Self-study
This passage was adapted from articles published in the 1990s.
P1
███ ███████ ████ █████████████ ████████ █████████ ██████ █████████ ███ █████ ███ ███ ██ █████████ █████████ ████ █████ ██████████ ████████ ███ ████ ██████ ██ ███ ███████████ ██ █████ ██████ ███████████ █████████ ███ ████ ███████████ ███ ███ ███████ ████ ███████ ██ ███ ██████ █████████ ████████ █████████████ ██ ███ ██████ ██ ████████ ████████ ████████ ███
Intro topic ·
Computer scientist Philip Emeagwali's inspiration and work on parallel computing
Describe Emeagwali's contribution ·
Developed parallel computing system to predict underground oil flow
Used network of many computers working simultaneously; solved speed and efficiency problems with traditional "sequential" computers
P2
Problem ·
Predicting oil flow requires many simultaneous calculations
Emeagwali's solution ·
Connect many individual computers over Internet to form huge parallel computer
New problem and solution ·
Properly dividing parallel tasks is hard; solution was to design computer network like tree branches
Tree branches follow very efficient patterns for collecting and moving resources; computer networks that follow the same underlying patterns are very efficient at generating and transmitting data
P3
██ ████ █████████ ███ ███████ ████████████ ████ ██ █████████ ███ ██████ ███ █ █████████ ████████ ████████ ████ ██ ██████ ████ ██ ████████ ██████ ██ ███████ ██████ ███████ ████████ █ ███████ ██ ████████ ███ ██████████ ██████ ██ █████ ██ ███ ████████ ██ █████ ███████████ █████ ███ ██ █████████ █████████ █████████████████ ████████ ███
Emeagwali's future work ·
Parallel computing modeled after spacing of honeycombs
Emeagwali's perspective ·
Nature will become a more important source of inspiration for technical solutions
Passage Style
Single position
Spotlight
10.
The passage most strongly suggests ████ █████████ █████ █████ ███ ██ ███ █████████ ██████
a
Some natural systems ████ ███████ ██ █████████ █████████ ██ ████████ ████ ███ █████████ ██ ███████████ ████ ██ █████████ ████████ █████ ██ ████████ ███████████
b
Global weather is ██████ ███ ███████████ ██ ██ ██████████ ███████████ ████ ████ █ ███ ███████ ██ ████████
We have no reason to think Emeagwali believes weather is too complicated to be predicatable long in advance. In fact, he believes he has a design that will predict global weather patterns a “century in advance.”
c
Most computer designs ████ ██ ███ ██████ ██ ████████ ██ ███████ ████████
No support for “most.” We don’t know that Emeagwali thinks over half of computer designs will be inspired by nature.
d
Massively parallel computers ████ ██████████ ██ █████████ ██████ ██ ███████ █████ ███ ████ ██ ██████████ ███████ █████████ ██████
We don’t know Emeagwali’s opinion about parallel computing and mundane computing tasks.
e
The mathematical structure ██ █████████ █████ ██ ██████ █████████ ███ █████████ ████████ ███████ ██ ███████ ███ ████ ██ ███ ███████ ███ ███████
Although Emeagwali used the structure of branching trees for his design, this doesn’t imply a belief about the “primary” use of the structure of branching trees.