Passage Two

People have all kinds of obsessions 一silly, serious, and everything in between. The sheer diversity of these fascinations, from playing bridge (my personal obsession) to scanning the skies for new planets, is one of the most beautiful things about humanity. And yet one person's obsession doesn't necessarily make for interesting reading for those of us who have never been bitten by that same bug. 

Mark Miodownik's personal and professional obsession, as he explains in his book Stuff Matters, is basic materials we often take for granted such as paper, glass, concrete, and steel — as well as new super materials that will change our world in : the decades ahead. I'm pleased to report that he is a witty, smart writer who has a great talent for imparting his love of this subject. As a result. Stuff Matters is a fun, accessible read.

My favorite writer, the historian Vaclav Smil, also wrote a wonderful book on materials, but it's completely different from Miodownik's. Smil is a facts-and- numbers guy; he doesn't bring any romance to his topic. Miodownik is the polar opposite. He's heavy on romance and very light on numbers. 

Miodownik, an Oxford-trained materials scientist who has worked in some of the most advanced labs in the world, discovered his obsession with materials in a bizarre way. When he was in high school in the 1980s. he was the victim of a random attack on a London Tube train. In his telling, instead of freaking out about the five-inch slash wound in his back, he fixated on the elegance of the attacker's steel razor blade. "This tiny piece of steel, not much bigger than a postage stamp, had cul through five layers of my clothes, and then through the epidermis and dermis of my skin in one slash without any problem at all," he writes.“It was the birth of my obsession with materials." 

Most of us have the luxury of not thinking much about steel - and not being attacked with a razor. But as Miodownik makes clear, steel is pretty magical. Its greatest virtue is that it doesn't crack or break under tension, unlike iron, from which it is forged. Steel has been made by skilled blacksmiths dating back to ancient Roman times, but once inventors created a process for producing steel cheaply at industrial scale in the mid-19" century, it became central to our lives — from our utensils to our transport to our built environment. 

Our next century is likely to produce even bigger material innovations. I live close to the longest floating bridge in the world, which, like so many big modern structures, is made from steel-reinforced concrete. That bridge has served Seattle well for more than a half century, but now is near the end of its lifespan. (From my yard I can see the construction crews working on the bridge that will replace it.) According to Miodownik. future bridges may be built with a "self-healing concrete" that could save billions of dollars in repair and replacement costs. 

Self-healing concrete is a great study in material innovation. In highly sulfurous volcanic lakes that would bum human skin, scientists found incredibly resilient bacteria that can stay dormant in rock for decades. You embed these bacteria in concrete with starch for them to consume; when the concrete cracks and water starts seeping in, the bacteria revive, find the starch, begin to replicate, and excrete minerals that seal up the crack. 

Questions 6-10 are based on Passage Two.

What does the writer say about obsessions?

(46.When smoking amongst women was not as widespread as it is now, women were considered to be almost free from cardiovascular diseases and lung cancer. Unhappily, the situation has changed, and smoking kills over half a million women each year in the industrialized world.) But it is also an increasingly important cause of ill health amongst women in developing countries 

(47.A recent World Health Organization (WHO) consultation on the statistical aspects of tobacco-related mortality concluded that the toll that can be attributed to smoking throughout the world is 2.7 million deaths per year.) It also predicted that if current patterns of cigarette smoking continue unchanged the global death toll from tobacco by the year 2025 may increase to eight million deaths per year. A large proportion of these will be amongst women. 

(48. Despite these alarming statistics the scale of the threat that smoking poses to women's health has received surprisingly little attention. Smoking is still seen by many as a mainly male problem, perhaps because men were the first to take up the habit and therefore the first to suffer the ill effects. ) This is no longer the case. Women who smoke like men will die like men. WHO estimates that in industrialized countries, smoking rates amongst men and women are very similar, a around 30 per cent; in a large number of developed countries. smoking is now more common among teenage girls than boys. 

As women took up smoking later than men, the full impact of smoking on their health has yet to be seen. But it is clear from countries where women smoked longest, such as the United Kingdom and the United States. that smoking causes the same diseases in women as in men and the gap between their death rates is narrowing. (49. On current trends. some 20 to 25 per cent of women who smoke will die from their habit. One in three of these deaths will be among women under 65 years of age.) The US Surgeon General has estimated that, amongst these women, smoking is responsible for around 40 per cent heart disease deaths, 55 per cent of lethal strokes and, among women of all ages, 80 per cent of lung cancer deaths and 30 per cent of all cancer deaths. Over the last 20 years, death rates in women from lung cancer have more than doubled in Japan, Norway, Poland, Sweden and the United Kingdom: have increased by more than 200 per cent in Australia, Demark and New Zealand; and have increased by more than 300 per cent in Canada and the United States. 

There are dramatically increasing trends in respiratory cancer among women in developed countries, and the casual relationship of smoking, rather than air pollution and other factors, to lung cancer is very clear. (50. In the United States. for instance, the mortality rate for lung cancer among female non-smokers has not changed during the past 20 years. During the same period, the rate among female smokers has increased by a factor of half. ) In South East Asia, more than 85 per cent of oral cancer cases in women are caused by tobacco habits.

Paragraph Ten

If you sit at a desk all day, get up frequently and walk around. If you carry a heavy shoulder bag. make sure to carry it on both your right and left shoulder, switching off as each gets tired. Even better: wear a cross-body bag. These and other tips will help you avoid bad posture.

Tips for m_____ good posture.

Paragraph Seven

An analysis across the EU showed that nearly 1/5 British families are headed by a single adult. And while 18.4% of families in this country have a solo parent, numbers come to just 12.7% in Germany. 14.4% in France and 10.6% in the Netherlands. In Belgium the share is 16.1%. In Ireland, it is 18.1%.

The p____ of single-parent families in European countries.

Paragraph Nine

A survey of more than 285.000 US high school students carried out between 1991 and 2012 found young people had fewer friends with whom to interact, but less desire for more friends. The research has also shown that teenagers have fewer friends than 20 years ago, despite the increasing popularity of social media.

U____ to make more friends.

Paragraph Eight

The eating habits of American children appear to be shifting. The news is good. Burgers. fries and colas remain popular with the under-13 set, of course, But new market research shows that consumption of these foods at restaurants is declining, while soup, yogurt, fruit, grilled chicken and chocolate milk are on the rise.

A c______ for the better in the eating habits of American children.

Paragraph Four

Mr Devlin, 46, from Nunhead, London, is living with a bizarre condition called prosopagnosia, meaning he struggles to recognize faces 一even those of his own family. Mr Devlin is a painter. He has to memorise his family's voices and body language in order to know who they are, but reading voices and body language doesn't always work.Mr.

Devlin is s____ from face blindness.

Paragraph Five

How dogs react to TV一whether it's running around, barking excitedly, or just ignoring it — may come down to personality or breed. Hunting dogs. which are driven by smell, aren't as interested in visuals, but herding breeds, such as terriers, may be more stimulated by moving objects they see on the small screen.

Breed a _____ dogs' reactions to TV.

Paragraph Six

A recent study has found that people who use an iPhone are cleverer than those who prefer Android devices. This is based on research that found states with more college graduates also tend to have higher iPhone sales. The study discovered that Alaska, Montana and Vermont have the largest number of iPhone users in the US. These states also have the highest percentage of college graduates.

iPhone users are s______.

Paragraph Two

Doctors should refrain from adding patients as friends on Facebook, they should not hug or allow patients to call them by their first names, regulators have warned. Blurring the lines between social and professional relationships can impact on the level of care offered and prevent patients from being honest about important side effects.

C_____ relationships may hinder objective care.

Paragraph Three

Researches suggest that for healthy older adults. even though their memory might not be as good, they can naturally recruit other brain regions that are not typically involved in shopping. Scientists discovered older shoppers use an additional brain area to remember competing consumer products and choose the better one — meaning they don't miss a bargain.

Shopping is b____ to one’s brainpower.