Vocabulary from Context
Read the conversations below and guess the meaning of the colored words
and phrases by writing a synonym in the parentheses ( ___ ). If you need
help, look at the choices in the box at the bottom of this page.

A. Ben:[an] advance Mei:

Computers have made great advances ( _____________ ) in the last ten years.
That’s true. They are smarter, faster, and cheaper.

/ədˈvæns/B. Bill:
malfunction Chie:

Has your car ever malfunctioned ( _____________ )?
Actually, I had a big problem with it last week. It broke down on the highway.

/mælˈfʌŋkʃən/

C. Dan:Which color are you going to select ( ___________ ) for your new car?

select Kaho:

I don’t know. I like blue or yellow, so I’ll probably select one of those.

/səˈlekt/

D. Kan:superior

Lisa:

Which is superior ( _____________ ), an American car or a Japanese car?
I think American cars break down more than Japanese cars do.

/suːˈpɪriər/

E. Mary:
predict ~I predict ( _____________ ) computers will be smarter than humans by 2030.

Keiko: I think so too.

/prəˈdɪkt/

F. Steve:resist (~)

Saori:

Is cancer a sickness which is age-related ( _____________ )?
Well, it’s true that senior citizens have a higher chance of getting cancer.

/rəˈzɪst/G. Mark:

What are you currently ( _____________ ) working on in your laboratory?

Shun:

We just started a project today about what humans will be like in the future.

currently/ˈkɝrəntli/

H. Amy:
brief

Rie:

How was your meeting with Professor Nakayama?
It was good but very brief ( ________ ). We only spoke for five minutes.

/briːf/actually / because of being older / believe / better /choose / now / progress / short / stopped working

062 │Lesson 5

Pre-Reading - The Human Hybrid
In groups, discuss the following questions.
1. Imagine you could have chosen your own eye color, hair color, and height before
you were born. What would you have looked like now? I would have had ~ eyes,~ hair, and been ~ centimeters tall.
2. How will humans one hundred years in the future be different from humans today?
Think about health, height, age, etc. Future humans will (be)...

The Human Hybrid│ 63

Part 1→ Comprehension on Pg. 68, # 1 - 6 / Rephrasing on Pg. 69

New words

Our genes greatly affect who we are. They control the way

1 - [a] gene /dʒiːn/

we look and play a very important role in our health and in how

2 - [a] role /roʊl/
3 - genetics /dʒəˈnetɪks/

long we live.

But with fantastic progress in genetics, human

8 - altogether /ˌɔltəˈɡeðər/

beings of the future may be very different from the way we are

9 - [a] breakthroughtoday. Many of the diseases that affect us now will be gone, and/ˈbreɪkˌθruː/

10 - CRISPR /ˈkrɪspər/people might live hundreds of years, if not longer. Let’s take a

11 - occur /əˈkɝː/

look at some amazing advances in science, medicine, and

12 - treat ~ /triːt/

technology that could change our species altogether.

515 - co-develop ~/ˈkoʊdɪˈveləp/

29 - immune /ɪˈmjuːn/Recently, there has been a huge breakthrough in genetic
research.

It is called CRISPR technology.

Today, there are10around six thousand diseases that occur due to genetic problems,Expressions

and only about five percent of these can be treated. With CRISPR

2 - play a (verytechnology, we can fix damaged genes by replacing bad genesimportant) part in ~3 - (human beings)

with good genes. Jennifer Daudna, a professor of chemistry at theof the future

University of California at Berkeley, is a scientist who co-

4 - (people) of today

developed CRISPR. She says that our genes are like software

6 - if not (longer)
23 - so far28 - wipe out ~which runs our body.

Sometimes, this software malfunctions.

This causes people to have serious health issues, which can evenlead to death.

With CRISPR

20technology, we are able to find any
genetic problems and fix them.
Scientists are now using CRISPR
in plants and animals, and so far,
the technology seems to be work-25

ing very well. According to one
researcher, CRISPR has the ability
to wipe out all disease and makeour bodies immune to sickness.
Professor Jennifer Daudna064 │Lesson 515Part 2→ Comprehension on Pg. 68, # 7 - 10 / Rephrasing on Pg. 70

Even though CRISPR technology has not yet been used on

New words

people, other genetic techniques are already being utilized in

3 - [an] embryo /ˈembriˌoʊ/human embryos. Dr. Jeffrey Steinberg, a fertility doctor, uses a

3 - fertility /fərˈtɪləti/
4 - [a] process /ˈproʊses/

process that allows parents to test for more than four hundred birth
5defects. In addition, Dr. Steinberg’s techniques give parents the6 - [a] feature /ˈfiːtʃər/ability to choose desirable features for their future babies, such as

9 - [a] trait /treɪt/

sex and eye color. In the near future, this technology will make it

10

6 - desirable /dəˈzaɪrəbəl/

16 - enthusiastic/enˌθuːziˈæstɪk/possible for doctors and parents to test for additional birth defects

17 - modified /ˈmɑːdəˌfaɪd/

and diseases and to select even more traits for their children, such

18 - nowadays /ˈnaʊəˌdeɪz/

as height, weight, and hair color. Dr. Steinberg thinks that we will
be able to choose height by the year 2021.

19 - ethical /ˈeθɪkəl̩ /28 - [a] gap /ɡæp/
29 - unforeseen

Pre-birth services like the ones offered by Dr. Steinberg,/ˌʌnfɔːrˈsiːn/have become very popular in some countries such as China, wheregenetic development is seen as a very important part of the15country’s success in the future. Thousands of Chinese couples areExpressions
4 - test for ~4 - [a] birth defectvery enthusiastic about receiving various fertility techniques.

12 - [a] pre-birth service

Chinese babies with modified genes, or what some call “designer

17 - [a] designer (baby)

babies,” are becoming more and more common nowadays.
But is it ethical to design a baby? A recent survey in the20

United Kingdom showed that fifty one percent of people were infavor of using genetic techniques in order to identify birth defects,
but only thirteen percent were in favor of using these methods toDr. Steinberg working
in his fertility clinic

select desirable features in babies. Some also worry that only therich would be able to afford such costly genetic processes. If that25

happened, those who are wealthy could become geneticallysuperior to the rest of the population and might look down onothers, perhaps like many people feel superior to animals. This
could create a new gap between the rich and the poor and lead tomany unforeseen problems.

The Human Hybrid│ 65