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Reading passage 1

A. On January 6 an asteroid-spotting telescope at White Sands Missile Range in New Mexicodetected a new and unusual object in the night sky. Towing a streaky debris tail, the object was

classified as a comet, although its orbit belied a different origin. Visible comets generally have

elongated orbits that carry them into Earth's neighbourhood from the colder outer reaches of

the solar system, but the newfound body had a neat, nearly circular orbit in the Asteroid Belt

[the green ring in the video below], between the orbits of Mars and Jupiter.

B. Within weeks, a group of astronomers had secured time on the Hubble Space Telescope to get abetter look at the curious object, dubbed P/2010 A2, which appeared not to be a comet at all

but a previously undiscovered asteroid that had somehow spewed its own debris into a comet-

mimicking tail.

C. Now two groups have used those Hubble photographs, as well as observations from ground-based telescopes and the European Space Agency's comet-chasing Rosetta spacecraft, to

confirm that P/2010 A2 is indeed an asteroid that was disrupted, quite possibly by a collision

with a smaller asteroid. The disruption appears to have occurred in early 2009, which is

remarkably recent in terms of the evolution of the solar system. The two groups reported their

findings in the October 14 issue ofNature. (Scientific American is part of Nature Publishing

Group.)

D. "I knew that this was an object the likes of which we hadn't seen before," says David Jewitt, aco-author ofone of the new papers and an astronomer at the University of California, Los

Angeles. "This is the first time we've seen an asteroid in the act of disrupting." Using Hubble,

Jewitt and his colleagues watched the nucleus and tail of P/2010 A2 evolve over several months,

from January to May 2010. Tracking the tail's changing position with respect to the nucleus, the

researchers estimated that the disruption of the parent asteroid must have happened in

February or March 2009.

E. Jewitt's group concluded that the impact of a small asteroid, just meters across, into the 120-meter nucleus of P/2010 A2 could excavate enough debris from the asteroid to produce the

curious tail. But a less violent phenomenon could also be the culprit: The asteroid may have

been spun up by the force of the sun, eventually rotating so fast that it began to shed mass.

"Like wind blowing onto a propeller, the solar radiation can exert a torque on an asteroid,"

Jewitt says. He notes that a collision is his "favorite" scenario but that it is not possible to

discriminate conclusively between the two causes based on the observations.

F. The authors ofthe other Nature paper on P/2010 A2 also favour the collision scenario. "It's notpossible for us to tell whether it was a collision or a spin-upwe simply say collision because a

collision is much more likely," says Colin Snodgrass, a postdoctoral astronomer at the Max

Planck Institute for Solar System Research in KatlenburgLindau, Germany.

G. And indeed, the spin-up mechanism is "probably not the most likely scenario," says WilliamBottke, a planetary scientist at the Southwest Research Institute in Boulder, Colo., who did not

participate in the new research, adding that a spinning asteroid would likely produce a disk

around its equator. "This is more consistent with a small body impacting and making a crater,

throwing debris off the asteroid."

http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=hubble-zooms-in-on-space-crash-2010-02http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=hubble-zooms-in-on-space-crash-2010-02http://www.nature.com/nature/current_issue.htmlhttp://www.nature.com/nature/current_issue.htmlhttp://www.nature.com/nature/current_issue.htmlhttp://www2.ess.ucla.edu/~jewitt/http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/nature09456http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/nature09453http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/nature09453http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/nature09453http://www.mps.mpg.de/homes/snodgrass/http://www.mps.mpg.de/en/http://www.mps.mpg.de/en/http://www.boulder.swri.edu/~bottke/http://www.boulder.swri.edu/~bottke/http://www.boulder.swri.edu/~bottke/http://www.boulder.swri.edu/~bottke/http://www.mps.mpg.de/en/http://www.mps.mpg.de/en/http://www.mps.mpg.de/homes/snodgrass/http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/nature09453http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/nature09456http://www2.ess.ucla.edu/~jewitt/http://www.nature.com/nature/current_issue.htmlhttp://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=hubble-zooms-in-on-space-crash-2010-02http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=hubble-zooms-in-on-space-crash-2010-02

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B. A planet.C. An asteroid.D. A constellation.10 Using Hubble, Jewitt and his colleagues watched theA. Nucleus and tail.B. Nucleus.C. Tail.D. The body.

Questions 11 14

Complete each of the following statements (questions 11 14) with the best endingsA Gfrom the box

below

Write the appropriate lettersA

G in boxes 11

14 on your answer sheet.

11 The impact of a small asteroid could excavate enough debris12 William Bottke is a planetary scientist at13 David Jewitt is an astronomer at the14 Two groups have used those Hubble photographs, as well as

Reading passage 2

A. A battleship is a large armoured warship with a main battery consisting of heavy calibre guns.Battleships were larger, better armed and armoured than cruisers and destroyers. As the largest

armed ships in a fleet, battleships were used to attain command of the sea and represented the

apex of a nation's naval power from the 19th century up until World War II. With the rise of air

power and guided missiles, large guns were no longer deemed necessary to establish naval

superiority, and as a result there are no battleships in active service today.

B. Battleship design evolved to incorporate and adapt technological advances to maintain an edge.The word battleship was coined around 1794 and is a contraction of the phrase line-of-battle

A University of California.B Observations from ground-based telescopes.C From the asteroid to produce the curious tail.D The Southwest Research Institute in Boulder.E Observations from University of California.F The Yale University.G To generate another comet of its size.

http://www.boulder.swri.edu/~bottke/http://www2.ess.ucla.edu/~jewitt/http://www2.ess.ucla.edu/~jewitt/http://www.boulder.swri.edu/~bottke/

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ship, the dominant wooden warship during the Age of Sail. The term came into formal use in the

late 1880s to describe a type of ironclad warship, now referred to as pre-dreadnought

battleships. In 1906, the commissioning of HMS Dreadnoughtheralded a revolution in battleship

design. Following battleship designs that were influenced by HMS Dreadnoughtwere referred to

as "dreadnoughts".

C. Battleships were a symbol of naval dominance and national might, and for decades thebattleship was a major factor in both diplomacy and military strategy. The global arms race in

battleship construction beginning in the late 19th century and exacerbated by Dreadnoughtwas

one of the causes of World War I, which saw a clash of large battle fleets at the Battle of Jutland.

The Naval Treaties of the 1920s and 1930s limited the number of battleships but did not end the

evolution of design. Both the Allies and the Axis Powers deployed battleships of old construction

and new during World War II.

D. The value of the battleship has been questioned, even during the period of their prominence.The Battle of Tsushima (1905) was the only decisive clash between steel battleship fleets, and

apart from the indecisive Battle of Jutland (1916), there were few great battleship clashes.

Despite their great firepower and protection, battleships were increasingly vulnerable to much

smaller, cheaper ordnance and craft: initially the torpedo and the naval mine, and later aircraft

and the guided missile. The growing range of naval engagements led to the aircraft carrier

replacing the battleship as the leading capital ship during World War II, with the last battleship

to be launched being HMS Vanguardin 1944. Battleships were retained by the United States

Navy into the Cold War only for fire support purposes. The last battleships were removed from

the U.S. Naval Vessel Register in March 2006.

E. Battleships were the largest and most complex, and hence the most expensive warships of theirtime; as a result, the value of investment in battleships has always been contested. As the

French politician Etienne Lamy wrote in 1879, "The construction of battleships is so costly, their

effectiveness so uncertain and of such short duration, that the enterprise of creating an

armoured fleet seems to leave fruitless the perseverance of a people". TheJeune cole school of

thought of the 1870s and 1880s sought alternatives to the crippling expense and debatable

utility of a conventional battle fleet. It proposed what would nowadays be termed a sea denial

strategy, based on fast, long-ranged cruisers for commerce raiding and torpedo boat flotillas to

attack enemy ships attempting to blockade French ports. The ideas of theJeuneEcole were

ahead of their time; it was not until the 20th century that efficient mines, torpedoes,

submarines, and aircraft were available that allowed similar ideas to be effectively

implemented.

F. The determination of powers such as the German Empire to build battle fleets with which toconfront much stronger rivals has been criticised by historians, who emphasize the futility of

investment in a battle fleet which has no chance of matching its opponent in an actual battle.

According to this view, attempts by a weaker navy to compete head-to-head with a stronger one

in battleship construction simply wasted resources which could have been better invested in

attacking the enemy's points of weakness.

G. In Germany's case, the British dependence on massive imports of food and raw materials provedto be a near-fatal weakness, once Germany had accepted the political risk of unrestricted

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submarine warfare against commercial shipping. Although the U-boat offensive in 191718 was

ultimately defeated, it was successful in causing huge material loss and forcing the Allies to

divert vast resources into anti-submarine warfare. This success, though not ultimately decisive,

was nevertheless in sharp contrast to the inability of the German battlefleet to challenge the

supremacy of Britain's far stronger fleet.

Source: Wikipedia.com

Questions

You should spend about 20 minutes on Questions 15 27 which are based on Reading Passage 2

Questions 15 19

Do the following statements agree with the information given in Reading Passage 2?

In boxes 15 -19 in your answer sheet write

TRUE if the statement agrees with the information

FALSE if the statement contradicts the informationNOT GIVEN if there is no information on this

15.A battleship is a large armoured warship used in modern day warfare.16.Battleships are cost effective and practical.17.The value of a battleship is never very much welcomed by people across the globe.18.The growing range of naval engagements led to the aircraft carrier replacing the battleship.19.Battleships were a symbol of naval dominance and national might for India.

Question 20

23Look at the following topics (questions 20 23) and the list of statements below.

Match each topic to the correct statement.

Write the correct letterA G in boxes 1 4 on your answer sheet.

20.The German Empire21.Battleships22.The British23.Etienne Lamy

A Joined hands with the government.B Was very much reliant on battleships.C Is a matter of pride.D Is a consulting firm.E Massive import of food.F A French politician.G Made many battleships to defeat the enemies.

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Questions 24 27

Complete the following statements with the correct alternative from the box.

Write the correct letterA Fin boxes 24 27 on your answer sheet.

24.Efficient mines, torpedoes, submarines, and aircraft were available that25.Battleships were the26.The determination of powers such as the German Empire to build battle fleets27.The value of the battleship has been questioned,

Reading Passage 3

A. Later this month, heads of state and diplomats from 11 countries will meet in St. Petersburg,Russia for a "tiger summit" to discuss how to stop tigers from going extinct. It's the first time

heads of state have gathered for a meeting about a single species. But to many conservationists,

the meeting shouldn't have been needed at all. A decade ago, tigers seemed to have bounced

back from the brink of extinction. But thanks to continuing illegal poaching, there are now just

3,200 tigers left in the wild; that's down from over 100,000 a century ago.

B. As part of the run-up to the summit, wildlife trade monitoring network TRAFFIC released areport today detailing how more than 1,000 parts of tigers killed by poachers across Asia have

been seized over the past decade. The tiger parts including skins, bones, skulls and penises

were seized in India, China and Nepal and were destined for use in traditional Chinese

medicines, decorations and even good luck charms, the report says.

C. The trade of wild tiger parts is illegal under the UN Convention on International Trade inEndangered Species. Earlier this year, the World Federation of Chinese Medicine Societies

explicitly stated that tiger parts were not necessary for traditional medicine. Tiger farms have

sprung up to meet some of the demand. But a black market continues to thrive thanks to the

widespread belief that medicines from wild tigers are more potent than those from farmed

animals. Conservationists were optimistic about tigers a decade ago for two reasons. The

species are hardy--if allowed to breed, they do so quite successfully. What's more, the main

tiger countries all laid out refuges for the animals in their borders.

A Replaced battleships.B Even during the period of their prominence.C Largest and most complex.D Pushed their investment-banking units into the red.E Has been criticised by historians.F Even though they were of great fame.

http://www.traffic.org/home/2010/11/9/more-than-1000-tigers-reduced-to-skin-and-bones-in-last-deca.htmlhttp://www.traffic.org/home/2010/11/9/more-than-1000-tigers-reduced-to-skin-and-bones-in-last-deca.htmlhttp://www.traffic.org/home/2010/11/9/more-than-1000-tigers-reduced-to-skin-and-bones-in-last-deca.htmlhttp://www.traffic.org/home/2010/11/9/more-than-1000-tigers-reduced-to-skin-and-bones-in-last-deca.html

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D. But tigers are restless, wandering beasts; the refuges were necessarily large, and policing themhas proved very difficult. According to the TRAFFIC report, many seizures take place within 30

miles of protected tiger areas like the Western Ghats in India, the Sundarbans of Bangladesh and

Nepal's terai region.

E. "Clearly enforcement efforts to date are either ineffective or an insufficient deterrent," thereport quoted Mike Baltzer, a tiger expert with The World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF), as

saying. The report recommends both tightening enforcement and curbing demand for tiger

parts. But others have more revolutionary ideas. A recent study in the journal PLoS Biology

suggested that protection be concentrated to the 42 "source" sites in India, Sumatra and Russia

that contain 70% of the world's remaining wild tigers. These sites are relatively small--roughly

6% of the tiger's distributionand therefore policing could be much more tightly enforced.

F. But the summit, which is hosted by Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin and which hopes tolay out a plan to double the number of tigers in the wild by 2022, will likely settle on a more

diverse and diffuse approach. It will likely look at poverty alleviation and education as part of a

holistic effort.

G. To many conservationists, the tiger is a symbol of wild, untameable natureallowing the beaststo go extinct would mark the crossing of a line for humanity's acceptance of environmental

degradation. As Alan Rabinowitz, CEO of Panthera, recently told the Guardian: "[A tiger] is the

epitome of the wild and wildness. It's kind of a clich, but we need wild in our lives. The tiger is a

piece of that wild. We lose that and it's the cork out of the bottle--everything else spills out. If

we can't pull together enough to save what is the most iconic living species, then what are going

to do for lesser species?"

Source: Time

Questions

You should spend about 20 minutes on Questions 2840which are based on Reading Passage 3.

Questions 28 32

The passage has seven paragraphs labelledAG.

Which paragraph contains the following information?

Write the correct letter A-G in boxes 28-32 on your answer sheet.

NB: You may use any letter more than once.

28. A tiger is the epitome of the wild and wildness.29. The trade of wild tiger parts is illegal under the UN Convention on International Trade in

Endangered Species.

30. Tigers are restless, wandering beasts.31. The tiger is a symbol of wild, untameable nature.32. The summit is hosted by Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin.

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Questions 33 36

Complete the sentences below with words taken from Reading Passage 3.

Use NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS for each answer.

Write your answers in boxes 33-36 on your answer sheet.

33. Many seizures take place within 30 miles of protected tiger areas like the.34. The summit hopes to lay out a plan to double the number of tigers in .35. Tiger parts were not necessary for traditional medicine .36. Protection is concentrated to the 42 "source" sites in India .

Questions 3740

Complete the summary of the paragraphs A C below.

Choose NO MORE THAN THREE WORDSfor each answer.

Write your answers in boxes 37-40 on your answer sheet.

Heads of state and diplomats from 11 countries will meet in St. Petersburg, Russia for 37.

Thanks to continuing illegal poaching, there are now just 3,200 tigers 38. The trade of wild

tiger parts is illegal under the UN Convention on International 39. The main tiger

countries all laid out refuges for the 40