IELTS Short Question & Answer
Sample 1
The fattest animals
As the
largest animal in the world, the blue whale also has the most fat. In a 1968
study involving 49 different species of mammal from across the US and Brazil,
researchers deduced that the blue whale had the highest percentage of body fat
– more than 35%. With the whales weighing in at up to 180 tonnes, that’s easily
a record-breaking amount of fat for one animal.
But if
we look at things proportionally, you might be surprised by some of the world’s
full-fat species. We’ll begin with blubber, the fat rich tissue belonging to
marine mammals that has myriad benefits for streamlining, buoyancy, defence,
insulation and energy storage.
In
waters further north live bowhead whales. To survive in these frosty, remote
waters they have a layer of blubber almost half a metre thick. In his studies,
Dr Craig George found blubber mass ranged from 43% to 50% of the body mass of
yearling whales.
Answer the questions with NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS:
1.
Which animal has the most fat?
2.
How is called tissue of marine mammals that is rich with fat?
3.
Which marine animals need a thick layer of fat to survive in
cold waters?
Sample 2
Peanut allergy theory backed
up by new research
The effects of eating peanut
products as a baby to avoid the risk of allergy have been backed up by new
research. In 2015, a study claimed early exposure to peanut products could cut
the risk of allergy by 80%. Now researchers say "long-lasting"
allergy protection can be sustained - even when the snacks are later avoided
for a year. The New England Journal of Medicine study looked at 550 children
deemed prone to developing a peanut allergy. The latest paper builds on the
results of the 2015 research, which was also carried out by King's College
London and marked the first time scientists were able to suggest that exposing
children to small amounts of peanut snacks could stave off an allergy.
The new study suggests that
if a child has consumed peanut snacks within the first 11 months of life, then
at the age of five they can afford to stop eating the food entirely for a year,
and maintain no allergy. Lead author Prof Gideon Lack said: "[The
research] clearly demonstrates that the majority of infants did in fact remain
protected and that the protection was long-lasting." He said that part of
the problem was that people lived in a "culture of food fear".
"I believe that this fear of food allergy has become a self-fulfilling
prophecy, because the food is excluded from the diet and, as a result, the
child fails to develop tolerance," he told the BBC News website. The
researchers used the same children who took part in the 2015 study - half of whom
had been given peanut snacks as a baby while the remainder had been fed on a
diet of breast milk alone.
"The study found that at
six years of age, there was no statistically significant increase in allergy
after 12 months of avoidance, in those who had consumed peanut during the
[2015] trial," the authors said. The children taking part in the study
were considered prone to peanut allergy, because they had already developed
eczema as a baby - an early warning sign of allergies. Prof Lack said that
further studies were needed to see if the resistance lasts for considerably
longer than the 12-month abstinence period. He said that in the UK and US
combined, 20,000 babies a year are being diagnosed with peanut allergies. He
also said that between 1995 and 2005, the number of people being diagnosed had
trebled, and this was not because detection methods had become any more
advanced as they had remained the same. Prof Barry Kay, from Imperial College
London, said the study's results "point the way to completely fresh
thinking on the mechanisms of tolerance to allergenic foods in 'at risk'
infants". Speaking about both pieces of research, Michael Walker, a
consultant analyst and medical adviser to the government, said: "Taken
together these are reassuring findings that pave the way to stem the epidemic
of peanut allergy."
Answer
the questions below.
Write EXACTLY
TWO WORDS OR A NUMBER from the passage for each answer.
1. What is the number of children that the New England Journal of Medicine
studied?
2. At what age can the child stop eating peanuts for a year if it has
consumed peanut snacks within the first 11 months of life?
3. What part of the infants remained protected for a long-lasting
period?
What's the illness that 20,000 babies in the UK and US combined are diagnosed with each year?
Sample
2
Museum of Lost Objects: Mar
Elian Monastery
For centuries, Christians and
Muslims have visited the small Syrian town of al-Qaryatain to venerate a saint
known as Mar Elian. But in August 2015, the shrine was bulldozed by the group
that calls itself Islamic State and the multifaith community was torn apart.
About 1,500 years ago, an elderly and pious man called Julian, from the far
east of Mesopotamia, went on a pilgrimage to Jerusalem with his disciples. As
he travelled home, Julian had an inkling that he was going to die before he
made it. "If such a fate befalls me," he told his companions,
"put my body on an ox cart and set it loose. Where the oxen stop is where
I should be buried."
Julian did indeed die, his
body was loaded on to the cart, and the oxen plodded on until they came to a
stop near a small town. Julian's disciples built a tomb for him and in time a
monastery grew up around the shrine. That at least is the legend of St Julian
the Old Man, or, as he is known in Arabic, Mar Elian. What's certainly true is
that Mar Elian's shrine has existed since at least the 6th Century, near the
remote town of al-Qaryatain, located in the desert between Damascus and
Palmyra. Mar Elian is not only venerated as a saint by Christians, however. The
local Sunni population regard him as a Sufi leader and call him Sheikh Ahmed
Ghouri ("ghouri" means "priest"). Until its destruction
last year, Mar Elian's sarcophagus was draped in green satin, a traditional
mark of homage to a Sufi holy man.
When the British
archaeologist, Emma Loosley, travelled to al-Qaryatain 15 years ago to excavate
and redevelop the monastery she found the tumbledown ruins of the original
complex, a run-down church from the 1930s and a friendly priest - Father
Jacques Murad - who immediately decamped to a house in a nearby village.
"We couldn't cause any scandal by sleeping in the same place," she
says. "That meant I was the only permanent resident of the monastery at
that point, and I had to live in this half-ruined mud-brick tower in the corner
of the cloister. "Our shower was tainted because the well had sulphur, so
I used to smell like rotten eggs every time I washed." But the Qurwani,
the people of al-Qaryatain, made up for the grotty living conditions. Loosley
found the remote desert community to be remarkably open-hearted and tolerant.
They even had a myth to explain why Sunni Muslims and Christians - who
accounted for about a fifth of the population in 2001 - lived together so
harmoniously. "Their belief is that there were two tribes living in this
place," says Loosley. "With the coming of Islam, the tribes got
together and they decided that one tribe would stay Christian and that the
other one would try the new religion. "Then they had a pact that whichever
religion became dominant, they would look after their brothers who stayed in
the minority religion."
Answer the questions below.
Write NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS from the
passage for each answer.
1.
Christians and Muslims were visiting
al-Qaryatain to appreciate what saint?
2.
What local population regard Mar Elian
as a Sufi leader?
3.
Who found the tumbledown ruins of the
original complex?
4.
What did the community have to explain
why Sunni Muslims and Christians lived together in harmony?
Sample 4
The Falkirk Wheel
A unique engineering achievement
A.
The Falkirk Wheel in Scotland is the world’s first and only rotating boat
lift. Opened in 2002, it is central to the ambitious £84.5m Millennium
Link project to restore navigability across Scotland by reconnecting the
historic waterways of the Forth & Clyde and Union Canals.
B.
The major challenge of the project lay in the fact that the Forth & Clyde
Canal is situated 35 metres below the level of the Union Canal. Historically,
the two canals had been joined near the town of Falkirk by a sequence of 11
locks – enclosed sections of canal in which the water level could be raised or
lowered – that stepped down across a distance of 1.5 km. This had been
dismantled in 1933, thereby breaking the link. When the project was launched in
1994, the British Waterways authority were keen to create a dramatic
twenty-first- century landmark which would not only be a fitting commemoration
of the Millennium, but also a lasting symbol of the economic regeneration of
the region.
Questions 1-3
Using NO
MORE THAN FOUR WORDS, answer the following questions.
Write
your answers in boxes 1-3 on your answer sheet.
1. What is the world’s first rotating
boat lift?
2. What keeps the Forth & Clyde Canal
and Union Canal joined?
3. Who wanted to create a dramatic
landmark?
Sample 5
Our Vanishing Night
” Most city skies have become virtually
empty of stars “
A. If humans were truly at home under the
light of the moon and stars, it would make no difference to us whether we were
out and about at night or during the day, the midnight world as visible to us
as it is to the vast number of nocturnal species on this planet. Instead, we
are diurnal creatures, meaning our eyes are adapted to living in the sun’s
light. This is a basic evolutionary fact, even though most of us don’t think of
ourselves as diurnal beings any more th`an as primates or mammals or
Earthlings. Yet it’s the only way to explain what we’ve done to the night:
we’ve engineered it to meet our needs by filling it with light.
B. This kind of engineering is no different
from damming a river. Its benefits come with consequences – called light
pollution – whose effects scientists are only now beginning to study. Light
pollution is largely the result of bad lighting design, which allows artificial
light to shine outward and upward into the sky, where it is not wanted, instead
of focusing it downward, where it is. Wherever human light spills into the
natural world, some aspect of life – migration, reproduction, feeding – is
affected. For most of human history, the phrase “light pollution” would have
made no sense. Imagine walking toward London on a moonlit night around 1800,
when it was one of Earth’s most populous cities. Nearly a million people lived
there, making do, as they always had, with candles and lanterns. There would be
no gaslights in the streets or squares for another seven years.
Questions 1-4
Using NO
MORE THAN FIVE WORDS, answer the following questions.
Write
your answers in boxes 1-4 on your answer sheet.
1. What are humans referred to as?
2. What have humans done to the
night?
3. What resulted in light pollution?
4. What are the factors impacted by human
lights?
Sample 6
Seed vault guards resources for the
future
Fiona Harvey paid a visit to a building
whose contents are very precious
A. About 1,000 km from the North Pole,
Svalbard is one of the most remote places on earth. For this reason, it is the
site of a vault that will safeguard a priceless component of our common
heritage – the seeds of our staple crops. Here, seeds from the world’s most
vital food crops will be locked away for hundreds or even thousands of years.
If something goes wrong in the world, the vault will provide the means to
restore farming. We, or our descendants, will not have to retread thousands of
years of agriculture from scratch.
B. Deep in the vault at the end of a long
tunnel, are three storage vaults which are lined with insulated panels to help
maintain the cold temperatures. Electronic transmitters linked to a satellite
system monitor temperature, etc. and pass the information back to the
appropriate authorities at Longyearbyen and the Nordic Gene Bank which provide
the technical information for managing the seed vaults. The seeds are placed in
sealed boxes and stored on shelves in the vaults. The minimal moisture level
and low temperature ensure low metabolic activity. The remote location, as well
as the rugged structure, provide unparalleled security for the world’s
agricultural heritage.
Questions 1-4
Using NO
MORE THAN FIVE WORDS, answer the following questions.
Write
your answers in boxes 1-4 on your answer sheet.
1. What is referred to as the priceless
component of our heritage?
2. How could the vault be beneficial?
3. What maintains cold temperatures in
storage vaults?
4. What offers low metabolic rates?
Sample 7
Communicating In Colour
A. There are more than 160 known species of
chameleons. The main distribution is in Africa and Madagascar, and other
tropical regions, although some species are also found in parts of southern
Europe and Asia. There are introduced populations in Hawaii and probably in
California and Florida too.
B. New species are still discovered quite
frequently. Dr. Andrew Marshall, a conservationist from York University, was
surveying monkeys in Tanzania. Accidently, he stumbled across a twig snake in
the Magombera forest, which, frightened, coughed up a chameleon and fled.
Though a colleague persuaded him not to touch it because of the venom’s risk,
Marshall suspected it might be a new species and took a photograph to send to
colleagues, who confirmed his suspicions. Kinyongia Magombera, literally “the
chameleon from Magombera,” is the result, and the fact it was not easy to
identify is precisely what made it unique. The most remarkable features of
chameleons are their ability to change colour and ability rivalled only by
cuttlefish and octopi in the animal kingdom. Because of this, colour is not the
best thing for telling chameleons apart, and different species are usually
identified based on the patterning and shape of the head, and the arrangement
of scales. In this case, it was the bulge of scales on the chameleon’s nose.
Questions 1-3
Using NO
MORE THAN FIVE WORDS, answer the following questions.
Write
your answers in boxes 1-3 on your answer sheet.
1. Where can you find the main species of
chameleon?
2. How did Dr. Andrew discover a new
chameleon species?
3. How are different species of
chameleons identified?
Sample 8
Nature on display in American zoos
by Elizabeth Hanson
A. The first zoo in the United States opened
in Philadelphia in 1874, followed by the Cincinnati Zoo the next year. By 1940
there were zoos in more than one hundred American cities. The Philadelphia Zoo
was more thoroughly planned and better financed than most of the hundreds of
zoos that would open later. But in its landscape and its mission – to both
educate and entertain, it embodied ideas about how to build a zoo that stayed
consistent for decades. The zoos came into existence in the late nineteenth
century during the transition of the United States from a rural and
agricultural nation to an industrial one.
B. The population more than doubled between
1860 and 1990. As more middle-class people lived in cities, they began seeking
new relationships with the natural world as a place for recreation,
self-improvement, and Spiritual renewal. Cities established systems of
public parks, and nature tourism – already popular – became even more
fashionable with the establishment of national parks. Nature was thought to be
good for people of all ages and classes. Nature study was incorporated into the
school curriculum, and natural history collecting became an increasingly
popular pastime.
Questions 1-4
Using NO
MORE THAN FIVE WORDS, answer the following questions.
Write
your answers in boxes 1-4 on your answer sheet.
1. In which year did the US have its
second zoo?
2. What transition did the US see in the
late 19th century?
3. What were the reasons behind city
people connecting to nature?
4. What additions did the school
curriculum see?
By
Balram sir
Youtube:
@studywithbrsir
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