bodies causes immediate cell death．
9．Humpback whales have the genes that initiate the process of committing suicide of mutated cells．
10．Some big animals on the earth have low rate of suffering from cancer．
A．Dr Schiffman
B．Dr Tollis
C．Richard Peto
PASSAGE 3
There seems to be little about the energy company in central England that would appeal to Royal Dutch Shell，the famous oil giant．The little company，First Utility，is an upstart challenger．It offers friendly customer service，and low prices on electricity and natural gas．But it doesn’t own any power plants or gas pipelines；First Utility is a virtual energy company—the product of technological advancement and deregulation（解除管制）．
Its recent acquisition by Shell，a living dinosaur that continues to make its billions pumping fossil fuels out of the ground，illustrates one of the ways the energy companies that dominated the past are looking toward a future in which power is harnessed from the sun and the wind．It is a future that the petroleum industry is increasingly trying to embrace，leveraging its financial and logistical resources to deal with the climate change problem its companies helped create．
Leading Shell’s efforts is Ben van Beurden．Since 2014，he has had to balance the company’s mainstay oil and gas business with the regulatory，shareholder and societal pressures—not to mention familial guilt—that will perhaps inevitably push Shell and its competitors to leave those businesses behind．
Mr．van Beurden recently recalled how his 9-year-old daughter had once come home from school in tears．“She had heard that the Earth was warming up and being destroyed by people like Shell，”he said．Investors are concerned，too．Mr．van Beurden faced shareholders resolutions demanding that Shell take steps to mitigate climate change．
Shell has begun allocating up to＄2 billion per year to electric power and other alternative energy．So far，it has bought First Utility and invested in operations as varied as a California solar energy business，an offshore wind farm in the Netherlands，a ride-sharing app start-up in London and even a company that provides charging outlets for electric vehicles．First Utility is the kind of business that could thrive．It couples low prices with a warm approach．Sales agents，who work online and by phone，are trained to try to help customers through problems like the loss of a family member，rather than following a script．“We try to make sure we have a human conversation，”said Mandeep Deu，First Utility’s customer service manager．That formula has won over some 850，000 customers in Britain’s competitive energy market and has impressed Shell，which had been supplying the company with power and natural gas．Shell closed a deal to buy First Utility in March after it decided that the company could be an important part of their future energy business．Maarten Wetselaar，the head of Shell’s new energies business and its natural gas unit，said“we will be able to grow much faster than if we were to start from the very beginning．”
1．According to the passage，who is responsible for the climate change？
A．Solar energy companies．
B．Wind energy companies．
C．Petroleum companies．
D．Water power companies．
2．Which of the following can be inferred from paragraph 2 about the future of Shell？
A．Shell will increase its production of new energy．
B．Shell will increase its production of fossil energy．
C．Shell will decrease its production of new energy．
D．Shell will balance its production of new energy and fossil energy．
3．Which of the sentence below best expresses the essential information in the highlighted sentence in the paragraph 5？
A．Shell purchases various fossil energy businesses．
B．Shell not only purchases but also invests in various fossil energies．
C．Shell invests in various new energy businesses．
D．Shell not only purchases but also invests in various new energy businesses．
4．What kind of company is First Utility？
A．It is a solar and wind energy company with excellent customer service．
B．It is a solar and petroleum energy company with excellent customer service．
C．It is a wind and petroleum company with excellent customer service．
D．It is an electricity and gas company with excellent customer service．
5．Why does Shell purchase First Utility？
A．Because Shell intends to further explore its petroleum business．
B．Because Shell intends to defeat First Utility．
C．Because Shell intends to develop new business．
D．Because Shell intends to build more gas pipeline．