Questões de Inglês

Can plants hear?

Flora may be able to detect the sounds of flowing water or munching insects

 

  Pseudoscientific claims that music helps plants grow have been made for decades, despite evidence that is shaky at best. Yet new research suggests some flora may be capable of sensing sounds, such as the gurgle of water through a pipe or the buzzing of insects.

  In a recent study, Monica Gagliano, an evolutionary biologist at the University of Western Australia, and her colleagues placed pea seedlings in pots shaped like an upside-down Y. One arm of each pot was placed in either a tray of water or a coiled plastic tube through which water flowed; the other arm had dry soil. The roots grew toward the arm of the pipe with the fluid, regardless of whether it was easily accessible or hidden inside the tubing. “They just knew the water was there, even if the only thing to detect was the sound of it flowing inside the pipe,” Gagliano says. Yet when the seedlings were given a choice between the water tube and some moistened soil, their roots favored the latter. She hypothesizes that these plants use sound waves to detect water at a distance but follow moisture gradients to home in on their target when it is closer.

  The research, reported earlier this year in Oecologia, is not the first to suggest flora can detect and interpret sounds. A 2014 study showed the rock cress Arabidopsis can distinguish between caterpillar chewing sounds and wind vibrations – the plant produced more chemical toxins after “hearing” a recording of feeding insects. “We tend to underestimate plants because their responses are usually less visible to us. But leaves turn out to be extremely sensitive vibration detectors,” says lead study author Heidi M. Appel, an environmental scientist now at the University of Toledo.

(Marta Zaraska. www.scientificamerican.com, 17.05.2017.)

No trecho do terceiro parágrafo “The research, reported earlier”, o termo em destaque indica

Can plants hear?

Flora may be able to detect the sounds of flowing water or munching insects

 

  Pseudoscientific claims that music helps plants grow have been made for decades, despite evidence that is shaky at best. Yet new research suggests some flora may be capable of sensing sounds, such as the gurgle of water through a pipe or the buzzing of insects.

  In a recent study, Monica Gagliano, an evolutionary biologist at the University of Western Australia, and her colleagues placed pea seedlings in pots shaped like an upside-down Y. One arm of each pot was placed in either a tray of water or a coiled plastic tube through which water flowed; the other arm had dry soil. The roots grew toward the arm of the pipe with the fluid, regardless of whether it was easily accessible or hidden inside the tubing. “They just knew the water was there, even if the only thing to detect was the sound of it flowing inside the pipe,” Gagliano says. Yet when the seedlings were given a choice between the water tube and some moistened soil, their roots favored the latter. She hypothesizes that these plants use sound waves to detect water at a distance but follow moisture gradients to home in on their target when it is closer.

  The research, reported earlier this year in Oecologia, is not the first to suggest flora can detect and interpret sounds. A 2014 study showed the rock cress Arabidopsis can distinguish between caterpillar chewing sounds and wind vibrations – the plant produced more chemical toxins after “hearing” a recording of feeding insects. “We tend to underestimate plants because their responses are usually less visible to us. But leaves turn out to be extremely sensitive vibration detectors,” says lead study author Heidi M. Appel, an environmental scientist now at the University of Toledo.

(Marta Zaraska. www.scientificamerican.com, 17.05.2017.)

De acordo com o segundo parágrafo,

Can plants hear?

Flora may be able to detect the sounds of flowing water or munching insects

 

  Pseudoscientific claims that music helps plants grow have been made for decades, despite evidence that is shaky at best. Yet new research suggests some flora may be capable of sensing sounds, such as the gurgle of water through a pipe or the buzzing of insects.

  In a recent study, Monica Gagliano, an evolutionary biologist at the University of Western Australia, and her colleagues placed pea seedlings in pots shaped like an upside-down Y. One arm of each pot was placed in either a tray of water or a coiled plastic tube through which water flowed; the other arm had dry soil. The roots grew toward the arm of the pipe with the fluid, regardless of whether it was easily accessible or hidden inside the tubing. “They just knew the water was there, even if the only thing to detect was the sound of it flowing inside the pipe,” Gagliano says. Yet when the seedlings were given a choice between the water tube and some moistened soil, their roots favored the latter. She hypothesizes that these plants use sound waves to detect water at a distance but follow moisture gradients to home in on their target when it is closer.

  The research, reported earlier this year in Oecologia, is not the first to suggest flora can detect and interpret sounds. A 2014 study showed the rock cress Arabidopsis can distinguish between caterpillar chewing sounds and wind vibrations – the plant produced more chemical toxins after “hearing” a recording of feeding insects. “We tend to underestimate plants because their responses are usually less visible to us. But leaves turn out to be extremely sensitive vibration detectors,” says lead study author Heidi M. Appel, an environmental scientist now at the University of Toledo.

(Marta Zaraska. www.scientificamerican.com, 17.05.2017.)

What is the topic mainly about?

TEXT

 

Pope Francis disappoints Rohingya by failing to condemn persecution

 

[1]   As the crowds trickled out of the  

Yangon sports ground where Pope Francis 

delivered his first public mass before tens of  

thousands of people, Khin Maung Myint, a  

[5] Rohingya activist, sat on the sidelines. He  

was disappointed. Not in Francis, but in the  

advisers who appear to have dissuaded the  

pontiff from bringing up the plight of the  

Rohingya people. “Rohingya are not the  

[10] ones who lost their dignity, but the people  

who silence the pope’s expression,” he said.  

“Those who pushed the pope not to use the  

word Rohingya, they are the ones who lost  

their dignity.” 

[15]   Francis is nearing the end of a  

four-day visit to Myanmar, previously  

known as Burma, in which he has not  

publicly spoken about the persecuted  

Muslim minority, more than 620,000 of  

[20] whom have fled to Bangladesh in recent  

months, escaping what western leaders are  

calling ethnic cleansing. 

  Among the guests in the VIP  

section, where a gazebo provided protection  

[25] from the hot Myanmar sun, was Aye Ne  

Win, the grandson of the country’s first  

dictator who attracted public derision  

recently after he dressed up as the pope for  

Halloween. Beside him, in a black veil, sat a  

[30] beauty queen who has described the  

Rohingya in a YouTube video as “harbingers  

of terror and violence”. 

  In his homily on Wednesday, the  

pope talked about the need for forgiveness  

[35] and ignoring the desire for revenge, but  

declined to reference violence meted out  

against the Rohingya, a campaign allegedly  

marked by gang-rape, massacres and  

arson. “We think that healing can come  

[40] from anger or revenge,” Francis said,  

speaking of the many “wounded” people in  

Myanmar. “Yet the way of revenge is not  

the way of Jesus,” he said. It was his  

second public address in Myanmar, coming  

[45] after he shared a stage with the state  

counsellor, Aung San Suu Kyi, on Tuesday,  

telling an audience of diplomats and  

journalists that all of Myanmar’s religious  

and minority ethnic groups – “none  

[50] excluded” – should be respected. 

  Both speeches have fallen short of  

what many expected from the pope, whose  

advocacy for refugees has been a  

benchmark of his papacy. He has previously  

[55] referred to “our Rohingya brothers and  

sisters”. At a press conference in Yangon on  

Wednesday night, papal spokesman Greg  

Burke said the moral authority of the Pope  

“still stands”. “You can criticize what is said  

[60] or not said but the Pope is not going to lose  

any moral authority on this question here,”  

he said.  

  The Rohingya have suffered  

decades of persecution in Myanmar, where  

[65] their freedoms have been slowly eroded and  

tens of thousands are confined to  

internment camps. They are widely deemed  

illegal immigrants from Bangladesh and  

labelled “Bengalis”. “For years the  

[70] international community has towed the  

government of Myanmar’s line, refusing to  

say ‘Rohingya’ for fear of doing harm,” said  

David Baulk, a Myanmar researcher for  

Fortify Rights. “There should be nothing  

[75] controversial about the pope identifying  

people by the name they want.” 

  Whether or not the pope should  

address the crisis has been a matter of  

debate within the Vatican since the visit was  

[80] announced, according to a source familiar  

with discussions. “There are probably a mix  

of voices in the Vatican,” they said. “Those  

who are old school diplomats for whom  

caution is always their watchword and  

[85] others who are a bit more bold.” 

  The most vocal was until recently  

Charles Maung Bo, Myanmar’s first cardinal,  

a powerful orator who has fiercely defended  

the Rohingya and condemned “merchants of  

[90] hatred” in the form of Buddhist  

ultranationalists who have sanctioned the  

violence. 

  Before this week’s visit he urged  

the pope not to use the word, though he  

[95] has made it clear he would have been  

happy with a compromise phrase, according  

to the source. “I think one factor in this was  

almost certainly pressure from within the  

church on him because he has been so  

[100] outspoken until now and I think there would  

have been an enormous amount of pressure  

from other bishops,” the source said. 

  Who are the Rohingya? 

  At the press conference on 

[105] Wednesday night, the split between the  

bishops was apparent, with one saying  

there was a lack of “reliable evidence” of  

atrocities and was not sure what was going  

on because he had not seen it himself. 

[110]   The silence is likely to appease  

many Catholics in the country who either  

share prejudices against the Rohingya or  

are afraid of a nationalist backlash against  

the 650,000-strong Catholic community in  

[115] Myanmar. 

  Francis is scheduled to fly to  

Dhaka in Bangladesh where he will meet  

Rohingya refugees on Thursday. But for  

some in Myanmar, the leader of the church  

[120] has a moral obligation not to leave the  

country without commenting on its most  

pressing crisis. 

  After the mass, Father Thomas, a  

Yangon priest, said he hoped the pope  

[125] brought the matter up in closed-door  

meetings this week with the army chief, Min  

Aung Hlaing, and Aung San Suu Kyi. 

  “This is the main issue in Burma,”  

he said. 

www.theguardian.com/nov.27.2017

 

The tenses of the underlined verbs in “I think one factor in this was almost certainly pressure from within the church on him because he has been so outspoken until now...” (lines 97-100) are respectively  

T E X T

 

  As growth slows in wealthy countries, Western food companies are aggressively expanding in developing nations, contributing to obesity and health problems. 

  FORTALEZA, Brazil — Children’s squeals rang through the muggy morning air as a woman pushed a gleaming white cart along pitted, trashstrewn streets. She was making deliveries to some of the poorest households in this seaside city, bringing pudding, cookies and other packaged foods to the customers on her sales route.

  Celene da Silva, 29, is one of thousands of door-to-door vendors for Nestlé, helping the world’s largest packaged food conglomerate expand its reach into a quarter-million households in Brazil’s farthestflung corners.

  As she dropped off variety packs of Chandelle pudding, Kit-Kats and Mucilon infant cereal, there was something striking about her customers: Many were visibly overweight, even small children.

  She gestured to a home along her route and shook her head, recalling how its patriarch, a morbidly obese man, died the previous week. “He ate a piece of cake and died in his sleep,” she said.

  Mrs. da Silva, who herself weighs more than 200 pounds, recently discovered that she had high blood pressure, a condition she acknowledges is probably tied to her weakness for fried chicken and the Coca-Cola she drinks with every meal, breakfast included. 

  Nestlé’s direct-sales army in Brazil is part of a broader transformation of the food system that is delivering Western-style processed food and sugary drinks to the most isolated pockets of Latin America, Africa and Asia. As their growth slows in the wealthiest countries, multinational food companies like Nestlé, PepsiCo and General Mills have been aggressively expanding their presence in developing nations, unleashing a marketing juggernaut that is upending traditional diets from Brazil to Ghana to India.

  A New York Times examination of corporate records, epidemiological studies and government reports — as well as interviews with scores of nutritionists and health experts around the world — reveals a sea change in the way food is produced, distributed and advertised across much of the globe. The shift, many public health experts say, is contributing to a new epidemic of diabetes and heart disease, chronic illnesses that are fed by soaring rates of obesity in places that struggled with hunger and malnutrition just a generation ago.

  The new reality is captured by a single, stark fact: Across the world, more people are now obese than underweight. At the same time, scientists say, the growing availability of high-calorie, nutrient-poor foods is generating a new type of malnutrition, one in which a growing number of people are both overweight and undernourished.

  “The prevailing story is that this is the best of all possible worlds — cheap food, widely available. If you don’t think about it too hard, it makes sense,” said Anthony Winson, who studies the political economics of nutrition at the University of Guelph in Ontario. A closer look, however, reveals a much different story, he said. “To put it in stark terms: The diet is killing us.”

  Even critics of processed food acknowledge that there are multiple factors in the rise of obesity, including genetics, urbanization, growing incomes and more sedentary lives. Nestlé executives say their products have helped alleviate hunger, provided crucial nutrients, and that the company has squeezed salt, fat and sugar from thousands of items to make them healthier. But Sean Westcott, head of food research and development at Nestlé, conceded obesity has been an unexpected side effect of making inexpensive processed food more widely available.

  “We didn’t expect what the impact would be,” he said.

  Part of the problem, he added, is a natural tendency for people to overeat as they can afford more food. Nestlé, he said, strives to educate consumers about proper portion size and to make and market foods that balance “pleasure and nutrition.”

  There are now more than 700 million obese people worldwide, 108 million of them children, according to research published recently in The New England Journal of Medicine. The prevalence of obesity has doubled in 73 countries since 1980, contributing to four million premature deaths, the study found.

By ANDREW JACOBS and MATT RICHTEL The New York Times SEPT. 16, 2017 https://www.nytimes.com 

 

Anthony Winson, from Ontario's University of Guelph, says we have low-priced food which is widely available but it

T E X T

 

  As growth slows in wealthy countries, Western food companies are aggressively expanding in developing nations, contributing to obesity and health problems. 

  FORTALEZA, Brazil — Children’s squeals rang through the muggy morning air as a woman pushed a gleaming white cart along pitted, trashstrewn streets. She was making deliveries to some of the poorest households in this seaside city, bringing pudding, cookies and other packaged foods to the customers on her sales route.

  Celene da Silva, 29, is one of thousands of door-to-door vendors for Nestlé, helping the world’s largest packaged food conglomerate expand its reach into a quarter-million households in Brazil’s farthestflung corners.

  As she dropped off variety packs of Chandelle pudding, Kit-Kats and Mucilon infant cereal, there was something striking about her customers: Many were visibly overweight, even small children.

  She gestured to a home along her route and shook her head, recalling how its patriarch, a morbidly obese man, died the previous week. “He ate a piece of cake and died in his sleep,” she said.

  Mrs. da Silva, who herself weighs more than 200 pounds, recently discovered that she had high blood pressure, a condition she acknowledges is probably tied to her weakness for fried chicken and the Coca-Cola she drinks with every meal, breakfast included. 

  Nestlé’s direct-sales army in Brazil is part of a broader transformation of the food system that is delivering Western-style processed food and sugary drinks to the most isolated pockets of Latin America, Africa and Asia. As their growth slows in the wealthiest countries, multinational food companies like Nestlé, PepsiCo and General Mills have been aggressively expanding their presence in developing nations, unleashing a marketing juggernaut that is upending traditional diets from Brazil to Ghana to India.

  A New York Times examination of corporate records, epidemiological studies and government reports — as well as interviews with scores of nutritionists and health experts around the world — reveals a sea change in the way food is produced, distributed and advertised across much of the globe. The shift, many public health experts say, is contributing to a new epidemic of diabetes and heart disease, chronic illnesses that are fed by soaring rates of obesity in places that struggled with hunger and malnutrition just a generation ago.

  The new reality is captured by a single, stark fact: Across the world, more people are now obese than underweight. At the same time, scientists say, the growing availability of high-calorie, nutrient-poor foods is generating a new type of malnutrition, one in which a growing number of people are both overweight and undernourished.

  “The prevailing story is that this is the best of all possible worlds — cheap food, widely available. If you don’t think about it too hard, it makes sense,” said Anthony Winson, who studies the political economics of nutrition at the University of Guelph in Ontario. A closer look, however, reveals a much different story, he said. “To put it in stark terms: The diet is killing us.”

  Even critics of processed food acknowledge that there are multiple factors in the rise of obesity, including genetics, urbanization, growing incomes and more sedentary lives. Nestlé executives say their products have helped alleviate hunger, provided crucial nutrients, and that the company has squeezed salt, fat and sugar from thousands of items to make them healthier. But Sean Westcott, head of food research and development at Nestlé, conceded obesity has been an unexpected side effect of making inexpensive processed food more widely available.

  “We didn’t expect what the impact would be,” he said.

  Part of the problem, he added, is a natural tendency for people to overeat as they can afford more food. Nestlé, he said, strives to educate consumers about proper portion size and to make and market foods that balance “pleasure and nutrition.”

  There are now more than 700 million obese people worldwide, 108 million of them children, according to research published recently in The New England Journal of Medicine. The prevalence of obesity has doubled in 73 countries since 1980, contributing to four million premature deaths, the study found.

By ANDREW JACOBS and MATT RICHTEL The New York Times SEPT. 16, 2017 https://www.nytimes.com 

 

Nowadays there is a new kind of malnutrition, and scientists believe it is caused by