PTE Listening Fill in the Blanks Practice

Scientists are looking for Earth-like planets around other stars. But one way to limit the search can be to figure out where an Earth-like planet cannot exist and eliminate those types of systems. In a new study, astronomers turned their attention to so-called hot Jupiter’s. These are Jupiter sized planets that have an orbit of only about three days. The scientists looked at 63 hot Jupiter’s to see if they could find evidence for any nearby Earth-like planets. They found none. But it could be that the companion planets are too small in size or mass or just aren't detectable with the current techniques. So the researchers then turned to hot Neptune’s, and warm Jupiter’s—these are Jupiter’s with slightly longer orbits. They found only 2 potential nearby planets among 222 hot Neptune’s. And of the 31 warm Jupiter’s, five showed evidence of a companion. The findings are in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. The current theory is that hot Jupiter’s formed and then migrated in towards their stars Researchers say that the migration might have quote disrupted the formation of Earth-like planets. Good thing our Jupiter kept its cool.

To figure out these counterintuitive findings, the researchers conducted an experiment in a hotel room. They rounded up some lizards, gave them a perch, and used a leaf blower to mimic the effects of high winds. They set up a net to catch any lizards that lost their grip. As the artificial wind blew, the lizards moved so the perch took most of the air flow. But their hind legs would stick out, and if those rear limbs stuck out too far, they acted as sails. "Eventually those back legs were blown off the perch, and the lizards were just holding on with their front two legs. And they could only hold on like that for so long as the wind speed increased further and further, until eventually they were blown off the perch and into the nets So shorter back legs gave a survival advantage. A trait that might be passed on to the next lizard generation.

Crows, she says, are what's known as "partial migrants." Every year, some members of the population migrate between breeding grounds and their overwintering grounds--like parking lots But others just stay put. So Townsend and her colleagues wanted to know if that urge to migrate was something individual crows can turn on and off. To find out, they captured 18 crows from overwintering spots in California and New York. They fitted the birds with little backpack satellite tags, and tracked them for several years. Overall, three quarters of the birds migrated, an average of 300 miles. And more importantly, if they migrated once, they did it every year--suggesting traveling is not a habit they switch on and off. The researchers also found that migrating crows returned faithfully to the same breeding grounds every year--but were more flexible on where to overwinter. Which could be a good thing.

On election day, where do you vote? If it's in a church, you might be inclined to vote more conservatively than if you cast your ballot at a school or government building. That's according to research published in the International Journal for the Psychology of Religion. And the effect seems to hold, whether you're Christian, Muslim or agnostic progressive , independent or conservative. The study found that when random people were surveyed in front of a church, they gave more socially and politically conservative responses than people surveyed while standing in front of a government building. The shift in people's attitudes, the researchers suggest, was likely a result of visual priming -- meaning that people who could see the religious building were, consciously or not, getting cues that influenced their response. The surveys were conducted in Europe, so it's possible American voters might react differently. But the survey included subjects from more than 30 countries to try to minimize a particular national bias. So before you cast your vote this election year, think about whether your view is influencing your views.

Those of you who've never heard the term neo-Latin, may be forgiven for thinking it's a new South American dance craze. If you're puzzled when I tell you it has something to do with the language of Romans, take heart, over the years many classes who have confessed they are not really sure what it is either. Some have assumed that they are so-called ‘Late-Latin', written at the end of the Roman Empire. Others have supposed it must have something to do with the middle ages. Or perhaps it's that pseudo-Latin which my five and seven-year-old boys seem to have gleaned from the Harry Potter books, useful for spells and curses that they zip one another with makeshift paper ash ones. No, in fact, neo-Latin is more or less the same as the Latin that was written in the ancient world, classical Latin. So, what's so new about it?