[...continuation]
5. Forest legislative changes and their impacts on mammal ecology and diversity in Brazil (Mauro Galetti)
Forest ecosystems within Brazil host one of the highest levels of mammalian diversity on Earth, much of which within legally required forest set-asides in private landholdings. The Legal Reserves (RLs) and Permanent Protected Areas (APPs) of the Brazilian Forest Code provide an important strategy to maintain this diversity. Yet a proposed amendment to Brazil's 1965 forestry code would reduce protection of Brazil's forests, including the Amazon and the Atlantic forest, and bring irreversible detrimental effects to mammal diversity. Mammals are key components of forest ecosystem, providing important environmental services as pollinators, seed dispersers and ecosystem engineers. The local extinction of some species will negatively affect forest ecosystem service provisioning throughout the country. Another important effect of forest conversion within private properties, should the proposed changes happen, will be the emergence of new diseases, bringing serious public health problems in Brazil.
6. Bees, ecosystem services and the Brazilian Forest Code (Vera Lucia Imperatriz-Fonseca & Patricia Nunes-Silva)
Bees are considered the main pollinators in natural and agricultural environments. This ecosystem service is essential to the maintenance of wild plant populations and to food production on agricultural environments and it's threatened in many regions of the world. Deforestation is pointed out as one of the main causes because it affects bee populations. Conservation of forests is necessary for the maintenance of bee populations and pollination services on agricultural landscapes.
7. Potencial impacts of changes in the Forest Law in relation to water resources (José Galizia Tundisi & Takako Matsumura Tundisi)
Mosaics of vegetation, riparian forests, and wetlands have an important quantitative and qualitative role on the hydrological cycle. Riparian forests protect the water quality of rivers, lakes and reservoirs. Wetlands control floods, sedimentation and regulate the water quality by enhancing processes such as denitrification, phosphorus and heavy metal retention. Both ecosystems of transition are fundamental. The removal of wetlands and forests (riparian and mosaics of vegetation) affects environmental services of these ecosystems, causing loss of economic assets of the capital natural and accelerating degradation of rivers, lakes, reservoirs and the watersheds. Protection of these ecosystems of transition is thus fundamental for the development of agriculture. The loss of services affects society, human health, increasing costs of recovery and deteriorating human-ecological relationships.
quinta-feira, 29 de dezembro de 2011
CHANGES IN THE BRAZILIAN FOREST CODE: (I) NEGATIVE IMPACTS ON THE ICHTHYOFAUNA, AMPHIBIANS, REPTILES, AND BIRDS
Brief comments on impacts that scientific studies have pointed out as plausible, as consequences of modifications being proposed in the Brazilian Forest Code are given here (in two postages). The original articles were published in BIOTANEOTROPICA, vol. 10, n.4, 2010, a publication of the “FAPESP – Fundação de Amparo à Pesquisa do Estado de São Paulo”. [N.B. bold types are of my responsibility]
In this first postage we will present the summaries of impacts on fish, amphibians, reptiles, and birds.
1. Changes in the Brazilian Forest Code: potential impacts on the ichthyofauna (Lilian Casatti).
In this paper is presented an analysis of possible impacts that the reduction of native vegetation, especially riparian forests, can have on the fish fauna. Three sets of primary functional aspects performed by riparian forests are discussed: transferring of solar energy to the aquatic environment, trapping nutrients and sediments that enter the rivers and transfer of organic material between the terrestrial and aquatic environments. Any modification which results in further loss of native vegetation, in permanent preservation areas or in protection reserves, may generate losses of species, faunal homogenization and reduction of fish biomass.
2. The review of the Brazilian Forest Act: harmful effects on amphibian conservation (Luís Felipe Toledo)
In the last months there is a growing discussion in Brazil about a new Brazilian Forest Act (Código Florestal). This new proposal, in substitution to the current Act, includes modifications which will affect negatively natural populations of amphibians. Besides the deleterious impacts upon amphibians, it will also harm the national and international human populations. Among the possible effects, in consequence of the associate amphibian population declines or complete loss, we cite the increase of agricultural production costs, loss of primary sources of compounds for the medical industry, generalized ecological disequilibrium, eutrofication of water bodies, increase in the costs of water (for humans) treatment, increase of agricultural plagues, and increase of insect borne diseases. All these effects are of high relevance, even more if we consider the population declines of amphibians, the most threatened terrestrial vertebrate group in the world. Therefore, we propose that if a new Forest Act must be prepared, that it should be based, besides in unlikely immediate economical benefits to farm owners, in scientific knowledge which benefits nature conservancy, economy, health, and human welfare.
3. Potential impacts of changes in the Brazilian Forest Code on reptiles (Otavio Augusto Vuolo Marques; Cristiano Nogueira; Marcio Martins; & Ricardo Jannini Sawaya).
We evaluate the potential impacts on Brazilian reptiles (721 species already described), if the proposed changes in the Brazilian Forest Code are approved. The possibility of environmental compensation (a legal obligation in case of disturbance of natural habitats) in basins or micro basins different from that in which the disturbance occurred would have harmful effects on reptile diversity. Some reptile genera include species that rarely co-occur in space. Thus, conservation action planning based on naturally smaller scales, such as micro basins, is most suitable to maintain species composition across large regions. The proposed changes also include the removal of mountaintops as Areas of Permanent Preservation (APP, areas which must be permanently protected, despite the fact that they are not part of a park), as well as a reduction in the width of gallery forests and protected riparian habitats (which are APPs). Many Brazilian reptiles are restricted to high elevation areas, whereas others dwell only or mostly in gallery forests and riparian areas. Thus, the habitat loss that would result from these two changes could make some reptiles vulnerable to extinction. The proposed changes also include allowing the restoration of the Legal Reserves (LR, the reserves of natural vegetation which landowners have to keep in private areas) using exotic plant species. There are evidences that many Brazilian reptiles are not able to persist in human-modified environments like forests composed of exotic trees. The proposed changes also allow the compensation of disturbances imposed on LR inside existing protected areas. However, existing protected areas are not sufficient for the maintenance of reptile diversity in Brazil (mainly because many species have restricted distributions). If approved, the proposed changes in the code will impose significant negative effects on the Brazilian reptile fauna, an important component of the country's natural heritage. Furthermore, unknown molecules with potential for pharmaceutical use could also be lost.
4. Potential impacts of the changes proposed in the Brazilian Forest Code on birds (Pedro Ferreira Develey & Tatiana Pongiluppi)
Proposed changes in the current Brazilian Forest Code can lead to the reduction of native vegetation (forests, grasslands and wetlands) impacting directly many bird species. In Brazil, 17 globally threatened species are dependent of riverine forests and eight of these are restricted to the Brazilian territory. A decrease in the width of the area that should be protected as Permanent Preservation Areas (Área de Preservação Permanente - APP) can lead to significant population losses that would put at risk the integrity of populations and, in some cases, the survival of species. In fragmented landscapes, the APPs function as corridors, allowing the dispersion of birds through the matrix. Legal Reserve (Reserva Legal) areas should be maintained complementary to APPs, as the avifauna composition varies in areas located near and far from water bodies. Environmental heterogeneity is crucial to the maintenance of the bird community integrity. Even small patches of forest are important to the avifauna, working as stepping stones that, like the corridors, enable forest birds to move across the landscape. Birds are important predators, dispersers, and pollinators in agricultural ecosystems: in the Tropical region, areas with high bird diversity are significantly correlated with the highest rates of arthropods' removal, including those considered pests. Thus, proposed changes in the current Forest Code may represent a negative impact not only in relation to biodiversity, but also in regarding the agricultural production.
[Continued...]
In this first postage we will present the summaries of impacts on fish, amphibians, reptiles, and birds.
1. Changes in the Brazilian Forest Code: potential impacts on the ichthyofauna (Lilian Casatti).
In this paper is presented an analysis of possible impacts that the reduction of native vegetation, especially riparian forests, can have on the fish fauna. Three sets of primary functional aspects performed by riparian forests are discussed: transferring of solar energy to the aquatic environment, trapping nutrients and sediments that enter the rivers and transfer of organic material between the terrestrial and aquatic environments. Any modification which results in further loss of native vegetation, in permanent preservation areas or in protection reserves, may generate losses of species, faunal homogenization and reduction of fish biomass.
2. The review of the Brazilian Forest Act: harmful effects on amphibian conservation (Luís Felipe Toledo)
In the last months there is a growing discussion in Brazil about a new Brazilian Forest Act (Código Florestal). This new proposal, in substitution to the current Act, includes modifications which will affect negatively natural populations of amphibians. Besides the deleterious impacts upon amphibians, it will also harm the national and international human populations. Among the possible effects, in consequence of the associate amphibian population declines or complete loss, we cite the increase of agricultural production costs, loss of primary sources of compounds for the medical industry, generalized ecological disequilibrium, eutrofication of water bodies, increase in the costs of water (for humans) treatment, increase of agricultural plagues, and increase of insect borne diseases. All these effects are of high relevance, even more if we consider the population declines of amphibians, the most threatened terrestrial vertebrate group in the world. Therefore, we propose that if a new Forest Act must be prepared, that it should be based, besides in unlikely immediate economical benefits to farm owners, in scientific knowledge which benefits nature conservancy, economy, health, and human welfare.
3. Potential impacts of changes in the Brazilian Forest Code on reptiles (Otavio Augusto Vuolo Marques; Cristiano Nogueira; Marcio Martins; & Ricardo Jannini Sawaya).
We evaluate the potential impacts on Brazilian reptiles (721 species already described), if the proposed changes in the Brazilian Forest Code are approved. The possibility of environmental compensation (a legal obligation in case of disturbance of natural habitats) in basins or micro basins different from that in which the disturbance occurred would have harmful effects on reptile diversity. Some reptile genera include species that rarely co-occur in space. Thus, conservation action planning based on naturally smaller scales, such as micro basins, is most suitable to maintain species composition across large regions. The proposed changes also include the removal of mountaintops as Areas of Permanent Preservation (APP, areas which must be permanently protected, despite the fact that they are not part of a park), as well as a reduction in the width of gallery forests and protected riparian habitats (which are APPs). Many Brazilian reptiles are restricted to high elevation areas, whereas others dwell only or mostly in gallery forests and riparian areas. Thus, the habitat loss that would result from these two changes could make some reptiles vulnerable to extinction. The proposed changes also include allowing the restoration of the Legal Reserves (LR, the reserves of natural vegetation which landowners have to keep in private areas) using exotic plant species. There are evidences that many Brazilian reptiles are not able to persist in human-modified environments like forests composed of exotic trees. The proposed changes also allow the compensation of disturbances imposed on LR inside existing protected areas. However, existing protected areas are not sufficient for the maintenance of reptile diversity in Brazil (mainly because many species have restricted distributions). If approved, the proposed changes in the code will impose significant negative effects on the Brazilian reptile fauna, an important component of the country's natural heritage. Furthermore, unknown molecules with potential for pharmaceutical use could also be lost.
4. Potential impacts of the changes proposed in the Brazilian Forest Code on birds (Pedro Ferreira Develey & Tatiana Pongiluppi)
Proposed changes in the current Brazilian Forest Code can lead to the reduction of native vegetation (forests, grasslands and wetlands) impacting directly many bird species. In Brazil, 17 globally threatened species are dependent of riverine forests and eight of these are restricted to the Brazilian territory. A decrease in the width of the area that should be protected as Permanent Preservation Areas (Área de Preservação Permanente - APP) can lead to significant population losses that would put at risk the integrity of populations and, in some cases, the survival of species. In fragmented landscapes, the APPs function as corridors, allowing the dispersion of birds through the matrix. Legal Reserve (Reserva Legal) areas should be maintained complementary to APPs, as the avifauna composition varies in areas located near and far from water bodies. Environmental heterogeneity is crucial to the maintenance of the bird community integrity. Even small patches of forest are important to the avifauna, working as stepping stones that, like the corridors, enable forest birds to move across the landscape. Birds are important predators, dispersers, and pollinators in agricultural ecosystems: in the Tropical region, areas with high bird diversity are significantly correlated with the highest rates of arthropods' removal, including those considered pests. Thus, proposed changes in the current Forest Code may represent a negative impact not only in relation to biodiversity, but also in regarding the agricultural production.
[Continued...]
segunda-feira, 26 de dezembro de 2011
SHUT YOUR WINDOWS AT 5 O’CLOCK P.M. EVERY DAY FROM NOVEMBER TO MARCH: ALATE SWARMING OF TERMITES
Two species of dry wood termites commonly found in the tropical Atlantic forest of Brazil, Cryptotermis brevis and C. dudleyi, were studied by Bandeira, A.G.; Silva, M.P.da e Vasconcellos,A. [Acta Biologica Leopoldinensia, v. 23, n. 2, 2001]. Swarmings occurred during nine months, from October to May in colonies of C. brevis with a peak from November to December. And C. dudleyi had a swarming period from December to June with a peak from February to March. The former species showed to be 5.4 times more efficient to form new colonies than the latter species.
The authors suggested that liberation of alates by colonies of both species during such long periods of the year, make them a most likely pest of structural timber in tropical areas; like in the campus of the Federal University of Paraíba, in João Pessoa, northeastern Brazil, where this study was performed. Cryptotermis brevis was reported by the authors as the worst destroyer of structural timber. However, giving a species a pest status is subjective because “without humans there would be no pest”, as pointed out by “Begon et al. (1990). Ecology: from individuals to ecosystems. London, Blackwell”.
It is also important to note that all the observed dispersion flights occurred between 4 p.m. and 6 p.m. Since they become less visible to predators at twilight time, the authors interpreted the highest swarming at that period of the day as a survival strategy of both species. That is why the title of this brief assay: a warning to Brazilians living in Paraíba state (and “surroundings”).
The photos shown here illustrate termites proliferation in the campus: (top) on old plywood desks discharged unduly outside a building, close to the forest; (middle) some nests on a tree in a parking lot in front of a bank agency in the campus; and (below) on a shrub in the forest. The termite nests on a tree in the parking lot might suggest that the tree is not healthy (outside its natural habitat, the forest), and that a preventive action by eliminating such focus of termites must be carried out; as well as the focus of termites on plywood timber of the old school desks.
sábado, 10 de dezembro de 2011
CCS -CARBON CAPTURE AND STORAGE. Climate Talks Prove Growing Need for it.
LET'S PRAY FOR DURBAN good results!!!
[From SCIENTIFIC AMERICAN, 10th December 2011]
DURBAN, South Africa — The roughly 3,000 fossil fuel–fired power plants in North America — Canada, Mexico and the U.S. — emit 6 percent of global greenhouse gases, or nearly as much as all of the European Union. In fact, coal-fired power plants around the globe are the single largest source of greenhouse gas emissions.
In other words, coal is largely responsible for climate change. Burning coal alone contributes more than half of global greenhouse gas emissions from human activity. "Whatever you hear from time to time, a big part of electricity is produced from coal," argued Philippe Joubert, deputy CEO of power equipment manufacturer Alstom at the climate talks here on December 6. "This will continue."
That's why so-called carbon capture and storage (CCS) is a mark of seriousness in efforts to combat climate change; Joubert calls it "mandatory." Because the world seems to have little interest in restraining coal burning — it continues to increase, driven largely by China and India — capturing the CO2 before it enters the atmosphere is the only real way to tackle such emissions.
"There are more than enough discovered hydrocarbons to fry the planet," Lord Nicholas Stern of the London School of Economics and Political Science told Scientific American. "You can do CCS or you can bust two degrees [Celsius of warming]."
That is why the negotiations here in Durban approved CCS as a potential technology under the Clean Development Mechanism — a way to provide funds from developed to developing countries for emission-reducing infrastructure in return for credit against the developed countries' CO2 emission quotas. Unfortunately, the mechanism is a part of the Kyoto Protocol. And the protocol will expire at the end of next year without a successor — unless one is agreed on this week in Durban.
Regardless, the world seems to be closing down more CCS plants than it opens: The E.U.'s flagship CCS project at Schwarze Pumpe was cancelled on December 5 due to local German opposition. Canada has had a CO2-sequestration project running for years now in the Weyburn oil field in Saskatchewan but has yet to expand operations to the tar sands that are single-handedly increasing that country's emissions — which violate its obligations under Kyoto. U.S. power company AEP recently turned down the opportunity to expand the world's first project to combine CO2 capture and storage at one site — Mountaineer in West Virginia. China, the world's largest emitter largely because of its coal burning, has a few pilot projects and is considering more.
Even more importantly, whereas China may be able to afford CCS, other developing countries like South Africa certainly cannot at a price of roughly $1 billion to add the technology to a one-gigawatt coal-fired power plant (per Brad Page, CEO of the Global CCS Institute in Australia). And South Africa consumes a lot of coal, generating 92 percent of its electricity and exporting $10 billion worth to Europe and China — even turning it into 30 percent of the diesel for trucks and jet fuel that it uses domestically.
In South Africa's bid to continue economic growth — and spread electricity to the more than 2 million South Africans who currently lack it — the republic is building more coal-fired plants. In fact, national utility Eskom recently received a $3.75-billion loan from the World Bank to build six 800-megawatt coal-burning units at the Medupi power plant in Limpopo Province as well as much smaller renewables projects.
[From SCIENTIFIC AMERICAN, 10th December 2011]
DURBAN, South Africa — The roughly 3,000 fossil fuel–fired power plants in North America — Canada, Mexico and the U.S. — emit 6 percent of global greenhouse gases, or nearly as much as all of the European Union. In fact, coal-fired power plants around the globe are the single largest source of greenhouse gas emissions.
In other words, coal is largely responsible for climate change. Burning coal alone contributes more than half of global greenhouse gas emissions from human activity. "Whatever you hear from time to time, a big part of electricity is produced from coal," argued Philippe Joubert, deputy CEO of power equipment manufacturer Alstom at the climate talks here on December 6. "This will continue."
That's why so-called carbon capture and storage (CCS) is a mark of seriousness in efforts to combat climate change; Joubert calls it "mandatory." Because the world seems to have little interest in restraining coal burning — it continues to increase, driven largely by China and India — capturing the CO2 before it enters the atmosphere is the only real way to tackle such emissions.
"There are more than enough discovered hydrocarbons to fry the planet," Lord Nicholas Stern of the London School of Economics and Political Science told Scientific American. "You can do CCS or you can bust two degrees [Celsius of warming]."
That is why the negotiations here in Durban approved CCS as a potential technology under the Clean Development Mechanism — a way to provide funds from developed to developing countries for emission-reducing infrastructure in return for credit against the developed countries' CO2 emission quotas. Unfortunately, the mechanism is a part of the Kyoto Protocol. And the protocol will expire at the end of next year without a successor — unless one is agreed on this week in Durban.
Regardless, the world seems to be closing down more CCS plants than it opens: The E.U.'s flagship CCS project at Schwarze Pumpe was cancelled on December 5 due to local German opposition. Canada has had a CO2-sequestration project running for years now in the Weyburn oil field in Saskatchewan but has yet to expand operations to the tar sands that are single-handedly increasing that country's emissions — which violate its obligations under Kyoto. U.S. power company AEP recently turned down the opportunity to expand the world's first project to combine CO2 capture and storage at one site — Mountaineer in West Virginia. China, the world's largest emitter largely because of its coal burning, has a few pilot projects and is considering more.
Even more importantly, whereas China may be able to afford CCS, other developing countries like South Africa certainly cannot at a price of roughly $1 billion to add the technology to a one-gigawatt coal-fired power plant (per Brad Page, CEO of the Global CCS Institute in Australia). And South Africa consumes a lot of coal, generating 92 percent of its electricity and exporting $10 billion worth to Europe and China — even turning it into 30 percent of the diesel for trucks and jet fuel that it uses domestically.
In South Africa's bid to continue economic growth — and spread electricity to the more than 2 million South Africans who currently lack it — the republic is building more coal-fired plants. In fact, national utility Eskom recently received a $3.75-billion loan from the World Bank to build six 800-megawatt coal-burning units at the Medupi power plant in Limpopo Province as well as much smaller renewables projects.
domingo, 13 de novembro de 2011
Effects of Urbanization on Stream Ecosystems
[TUDO QUE É FALADO PELO NARRADOR DO "USGS-UNITED STATES GEOLOGICAL SURVEY" ESTÁ DISPONÍVEL NO TEXTO ABAIXO DO VÍDEO]
Effects of Urbanization on Stream Ecosystems
Effects of Urbanization on Stream Ecosystems
sábado, 12 de novembro de 2011
LET’S PRACTISE ENGLISH – Chapter X
10. WORDS
IN THIS LAST CHAPTER OF LET'S PRACTISE ENGLISH WE ARE GOING TO SEE "WORDS" THAT ARE COMMONLY USED IN SCIENTIFIC LANGUAGE
(I) WORD LIST // (II) FALSE FRIENDS // (III) LATIN NAMES AND EXPRESSIONS
(I) WORD LIST
A
a- (prefix): lacking in: asymmetry, amoral.
About, on: about is used to talk about ordinary, more general things: ‘A book for children about Brazilian animals’. On suggests that a book, lecture a talk, etc. is serious or academic: ‘A lecture on forestry’
Absorption, adsorption: absorption is the process of taking up by capillary, osmotic, chemical, or solvent action; adsorption is the holding of something by the surface of a solid or liquid through physical or chemical forces.
Actually: really, in fact.[See FALSE FRIENDS]
Accuracy: degree of correctness of a measurement or a statement; do not confuse with precision; precision: degree of refinement with which a measurement is made or stated; do not confuse with accuracy ;e.g. the number 3.43 shows more precision than 3.4, but it is not necessarily more accurate.
Agenda: as singular noun, an outline of subjects to be discussed, a plan of procedure; plural agendas.
Air-condition (verb); air-conditioned (adjective); air conditioner (noun).
Also, as well, too: they have similar meanings but they go in different positions: ‘She not only knows maths; she also knows chemistry’. ‘He not only plays the piano; he plays the violin as well’ ‘And he plays the guitar too’. Notice the expression as well as, which means ‘not only...but also’: ‘I have to feed the animals as well as to water the plants’
Alternate(ly), alternative(ly): alternate(ly) means ‘first one and then the other’: ‘I am alternately happy and depressed’. Alternative(ly) is similar to ‘different’, ‘instead’, ‘on the other hand’: ‘You could go by bus, or alternatively, you could go by walking’.
Altogether, all together: altogether means ‘completely’ or ‘everything considered’: ‘The glassware cost U$1,000 altogether’. And all together usually means ‘everybody’ or ‘everything together’: ‘Put the Petri dishes all together in the sink’.
Ambience: (noun): surrounding atmosphere or environment.
Ambient: as noun, environment or encompassing atmosphere; as adjective, surrounding or encompassing.
Ampersand: the ampersand is a convenient symbol of and (&) (= ‘and per se and’). It was formed by a combination of the letters e and t (of the Latin et, meaning and).
Analyse (BrE); analyze (AmE).
Anesthesia: preferred to anaesthesia.
Ante (before) and anti (against).
Antero and postero: situated toward the front and the opposite, respectively (combines without hyphen: ‘anteroparietal’).
Any, not any, no: any suggests an indefinite amount: ‘You never give me any help’ / ‘If you find any pipette tips, keep some for me’. Not any gives the negative sense to any: ‘She hasn’t got any friends’. And no is more emphatic: ‘She’s got no friends’. Not any cannot begin a sentence; instead we use no: ‘No cigarette is harmless’ (= ‘Any cigarette is harmful’).
Apparent, apparently: these words have tricky use: apparent means ‘evident, obvious’: ‘His disapproval is quite apparent’. It also means ‘likely, probable’ (= seeming, that appears to the mind or senses): ‘His real merit, and apparent fidelity, gained the confidence of the people’. Apparently means ‘visibly, evidently’ to the understanding: ‘His delay was apparently due to the difficulty he had to get there’.
Appear: it can be used to say how things look (= seem): ‘He appears / seems (to be) hungry’. It also means ‘come into sight’: ‘It suddenly appeared on the surface’.
Autolysate, autolysis (nouns); autolyze (verb).
Autopsy = necropsy: postmortem examination.
B
Base line (noun); base-line (adjective).
Beside, besides: beside is a preposition meaning ‘at the side of’, ‘by’, ‘next to’: ‘He is sitting beside my teacher’. Besides can be used as a preposition meaning ‘as well as’ to add information: ‘Besides chemistry, he knows physics’. Notice the other use of besides: ‘It’s too late to go to the field now; besides, it´s starting to rain’.
Big, large, great: big and large are used for concrete nouns that you can see, touch etc.: ‘There are big trees in front of the large house’ / ‘Brazil is a big / large country’. Big is also used with countable abstract nouns (informally): ‘I’ve made a big mistake’. Great is used mostly with abstract nouns: ‘You are making a great mistake’ / ‘She is a great woman’.
Bioassay: noun or verb.
Blender: a mechanical device for blending materials; Waring blender: is now acceptable.
Border line (noun); borderline (adjective).
Breakdown (noun).
Break up (verb); breakup (noun).
Breath-holding (noun or adjective).
Brewer’s yeast: or brewers’yeast.
Broad, wide: broad is mostly used in abstract expressions: ‘The members of the Department had a broad agreement (= on most important points)’. Wide is used for the physical distance: ‘We live in a very wide street’. Notice: ‘His theory is widely known’.
Büchner funnel: (a capital B) (after Ernst Büchner).
Build up (verb); buildup (noun); built-up (adjective); built-in (adjective).
Burette or buret.
By, near: by means ‘just at the side of’: ‘He lives by the sea’ (= we can see it). Near means that something is less close to you: ‘We live near the sea’ (= perhaps 5km away).
Bypass (noun or verb); but by-product, by-reaction.
C
Cactus: in italics and with a capital C is the scientific name of a genus; cactus: common name (plural: cacti or cactuses).
Catalogue, cataloguer, catalogued, cataloguing (BrE); catalog, cataloged, cataloging (AmE).
Catalysis: noun; catalyze: verb.
Changeover: noun; change over: verb.
Chi-square: noun or adjective.
Chloroacetic: preferred to chloracetic.
Coauthor: noun or verb.
Coordinate: noun or verb.
Cutoff: noun or adjective; cut off: verb.
D
Dark-eyed, dark-haired, long-tailed: adjectives.
Dark field: noun; dark-field: adjective; darkroom.
Daylight: noun or adjective.
de-: negatory prefix : to reverse action: defrost, demineralize (both verbs); deforestation (noun).
Deep-rooted, deep-seated: adjectives.
Desoxy: BrE; deoxy: AmE.
Detoxication = detoxification.
Diagramed = diagrammed; diagraming = diagramming; but diagrammatic.
Die-away: noun or adjective; die away: verb; die-off: noun; die off: verb.
Dilatation: the act or anatomic result of dilating; dilation: the act of dilating [speak or write about something for a long time]
dis- (prefix): similar to un-: disconnect, discontent.
Disc: BrE; disk: AmE.
Double cross: noun; double-cross: verb.
Due to (past participle) = owing to (present participle).
E
Each, every: they are both used with singular nouns, without much difference of meaning: ‘The business makes less money each / every year. But: Each is used to talk about two or more people or things: ‘She had a child holding on to each hand’. Every is used to talk about three or more: ‘Every one of the children was crying’ / ‘The doctor gave every patient the same medicine’. In negative statement: ‘Not every kind of bird can fly’. It is also used before a plural noun referring to intervals: ‘I measured the temperature every few hours’ / ‘I had to stop and rest every ten steps’. Notice: ‘In everyday life you don’t find a vampire bat’ and ‘You don’t see jaguars every day’ / ‘I go to the Atlantic forest every single day’ / ‘He goes to the beach every other Saturday’ (= ...every second Saturday).
Earache, earlobe / ear lobe (in the Oxford Advanced Learner’s Dictionary), earmark, earwax; but ear snail, ear tree, ear trumpet.
East, eastern; north, northern etc.: eastern, northern etc., are preferred when talking about vague, indefinite areas: ‘The northern part of the country’. Therefore east, north etc. would refer to more clearly defined places: ‘The north of the National Park’ / ‘We live in east Paraíba State’. Notice the use of an initial capital letter: ‘He lives in North Carolina and his wife lives in Western Australia’ / ‘North and South Korea’ / ‘North-east (or Northeast) Brazil’ / ‘Farmers of Southern Africa went to Pretoria, the capital of South Africa’.
Economy, economics, economic, economical: the examples show the differences: ‘The world economy is in recession’. ‘I’m studying politics and economics’. ‘The economic aspects of having children’. ‘It is economical to buy food straight from the growers’.
Efficient, effective: to be efficient means that he / she / it works in a well-organized way without wasting time or energy: ‘He’s not efficient because he works very slowly’ / ‘The telephone system is more efficient than the postal service’. If something is effective, it has the right ‘effect’: ‘I think these tablets are effective for strong headaches’.
Electric: note electric potential, electric shock, electric wave; but electrical drainage, electrical engineer [a good dictionary will be quite useful!]. [See –ic, -ical, suffix].
Else, elsewhere: else means ‘other’ or ‘more’ after many words like ‘somebody, someone, something, somewhere, anybody/one/thing/where, who, what, when, whenever’, etc.: ‘I got books and equipment from the federal government. And what else did you get’? / ‘Whatever else he may be, he’s not a mathematician’ / ‘Information on this method you can see elsewhere’.
Enable: it is not a substitute of permit: ‘Insulin enables the body to use and store sugar’.
Ensure: to make sure or guarantee.
Envelop: verb; envelope: noun.
Enzymatic = enzymic.
Especial(ly), special(ly): they can often be used with the same meaning but: Especial(ly) is used to mean ‘above all’, and special(ly) is used to mean ‘for a particular purpose’: ‘These are special pens for writing on white boards and I like especially the blue and black pens’.
Estrogen (AmE); oestrogen (BrE).
Oestrus (noun, BrE) and oestrous (adjective, BrE); estrus (noun, AmE) and estrous (adjective, AmE).
Eventually (see FALSE FRIENDS).
Even: it is used to express surprising extremes: ‘Even a child can do that’ / ‘He eats anything, even raw potatoes’. It is used instead of ‘also’ in surprising extremes: ‘Everybody helped with the packing, even the little child’. It is also used before ‘if’ and ‘though’: ‘Even though I didn’t know anybody in the Congress, I had a nice time’ / ‘Even if I become a famous scientist, I shall always be a socialist’.
Ever: it is used mainly in questions meaning ‘at any time’: ‘Do you ever go to Rio de Janeiro on holiday’?. It also means ‘always’ in compound expressions: ‘Evergreen forests’ / ‘Ever-increasing debt’. Notice this meaning: ‘It’s the largest lake ever seen in an arid region’ / ‘She’s the only student ever to have captured an anaconda’.
Experiment, experience: an experiment is a test: ‘We did an experiment in the chemistry lesson’. An experience is something that happens to you in life: ‘I had a lot of interesting experiences during my years in the Amazon’.
Extracapsular = extracellular.
Eyeball, eyepiece micrometer; but eye colour, eye lens.
F
Far, a long way: in questions and negatives we use far: ‘How far did you walk’? / ‘The youth hostel is not far from the Pontal dos Seixas’. In affirmative it is used a long way: ‘We walked a long way’ / ‘The bus station is a long way from here’.
Farther, further: both forms can be used of distances: ‘Curitiba is farther / further than São Paulo or Rio de Janeiro’ / ‘Curitiba is the farthest / furthest’. Further is used to mean ‘additional’, ‘extra’, ‘more advanced’: ‘Further supplies will be soon available’ / ‘For further information, go to the reception desk’.
Feedback: noun.
Female, feminine; male, masculine: Female and male are used to indicate the sex of people, animals and plants: ‘A female fox is called a vixen’ / ‘A male duck is called a drake’ / ‘He is a typical Latin American male’. Feminine and masculine are used for ‘qualities’ and ‘behaviour’ of people: ‘She’s a very masculine laugh’ / ‘It is a very feminine bathroom’. ‘The word for “moon” is feminine in French and masculine in German’.
Fingerprint, fingertip, but finger fracture, finger grass, finger-shaped.
Fit, suit: fit refers to ‘size’ and ‘shape’: ‘The lab coat doesn’t fit me’. Suit refers to style, colour: ‘This style doesn’t suit you very well’ / ‘Friday would suit me for an English lesson’.
Flow chart, flow line, but flowmeter.
-fold (suffix): (adj. and adv.) multiplied by; having the specified number of parts, e.g. tenfold, twofold; with an arabic numeral it forms a hyphenated term, e.g. 10-fold.
Foot-binding, foothill, foot louse, footnote, footstalk: noun; footloose: adjective.
Forebrain, forehead, forefoot, foreleg, foreword, but fore wing.
Former and latter: used with only two antecedents / [see Late, later, latter].
Free: as verb or adjective, followed by with or of; as suffix used with a hyphen, but germfree and carefree.
Freeze-dry (and freeze-dried): verb; not froze-dried or frozen-dried; freeze dryer: noun; freezing point: noun; freezing-point: adjective.
-ful (suffix): having ...: useful; giving ...: helpful.
Fungal or fungus: adjective.
G
Gauge (noun or verb): associated with measurement; air gauge, pressure gauge.
Get: just a few meanings: it usually means ‘receive’, ‘fetch’, ‘obtain’, ‘catch’ or similar: ‘I got a letter this morning’ / ‘Can you come and get me at the station’? / ‘I got a headache last night’ / ‘If you get the 503 bus, it stops in front of my house’ / ‘Let me get you a drink’. It also means ‘become’, before an adjective: ‘As you get old, your memory gets worse’ / ‘My feet are getting cold’. Get + past participle: ‘get washed’, ‘get lost’, ‘get dressed’, ‘get drowned’, ‘get engaged/married/divorced ... . Get + object + past participle: ‘I must get my hair cut’ / ‘You ought to get your car repaired’.
Gnotobiotic: refers to laboratory animals specially reared and germfree except for known microorganisms with which they have been inoculated.
Gram stain or Gram’s stain: (with a capital G) after Hans C.J. Gram; but gram-negative, gram-positive: adjective.
Grey: BrE; gray: AmE.
H
Half time: noun; half-time: adjective.
Hear, listen: hear is the ordinary word to say that something ‘comes to our ears’: ‘I heard voices’ / ‘Can you hear me’?. Listen (to) is used to talk about ‘paying attention’ to sounds: ‘I heard them talking, but I didn’t really listen to what they were saying’ / ‘Listen to me’!
Heartbeat but heart block, heart failure.
Hemacytometer.
Hindbrain, hindfoot, hindgut but hind kidney, hind wing.
I
-ic, -ical, (suffix, see a good dictionary): note the difference economic botany and economical process. Some adjectives ending in –ic: academic, artistic, athletic, catholic, domestic, emphatic, energetic, fantastic, linguistic, majestic, neurotic, phonetic, public, semantic, syntactic systematic, tragic ...; some adjectives ending in –ical: biological, chemical, critical cynical, grammatical, logical, mathematical, mechanical, medical, musical, physical, radical, surgical, tactical, topical ... . Notice: ‘an electric motor’ (a particular machine); ‘electrical equipment’ and ‘electrical components’ (general words).
Incidence, prevalence: number of cases developing per unit of population per unit of time, e.g. ‘100 cases of tuberculosis per 100,000 persons per year’. It is different from prevalence: number of cases existing per unit of population at a given time.
Incipient, insipient: the former means a beginner and its verbal form denotes an uncompleted action; the latter, now rarely used, means lacking in wisdom, foolish.
Ill, sick: ill is often used to mean ‘unwell’ (in BrE): George didn’t come yesterday because he was ill. Many British people prefer to use sick: ‘He spent many years looking after his sick mother’. Be sick can also mean ‘vomit’: ‘She’s always sea-sick’.
Instead (of): as a preposition: ‘I’ll have tea instead of coffee’; as an adverb: ‘I didn’t do field work. Instead, I went to the library’.
Intend (v.), intent (adj., n.): intend, as a verb means to have a plan, result or purpose in your mind: ‘We finished later than intended’. Intent, as an adjective means showing strong interest and attention: ‘Are you intent upon destroying my reputation’?; intent as a noun, means intention: ‘She denies possessing the drug with intent to supply’.
K
Kjeldahl flask (with a capital K); kjeldahlize (verb).
L
Landfall, landfill, landholder, landmark, landowner, landslide, but land bridge, land crab, land lead, land measure, land snail, land tortoise: all nouns.
Last, latest: ‘She says her latest book is being published next week and she thinks it’s much better than her last one’.
Late(ly), later, latter: ‘The bus is late today’ [= after its proper time]. ‘Have you done any experiment lately’?. ‘I’ll do it later’ [= after some time]. ‘There were two Professors in the meeting, Professor Coler and Professor Gray: the latter was my PhD advisor’.
Lay (laying), laid, laid [regular verb]: it means to place in a position of REST ON THE GROUND or PUT DOWN FLAT; e.g. ‘I laid the papers on the table’ / ‘The cuckoo lays its eggs in other birds’ nests’.
Lie (lying), lay, lain [irregular verb]: it means BE DOWN or BE OR BECOME HORIZONTAL; ‘The animals lie on the ground nearly all day’ / ‘I lay down and closed my eyes’. Observation: lie also has several other meanings, as for example TO EXIST OR TO BE FOUND: ‘The problem lies in deciding when to intervene’; and also TO BE SITUATED IN A PARTICULAR POSITION (town, natural feature …): ‘The town lies on the coast’.
Lie (lying), lied, lied [regular verb]: it means to make a statement that is ‘untrue’: ‘You lied to me when you said you had finished to writing up your thesis’.
-less (suffix): without: helpless, careless, childless.
-let (suffix): small: booklet, leaflet, piglet.
Lifeboat, lifelong, lifework, but life buoy, life plant, life preserver; and life-form, life-size, life-span.
-like (suffix): having the qualities of: savannah-like, lifelike, eellike, shell-like.
Live trap: noun; livetrap: verb.
Lots, a lot, plenty, a great deal, a large number, the majority: ‘Lots of patience is needed to learn a language’. ‘A lot of time is needed to learn a language’. ‘There is plenty of shops where you can buy bike accessories’. ‘He stays silent for long periods, but when he does speak he says a great deal’. ‘I’ve thrown out a large number of rotten fruits’ [= a large amount of ...]. ‘The majority of the animals on the island was birds’ [= ‘Most of the animals ...].
M
mal- (prefix): it means bad(ly): malfunction, maltreat.
Mean [noun and verb], by no means: notice the difference of mean: ‘The means obtained in all the experiments mean that the procedure we used is correct’. In the sense of ‘intend’ or ‘plan’: ‘I mean to find out what’s going on’ / ‘I didn’t mean to destroy your work’. By no means: ‘Galileo was by no means the first person to use a telescope’.
Microphotograph: a photograph on a greatly reduced scale, as on microfilm, using a ‘macro’ lens; do not confuse with photomicrograph, a photograph taken through a microscope.
Midday, midline, midpoint, midrib, but mid-latitudes, mid-carpal.
mis- (prefix): wrongly: misunderstand; astray: misconduct.
Mollusc (BrE), molusk (AmE).
Mould: BrE; mold: AmE.
Mucous: adjective; mucus: noun.
N
Necropsy (see autopsy)
Neither, nor; not ... either; not ... nor: ‘Neither the trees nor the grasses presented high transpiration rates’. ‘You said he can not swim, but I can not either’. ‘The plant did not transpire that day, nor the next day’.
-ness (suffix): state or quality: hardness, darkness, blindness.
Nessler’s reagent or test (with a capital N); nesslerize: verb.
NGO: non-governmental organization, that is independent of government and business.
Non (prefix): as an English prefix combines without a hyphen, except before a capital letter and a hyphenated word, e.g. non-British and non-self-governing, respectively; some authors use the hyphen between non and a word beginning with n.
O
Oestrus, oestrous: see estrus
Off-colour: adjective; offshot: noun; offshore: adverb or adjective.
Optimal, optimum: adjectives; optimum: noun.
Orient (verb, BrE); orientate (verb, AmE).
out- (prefix): to do something faster, longer ... than: outrun, outline.
over- (prefix): too much: overheat, overestimation (see under-).
Owing to: (see due to).
P
Part, partly; partially: ‘Part of the glassware was missing’. ‘Partly of it was missing’ [part of the whole]. ‘It is made partially of iron and partially of copper’ [in the sense of ‘a limited degree’].[The distinction between partly and partially is not an absolute one]. N.B. Partly is often followed by because or due to: ‘We couldn’t do our fieldwork partly because of the weather’.
Parameter: has a special meaning in mathematics; do not use loosely for variable, quantity, quality, determinant, or feature.
Pathological: of the field of pathology; pathologic: having the qualities studied in pathology, abnormal (see -ic, -ical).
Petri dish = petri dish: after Julius R. Petri (German bacteriologist).
Photomicrograph (see Microphotograph)
Physical chemistry (noun); physicalchemistry (adjective); it is very common the use of physico-chemical (adjective, which means: of/pertaining to physical chemistry.
Physiological (see -ic, -ical).
Policy, politics: policy refers to a plan of action agreed/chosen by a political party, a business etc.; it is also a principle that you believe in that influences your behaviour. Politics refers to the activities in getting and using power in public life and being able to influence decisions that affect a country, people etc.; it is also a person’s political views/beliefs.
Poly-, post-, pre- (prefixes): most words formed are solid, e.g. polymorphous, polyunsaturated, postgraduate, postnatal, prefabricate, preconception, precursor; exceptions are those containing proper nouns or their derivatives, e.g. pre-Christian, pre-Darwinian.
Precision (see Accuracy).
Prevalence (see Incidence)
Privative: having the quality of depriving a person or thing; characterized by the absence of a quality.
R
Rhythmic: marked by pronounced rhythm; rhythmical: pertaining to or involving rhythm (see -ic, ical).
Ringer’s or Ringer solution (with a capital R).
Rule of three: a method of finding a fourth number from three given numbers, of which the first is in the same proportion to the second as the third is to the unknown fourth.
Rule of thumb: a general principle or a method derived from practice or experience rather than theory.
S
See, look (at), watch [a good dictionary will show the several meanings of these three verbs]: we use see when something ‘comes to our eyes’ (whether or not we are paying attention): ‘Suddenly I saw something strange’ / ‘I can see a light at the end of the tunnel’. We use look in the sense of ‘concentrating’ or ‘paying attention’: ‘I looked at the photo but I didn’t see anybody I knew’ / ‘Look again through the microscope and try to see a cell with blue particles’. Watch is similar to look at but it suggests that something is happening or going to happen: ‘Watch that animal and see when it catches the prey’ / ‘I am watching TV’.
Setup (noun); set up (verb).
Shade, shadow: the protection from the sun is shade: ‘The temperature is 30 degree Celsius in the shade’. Shadow is the ‘picture’ made by an unlighted area: ‘You can estimate how tall a tree is from the length of its shadow as compared to the length of a shadow of a known stick, by using the rule of three’ [see the entry Rule of three].
-ship (suffix): status or condition: friendship, relationship.
Sign, signal: they have very similar meanings. Sign is usually something that you ‘can find’ or ‘see’: ‘Early signs of the disease’ / ‘The first signs of spring’. Signal is something ‘done intentionally’ or suggesting that you ‘should take some action’: ‘His visit was a clear signal that he supports our project’ / ‘I got a faint signal from the internet’.
Sizeable = sizable.
Skillful = skilful (adjective); skillfully = skilfully (adverb).
Small, little: small simply refers to size and little not only refers to size, but also expresses some kind of emotion: ‘A pretty little house in the country, close to a small village’. ‘That plant is too small to be counted as a tree’. ‘A poor little animal’.
So: degree: ‘It was so cold that the animal did not come out of the cave’. Before adjectives: ‘The cheetah run so fast that it caught the prey in a few seconds’. Notice the difference between very (simply giving information) and so (referring to information which has already been given): ‘It was very warm’ / ‘If we had known it would be so warm, we would have taken lighter clothing’. Emphatic use: ‘You’re so right’! So and that: ‘It was so cold that we stopped walking’. So ... a: ‘I had never seen before so loveable [= lovable] a pet’. Substitute word: ‘The weather is stormy and will remain so over the weekend. So much: ‘The other side of the river is so much steeper’.
So that, in order that: informal: ‘I’ve put it in the oven so that it’ll be ready in one hour’. Formal: ‘We send them monthly reports in order that they may have full information on the project’.
Some time, sometime, sometimes: Some time [stresses in the two words] means ‘a considerable amount of time’: ‘It will take some time to repair the spectrophotometer’. Sometime refers to ‘an indefinite time’: ‘The equipment will be ready sometime next week’. Sometimes means ‘in some occasion’, ‘more than once’: ‘It gave sometimes signs of life’ / ‘Sometimes, in the long winter, the birds flew into my house’.
Sporebearer, sporeformer, sporeforming; but spore ball, spore case, spore fruit, spore sac.
Steam distillation (noun); steam-distill (verb).
Stop bath, stop clock, stop valve; stop-off; stopback (see a dictionary).
Sub (prefix): lower than, less than, usually combines to form a solid word (without hyphen): subhuman, subway; exceptions: sub-clan and sub-society (nouns); sub-zero, sub-Atlantic: adjectives.
T
Tapeworm, tape grass, tape measure.
Taproot, tap water, tap screw.
Threefold (see -fold).
Trademark, trade name.
Travel, journey, trip, voyage: Compare: ‘He is only interested in travelling’ [travelling in general] / ‘She always spends lots of money on her travels’. Journey is the act of travelling: ‘Did you have a good journey’? [you talk about your experience] / ‘How long is your journey to work’ [an act of travelling from one place to another] / ‘Amundsen made his journey to the South Pole in 1911’. Trip is a journey to a place and back (especially short): ‘A business trip’. Voyage is a long journey especially by sea or in space: ‘The Titanic sank on its first voyage’.
Twofold (see -fold).
U
U shape (noun); U-shaped (adjective).
Ultra, prefix: most words with this prefix are solid, ultracentrifuge, ultraviolet; but ultra-atomic.
un- (prefix): negatory prefix: unfair, unexpected; it also refers to reverse action: unscrew, undo; most words beginning with this prefix are solid (see the exceptions in a dictionary).
under- (prefix): too little: undercook, underestimation (see over-).
V
Various: of different kinds or aspects.
Varying: = changing = causing to change.
W
-wards (suffix): direction: upwards, downwards, onwards, backwards, eastwards.
Washout (noun); wash out (verb).
Water bath, water vapour (AmE vapor): but waterfowl, waterline; and water-resistant, water-soluble (see the dictionary).
Wave form, wave guide, wave height, wave number: nouns; wave-built, wave-worn (adjectives); wavelength, wavemeter (nouns).
Wildlife, wildfowl: but wild canary, wild duck.
Windbreak, windfall: but wind drift, wind tunnel.
-wise (suffix): in the manner of: clockwise (anticlockwise), crabwise; as far as: lengthwise.
Work curve, work load: but workboat, workday.
Write-off (noun); write off (verb).
Write-out = printout (noun); write out (verb).
X
X ray (noun): ‘the X ray of the solar radiation spectrum’; X-ray (verb and adjective): ‘the X-ray photograph’.
Y
Y form (noun); and Y-shaped (adjective).
Z
Zero drift, zero group, zero hour, zero time, zero potential (nouns); zerovalent (adjective).
(II) FALSE FRIENDS
FALSE FRIEND IS A WORD THAT ‘LOOKS’ (OR SOUNDS) SIMILAR TO A WORD IN YOUR OWN LANGUAGE
[“algumas palavras foram traduzidas para o português, entre colchetes”]
Abstract (n.): a piece of writing containing the main ideas in a document (= summary).
Actual (adj.) / Actually (adv.): real, existing in fact / really: ‘The actual cost was much higher than we had expected’ / ‘The food was not actually all that expensive’.
Adept (adj.): good at doing something that is quite difficult (= skilful). [“perito”]
Alias (adv., n.): used when a person, especially a criminal or an actor, is known by two names. [“cognome”]
Cargo (n.): the goods carried in a ship or plane/aircraft or other large vehicle. ‘The tanker spilled its cargo of oil’.
Casualty: a person who is killed or injured in war or in an accident.
Claim (v.): to say that something is true (although not proved and other people may not believe it). [“alegar”]
Commodity: something that can be traded, bought or sold. [“mercadoria, bem consumível”]
Comprehensive (adj.): including all, the items, details, facts, information etc., that may be concerned (= complete, full). [in England, Comprehensive School = secondary school for young people of all levels of ability. [“abrangente, amplo”]
Discrete (adj.): separate; distinct: ‘The organisms can be divided in discrete categories’.
Discreet (adj.): intentionally not attracting attention: ‘He’s always discreet about his successes’.
Discretion (n.): 1) The freedom or power to decide what should be done in a particular situation: ‘To tell the truth to terminally ill patients is left to the discretion of the doctor’. 2) Care in what you say or do: ‘This is confidential, but can I rely on your discretion’?
Disgust (n., v.): a strong feeling of dislike or disapproval for somebody or something. ´I can only feel disgust for these criminals´. [“nojo”]
Enrol (v.): to join (officially) a course, school etc. [“matricular-se”]
Eventual (adj.) and Eventually (adv.): happening at the end of a period of time or of a process: ‘War is possible to predict with the eventual lack of water in many parts of the world’. ‘The increasing emissions of CO2 will eventually cause global warming’.
Exit (n.): a way out of a public building or vehicle. ‘There is a fire exit on each floor of the library’. [“saída”]
Expansive (adj.): covering a large amount of space or a large subject area: ‘We’re looking for a more expansive definition of the term’.
Expensive (adj.): costing a lot of money: ‘Art books are expensive’.
Exquisite (adj.): extremely beautiful or carefully made; delicate and sensitive. ´An exquisite sense of timing´. [“refinado”]
Fabric (n.): material (cotton, silk, wool…) used for making clothes, curtains etc.
Facilities (n.): buildings, services, equipment…that are provided for a particular purpose. [“infra-estrutura, instalações, condições”]
Incipient (adj.) and Insipient (adj./n.): incipient: just beginning; insipient: lacking in wisdom, foolish.
Inexistent and Non-existent: inexistent means existing in something, inherent; non-existent means that does not exist.
Ingenuity (n.): the ability to invent things or solve problems in clever new ways. ‘Being a man of ingenuity, he soon repaired the machine’. [“engenhosidade]
Ingenious (adj.): (for objects, ideas…) that is very suitable for a particular purpose; and (for persons) having a lot of clever new ideas. [“engenhoso”]
Intend (v.): to have a plan, purpose or result in your mind. ´We finished later than we intended´. [“pretender, planejar”]
Journal (n.): a newspaper or magazine that deals with a particular subject or profession: ‘Journal of Ecology’. [“periódico”]. Journalist (n.): a person whose job is to write for newspapers, magazines, radio or TV.
Library (n.): a building with collections of books, tapes etc. for people to read or borrow. ‘There are not many books in the university library’.
Mayor (n.): the head of a town or city elected by the public [“prefeito”]
Notorious (adj.): well known for being bad: a notorious criminal.
Novel (n., adj.): a story (usually imaginary) long enough to fill a complete book. [“romance”]
Oil: 1) A thick liquid that is found in rock underground (= petroleum). 2) A form of petroleum that is used as fuel(= gasoline, AmE) and to make parts of machines move smoothly.
Parent (n.): [usually plural]: a person’s father and mother: ‘I live with my parents’.
Prejudice (n.): an unreasonable dislike of or preference for a person, group, custom, etc. especially when it is based on their race, religion, sex, etc.: ‘’A victim of racial prejudice’ / ‘Their decision was based on ignorance and prejudice’. Prejudice (v.): 1) To influence somebody so that they have an unfair or unreasonable opinion about somebody or something: ‘The lawyers tried to prejudice the jury against her’. 2) To have a harmful effect on something: ‘Any delay will prejudice the child’s welfare’.
Pretend (v.): to make other people to believe something that is not true. Used by children: not real, imaginary. [“fingir”] (see intend)
Private (adj.): belonging to or for the use of a particular person on group. ‘Private property. Keep out’!
Privative (adj.): denoting privation or absence of a quality or attribute.
Professor (n.): a teacher of the highest rank in department (in GB and USA): ‘Professor Stephen Hawking’.
Push (v.): to use your hands / arms / body to move somebody or something forward or away from you: ‘You push and I’ll pull’.
Resume (v.): it (an activity, conversation…) begins again or continues after an interruption. ´The noise resumed louder than before´. ´Then they resumed their conversation´. [“reiniciar, recomeçar”]
Scholar (n.): (FORMAL) a scholar is a person who studies an academic subject and knows a lot about it. ´The library attracts thousands of scholars and researchers´. [“intelectual, erudito”]
Sensible (adj.): ability to make good judgement: ‘Be sensible my son’! / ‘Say something sensible’! [“sensato”; “que tem juízo”]
Sensitive (adj.): 1) Aware of and able to understand other people. 2) To understand art, music etc.. 3) To be easily offended, upset ...; 4) Reacting quickly or more than usual to something (to cold etc.). [“sensível”]
Sort (n.): a group or type of people or things that are similar in a particular way (= kind). [“tipo”]
Sympathetic (adj.): showing that you understand and care for someone´s problems.[“compreensivo”]
Ultimate (adj.): 1) Final: ‘The ultimate decision is yours’. 2) Most extreme; best; worst: ‘This test will be the ultimate one of your academic life’. 3) Fundamental: ’The ultimate principles of ecology’. Ultimate (n.): the best, most advanced ...: ‘The ultimate in modern design’. Ultimately (adv.): 1) Finally: ‘A poor diet will ultimately lead to illness’. 2) At the most basic and important level: ‘All life depends ultimately on water’!
Vacant (n.): (of a seat, hotel room, house…) empty, not being used (=unoccupied). [“vaga, desocupado, vago”]
Vague (adj.): not clear in a person’s mind.
(III) LATIN NAMES AND EXPRESSIONS
addendum (pl. addenda): ‘thing that is to be added’ (addenda: ‘material added at the end of a book’).
ante meridiem (abbreviation a.m.): ‘before midday’.
circa (abbr.: ca.): about, approximately (with reference to a date or quantity).
cf. (abbrev. of confer): compare.
editio citato (abbr. ed. Cit.): edition cited.
et al. (abbrev. of et alii): ‘and others’.
et cetera (abbr. etc.): and so on, and so forth.
et sequens: and the following.
exempli gratia (abbr. e.g.): ‘for example’.
ibidem (abrev. ibid): ‘in the same passage, article etc previously mentioned’.
id est (abbr. i.e.): ‘that is’.
in loco: ‘in place’; ‘in the proper place’.
in loco citato (abbr. in loc. cit.): ‘in the place cited’.
in natura: ‘raw material’; ‘not industrialized’, ‘as it occurs in nature’.
in situ: ‘situated in the original, natural, or existing place or position’.
ipso facto: ‘by the fact itself’.
momentum: ‘importance, consequence’; ‘movement, moving power’.
Nota Bene (abbrev. N.B.): ‘observation’.
per se: by or in itself
post meridien (abbrev. p.m.): ‘after midday’.
postscriptum (abbrev. PS): or postcript, ‘an additional passage at the end of any text’.
viva voce: ‘examination or oral examination’.
viz. (abbrev. of videlicet; the z represents the contraction -et): ‘namely’; ‘that is to say’; ‘specifically’.
IN THIS LAST CHAPTER OF LET'S PRACTISE ENGLISH WE ARE GOING TO SEE "WORDS" THAT ARE COMMONLY USED IN SCIENTIFIC LANGUAGE
(I) WORD LIST // (II) FALSE FRIENDS // (III) LATIN NAMES AND EXPRESSIONS
(I) WORD LIST
A
a- (prefix): lacking in: asymmetry, amoral.
About, on: about is used to talk about ordinary, more general things: ‘A book for children about Brazilian animals’. On suggests that a book, lecture a talk, etc. is serious or academic: ‘A lecture on forestry’
Absorption, adsorption: absorption is the process of taking up by capillary, osmotic, chemical, or solvent action; adsorption is the holding of something by the surface of a solid or liquid through physical or chemical forces.
Actually: really, in fact.[See FALSE FRIENDS]
Accuracy: degree of correctness of a measurement or a statement; do not confuse with precision; precision: degree of refinement with which a measurement is made or stated; do not confuse with accuracy ;e.g. the number 3.43 shows more precision than 3.4, but it is not necessarily more accurate.
Agenda: as singular noun, an outline of subjects to be discussed, a plan of procedure; plural agendas.
Air-condition (verb); air-conditioned (adjective); air conditioner (noun).
Also, as well, too: they have similar meanings but they go in different positions: ‘She not only knows maths; she also knows chemistry’. ‘He not only plays the piano; he plays the violin as well’ ‘And he plays the guitar too’. Notice the expression as well as, which means ‘not only...but also’: ‘I have to feed the animals as well as to water the plants’
Alternate(ly), alternative(ly): alternate(ly) means ‘first one and then the other’: ‘I am alternately happy and depressed’. Alternative(ly) is similar to ‘different’, ‘instead’, ‘on the other hand’: ‘You could go by bus, or alternatively, you could go by walking’.
Altogether, all together: altogether means ‘completely’ or ‘everything considered’: ‘The glassware cost U$1,000 altogether’. And all together usually means ‘everybody’ or ‘everything together’: ‘Put the Petri dishes all together in the sink’.
Ambience: (noun): surrounding atmosphere or environment.
Ambient: as noun, environment or encompassing atmosphere; as adjective, surrounding or encompassing.
Ampersand: the ampersand is a convenient symbol of and (&) (= ‘and per se and’). It was formed by a combination of the letters e and t (of the Latin et, meaning and).
Analyse (BrE); analyze (AmE).
Anesthesia: preferred to anaesthesia.
Ante (before) and anti (against).
Antero and postero: situated toward the front and the opposite, respectively (combines without hyphen: ‘anteroparietal’).
Any, not any, no: any suggests an indefinite amount: ‘You never give me any help’ / ‘If you find any pipette tips, keep some for me’. Not any gives the negative sense to any: ‘She hasn’t got any friends’. And no is more emphatic: ‘She’s got no friends’. Not any cannot begin a sentence; instead we use no: ‘No cigarette is harmless’ (= ‘Any cigarette is harmful’).
Apparent, apparently: these words have tricky use: apparent means ‘evident, obvious’: ‘His disapproval is quite apparent’. It also means ‘likely, probable’ (= seeming, that appears to the mind or senses): ‘His real merit, and apparent fidelity, gained the confidence of the people’. Apparently means ‘visibly, evidently’ to the understanding: ‘His delay was apparently due to the difficulty he had to get there’.
Appear: it can be used to say how things look (= seem): ‘He appears / seems (to be) hungry’. It also means ‘come into sight’: ‘It suddenly appeared on the surface’.
Autolysate, autolysis (nouns); autolyze (verb).
Autopsy = necropsy: postmortem examination.
B
Base line (noun); base-line (adjective).
Beside, besides: beside is a preposition meaning ‘at the side of’, ‘by’, ‘next to’: ‘He is sitting beside my teacher’. Besides can be used as a preposition meaning ‘as well as’ to add information: ‘Besides chemistry, he knows physics’. Notice the other use of besides: ‘It’s too late to go to the field now; besides, it´s starting to rain’.
Big, large, great: big and large are used for concrete nouns that you can see, touch etc.: ‘There are big trees in front of the large house’ / ‘Brazil is a big / large country’. Big is also used with countable abstract nouns (informally): ‘I’ve made a big mistake’. Great is used mostly with abstract nouns: ‘You are making a great mistake’ / ‘She is a great woman’.
Bioassay: noun or verb.
Blender: a mechanical device for blending materials; Waring blender: is now acceptable.
Border line (noun); borderline (adjective).
Breakdown (noun).
Break up (verb); breakup (noun).
Breath-holding (noun or adjective).
Brewer’s yeast: or brewers’yeast.
Broad, wide: broad is mostly used in abstract expressions: ‘The members of the Department had a broad agreement (= on most important points)’. Wide is used for the physical distance: ‘We live in a very wide street’. Notice: ‘His theory is widely known’.
Büchner funnel: (a capital B) (after Ernst Büchner).
Build up (verb); buildup (noun); built-up (adjective); built-in (adjective).
Burette or buret.
By, near: by means ‘just at the side of’: ‘He lives by the sea’ (= we can see it). Near means that something is less close to you: ‘We live near the sea’ (= perhaps 5km away).
Bypass (noun or verb); but by-product, by-reaction.
C
Cactus: in italics and with a capital C is the scientific name of a genus; cactus: common name (plural: cacti or cactuses).
Catalogue, cataloguer, catalogued, cataloguing (BrE); catalog, cataloged, cataloging (AmE).
Catalysis: noun; catalyze: verb.
Changeover: noun; change over: verb.
Chi-square: noun or adjective.
Chloroacetic: preferred to chloracetic.
Coauthor: noun or verb.
Coordinate: noun or verb.
Cutoff: noun or adjective; cut off: verb.
D
Dark-eyed, dark-haired, long-tailed: adjectives.
Dark field: noun; dark-field: adjective; darkroom.
Daylight: noun or adjective.
de-: negatory prefix : to reverse action: defrost, demineralize (both verbs); deforestation (noun).
Deep-rooted, deep-seated: adjectives.
Desoxy: BrE; deoxy: AmE.
Detoxication = detoxification.
Diagramed = diagrammed; diagraming = diagramming; but diagrammatic.
Die-away: noun or adjective; die away: verb; die-off: noun; die off: verb.
Dilatation: the act or anatomic result of dilating; dilation: the act of dilating [speak or write about something for a long time]
dis- (prefix): similar to un-: disconnect, discontent.
Disc: BrE; disk: AmE.
Double cross: noun; double-cross: verb.
Due to (past participle) = owing to (present participle).
E
Each, every: they are both used with singular nouns, without much difference of meaning: ‘The business makes less money each / every year. But: Each is used to talk about two or more people or things: ‘She had a child holding on to each hand’. Every is used to talk about three or more: ‘Every one of the children was crying’ / ‘The doctor gave every patient the same medicine’. In negative statement: ‘Not every kind of bird can fly’. It is also used before a plural noun referring to intervals: ‘I measured the temperature every few hours’ / ‘I had to stop and rest every ten steps’. Notice: ‘In everyday life you don’t find a vampire bat’ and ‘You don’t see jaguars every day’ / ‘I go to the Atlantic forest every single day’ / ‘He goes to the beach every other Saturday’ (= ...every second Saturday).
Earache, earlobe / ear lobe (in the Oxford Advanced Learner’s Dictionary), earmark, earwax; but ear snail, ear tree, ear trumpet.
East, eastern; north, northern etc.: eastern, northern etc., are preferred when talking about vague, indefinite areas: ‘The northern part of the country’. Therefore east, north etc. would refer to more clearly defined places: ‘The north of the National Park’ / ‘We live in east Paraíba State’. Notice the use of an initial capital letter: ‘He lives in North Carolina and his wife lives in Western Australia’ / ‘North and South Korea’ / ‘North-east (or Northeast) Brazil’ / ‘Farmers of Southern Africa went to Pretoria, the capital of South Africa’.
Economy, economics, economic, economical: the examples show the differences: ‘The world economy is in recession’. ‘I’m studying politics and economics’. ‘The economic aspects of having children’. ‘It is economical to buy food straight from the growers’.
Efficient, effective: to be efficient means that he / she / it works in a well-organized way without wasting time or energy: ‘He’s not efficient because he works very slowly’ / ‘The telephone system is more efficient than the postal service’. If something is effective, it has the right ‘effect’: ‘I think these tablets are effective for strong headaches’.
Electric: note electric potential, electric shock, electric wave; but electrical drainage, electrical engineer [a good dictionary will be quite useful!]. [See –ic, -ical, suffix].
Else, elsewhere: else means ‘other’ or ‘more’ after many words like ‘somebody, someone, something, somewhere, anybody/one/thing/where, who, what, when, whenever’, etc.: ‘I got books and equipment from the federal government. And what else did you get’? / ‘Whatever else he may be, he’s not a mathematician’ / ‘Information on this method you can see elsewhere’.
Enable: it is not a substitute of permit: ‘Insulin enables the body to use and store sugar’.
Ensure: to make sure or guarantee.
Envelop: verb; envelope: noun.
Enzymatic = enzymic.
Especial(ly), special(ly): they can often be used with the same meaning but: Especial(ly) is used to mean ‘above all’, and special(ly) is used to mean ‘for a particular purpose’: ‘These are special pens for writing on white boards and I like especially the blue and black pens’.
Estrogen (AmE); oestrogen (BrE).
Oestrus (noun, BrE) and oestrous (adjective, BrE); estrus (noun, AmE) and estrous (adjective, AmE).
Eventually (see FALSE FRIENDS).
Even: it is used to express surprising extremes: ‘Even a child can do that’ / ‘He eats anything, even raw potatoes’. It is used instead of ‘also’ in surprising extremes: ‘Everybody helped with the packing, even the little child’. It is also used before ‘if’ and ‘though’: ‘Even though I didn’t know anybody in the Congress, I had a nice time’ / ‘Even if I become a famous scientist, I shall always be a socialist’.
Ever: it is used mainly in questions meaning ‘at any time’: ‘Do you ever go to Rio de Janeiro on holiday’?. It also means ‘always’ in compound expressions: ‘Evergreen forests’ / ‘Ever-increasing debt’. Notice this meaning: ‘It’s the largest lake ever seen in an arid region’ / ‘She’s the only student ever to have captured an anaconda’.
Experiment, experience: an experiment is a test: ‘We did an experiment in the chemistry lesson’. An experience is something that happens to you in life: ‘I had a lot of interesting experiences during my years in the Amazon’.
Extracapsular = extracellular.
Eyeball, eyepiece micrometer; but eye colour, eye lens.
F
Far, a long way: in questions and negatives we use far: ‘How far did you walk’? / ‘The youth hostel is not far from the Pontal dos Seixas’. In affirmative it is used a long way: ‘We walked a long way’ / ‘The bus station is a long way from here’.
Farther, further: both forms can be used of distances: ‘Curitiba is farther / further than São Paulo or Rio de Janeiro’ / ‘Curitiba is the farthest / furthest’. Further is used to mean ‘additional’, ‘extra’, ‘more advanced’: ‘Further supplies will be soon available’ / ‘For further information, go to the reception desk’.
Feedback: noun.
Female, feminine; male, masculine: Female and male are used to indicate the sex of people, animals and plants: ‘A female fox is called a vixen’ / ‘A male duck is called a drake’ / ‘He is a typical Latin American male’. Feminine and masculine are used for ‘qualities’ and ‘behaviour’ of people: ‘She’s a very masculine laugh’ / ‘It is a very feminine bathroom’. ‘The word for “moon” is feminine in French and masculine in German’.
Fingerprint, fingertip, but finger fracture, finger grass, finger-shaped.
Fit, suit: fit refers to ‘size’ and ‘shape’: ‘The lab coat doesn’t fit me’. Suit refers to style, colour: ‘This style doesn’t suit you very well’ / ‘Friday would suit me for an English lesson’.
Flow chart, flow line, but flowmeter.
-fold (suffix): (adj. and adv.) multiplied by; having the specified number of parts, e.g. tenfold, twofold; with an arabic numeral it forms a hyphenated term, e.g. 10-fold.
Foot-binding, foothill, foot louse, footnote, footstalk: noun; footloose: adjective.
Forebrain, forehead, forefoot, foreleg, foreword, but fore wing.
Former and latter: used with only two antecedents / [see Late, later, latter].
Free: as verb or adjective, followed by with or of; as suffix used with a hyphen, but germfree and carefree.
Freeze-dry (and freeze-dried): verb; not froze-dried or frozen-dried; freeze dryer: noun; freezing point: noun; freezing-point: adjective.
-ful (suffix): having ...: useful; giving ...: helpful.
Fungal or fungus: adjective.
G
Gauge (noun or verb): associated with measurement; air gauge, pressure gauge.
Get: just a few meanings: it usually means ‘receive’, ‘fetch’, ‘obtain’, ‘catch’ or similar: ‘I got a letter this morning’ / ‘Can you come and get me at the station’? / ‘I got a headache last night’ / ‘If you get the 503 bus, it stops in front of my house’ / ‘Let me get you a drink’. It also means ‘become’, before an adjective: ‘As you get old, your memory gets worse’ / ‘My feet are getting cold’. Get + past participle: ‘get washed’, ‘get lost’, ‘get dressed’, ‘get drowned’, ‘get engaged/married/divorced ... . Get + object + past participle: ‘I must get my hair cut’ / ‘You ought to get your car repaired’.
Gnotobiotic: refers to laboratory animals specially reared and germfree except for known microorganisms with which they have been inoculated.
Gram stain or Gram’s stain: (with a capital G) after Hans C.J. Gram; but gram-negative, gram-positive: adjective.
Grey: BrE; gray: AmE.
H
Half time: noun; half-time: adjective.
Hear, listen: hear is the ordinary word to say that something ‘comes to our ears’: ‘I heard voices’ / ‘Can you hear me’?. Listen (to) is used to talk about ‘paying attention’ to sounds: ‘I heard them talking, but I didn’t really listen to what they were saying’ / ‘Listen to me’!
Heartbeat but heart block, heart failure.
Hemacytometer.
Hindbrain, hindfoot, hindgut but hind kidney, hind wing.
I
-ic, -ical, (suffix, see a good dictionary): note the difference economic botany and economical process. Some adjectives ending in –ic: academic, artistic, athletic, catholic, domestic, emphatic, energetic, fantastic, linguistic, majestic, neurotic, phonetic, public, semantic, syntactic systematic, tragic ...; some adjectives ending in –ical: biological, chemical, critical cynical, grammatical, logical, mathematical, mechanical, medical, musical, physical, radical, surgical, tactical, topical ... . Notice: ‘an electric motor’ (a particular machine); ‘electrical equipment’ and ‘electrical components’ (general words).
Incidence, prevalence: number of cases developing per unit of population per unit of time, e.g. ‘100 cases of tuberculosis per 100,000 persons per year’. It is different from prevalence: number of cases existing per unit of population at a given time.
Incipient, insipient: the former means a beginner and its verbal form denotes an uncompleted action; the latter, now rarely used, means lacking in wisdom, foolish.
Ill, sick: ill is often used to mean ‘unwell’ (in BrE): George didn’t come yesterday because he was ill. Many British people prefer to use sick: ‘He spent many years looking after his sick mother’. Be sick can also mean ‘vomit’: ‘She’s always sea-sick’.
Instead (of): as a preposition: ‘I’ll have tea instead of coffee’; as an adverb: ‘I didn’t do field work. Instead, I went to the library’.
Intend (v.), intent (adj., n.): intend, as a verb means to have a plan, result or purpose in your mind: ‘We finished later than intended’. Intent, as an adjective means showing strong interest and attention: ‘Are you intent upon destroying my reputation’?; intent as a noun, means intention: ‘She denies possessing the drug with intent to supply’.
K
Kjeldahl flask (with a capital K); kjeldahlize (verb).
L
Landfall, landfill, landholder, landmark, landowner, landslide, but land bridge, land crab, land lead, land measure, land snail, land tortoise: all nouns.
Last, latest: ‘She says her latest book is being published next week and she thinks it’s much better than her last one’.
Late(ly), later, latter: ‘The bus is late today’ [= after its proper time]. ‘Have you done any experiment lately’?. ‘I’ll do it later’ [= after some time]. ‘There were two Professors in the meeting, Professor Coler and Professor Gray: the latter was my PhD advisor’.
Lay (laying), laid, laid [regular verb]: it means to place in a position of REST ON THE GROUND or PUT DOWN FLAT; e.g. ‘I laid the papers on the table’ / ‘The cuckoo lays its eggs in other birds’ nests’.
Lie (lying), lay, lain [irregular verb]: it means BE DOWN or BE OR BECOME HORIZONTAL; ‘The animals lie on the ground nearly all day’ / ‘I lay down and closed my eyes’. Observation: lie also has several other meanings, as for example TO EXIST OR TO BE FOUND: ‘The problem lies in deciding when to intervene’; and also TO BE SITUATED IN A PARTICULAR POSITION (town, natural feature …): ‘The town lies on the coast’.
Lie (lying), lied, lied [regular verb]: it means to make a statement that is ‘untrue’: ‘You lied to me when you said you had finished to writing up your thesis’.
-less (suffix): without: helpless, careless, childless.
-let (suffix): small: booklet, leaflet, piglet.
Lifeboat, lifelong, lifework, but life buoy, life plant, life preserver; and life-form, life-size, life-span.
-like (suffix): having the qualities of: savannah-like, lifelike, eellike, shell-like.
Live trap: noun; livetrap: verb.
Lots, a lot, plenty, a great deal, a large number, the majority: ‘Lots of patience is needed to learn a language’. ‘A lot of time is needed to learn a language’. ‘There is plenty of shops where you can buy bike accessories’. ‘He stays silent for long periods, but when he does speak he says a great deal’. ‘I’ve thrown out a large number of rotten fruits’ [= a large amount of ...]. ‘The majority of the animals on the island was birds’ [= ‘Most of the animals ...].
M
mal- (prefix): it means bad(ly): malfunction, maltreat.
Mean [noun and verb], by no means: notice the difference of mean: ‘The means obtained in all the experiments mean that the procedure we used is correct’. In the sense of ‘intend’ or ‘plan’: ‘I mean to find out what’s going on’ / ‘I didn’t mean to destroy your work’. By no means: ‘Galileo was by no means the first person to use a telescope’.
Microphotograph: a photograph on a greatly reduced scale, as on microfilm, using a ‘macro’ lens; do not confuse with photomicrograph, a photograph taken through a microscope.
Midday, midline, midpoint, midrib, but mid-latitudes, mid-carpal.
mis- (prefix): wrongly: misunderstand; astray: misconduct.
Mollusc (BrE), molusk (AmE).
Mould: BrE; mold: AmE.
Mucous: adjective; mucus: noun.
N
Necropsy (see autopsy)
Neither, nor; not ... either; not ... nor: ‘Neither the trees nor the grasses presented high transpiration rates’. ‘You said he can not swim, but I can not either’. ‘The plant did not transpire that day, nor the next day’.
-ness (suffix): state or quality: hardness, darkness, blindness.
Nessler’s reagent or test (with a capital N); nesslerize: verb.
NGO: non-governmental organization, that is independent of government and business.
Non (prefix): as an English prefix combines without a hyphen, except before a capital letter and a hyphenated word, e.g. non-British and non-self-governing, respectively; some authors use the hyphen between non and a word beginning with n.
O
Oestrus, oestrous: see estrus
Off-colour: adjective; offshot: noun; offshore: adverb or adjective.
Optimal, optimum: adjectives; optimum: noun.
Orient (verb, BrE); orientate (verb, AmE).
out- (prefix): to do something faster, longer ... than: outrun, outline.
over- (prefix): too much: overheat, overestimation (see under-).
Owing to: (see due to).
P
Part, partly; partially: ‘Part of the glassware was missing’. ‘Partly of it was missing’ [part of the whole]. ‘It is made partially of iron and partially of copper’ [in the sense of ‘a limited degree’].[The distinction between partly and partially is not an absolute one]. N.B. Partly is often followed by because or due to: ‘We couldn’t do our fieldwork partly because of the weather’.
Parameter: has a special meaning in mathematics; do not use loosely for variable, quantity, quality, determinant, or feature.
Pathological: of the field of pathology; pathologic: having the qualities studied in pathology, abnormal (see -ic, -ical).
Petri dish = petri dish: after Julius R. Petri (German bacteriologist).
Photomicrograph (see Microphotograph)
Physical chemistry (noun); physicalchemistry (adjective); it is very common the use of physico-chemical (adjective, which means: of/pertaining to physical chemistry.
Physiological (see -ic, -ical).
Policy, politics: policy refers to a plan of action agreed/chosen by a political party, a business etc.; it is also a principle that you believe in that influences your behaviour. Politics refers to the activities in getting and using power in public life and being able to influence decisions that affect a country, people etc.; it is also a person’s political views/beliefs.
Poly-, post-, pre- (prefixes): most words formed are solid, e.g. polymorphous, polyunsaturated, postgraduate, postnatal, prefabricate, preconception, precursor; exceptions are those containing proper nouns or their derivatives, e.g. pre-Christian, pre-Darwinian.
Precision (see Accuracy).
Prevalence (see Incidence)
Privative: having the quality of depriving a person or thing; characterized by the absence of a quality.
R
Rhythmic: marked by pronounced rhythm; rhythmical: pertaining to or involving rhythm (see -ic, ical).
Ringer’s or Ringer solution (with a capital R).
Rule of three: a method of finding a fourth number from three given numbers, of which the first is in the same proportion to the second as the third is to the unknown fourth.
Rule of thumb: a general principle or a method derived from practice or experience rather than theory.
S
See, look (at), watch [a good dictionary will show the several meanings of these three verbs]: we use see when something ‘comes to our eyes’ (whether or not we are paying attention): ‘Suddenly I saw something strange’ / ‘I can see a light at the end of the tunnel’. We use look in the sense of ‘concentrating’ or ‘paying attention’: ‘I looked at the photo but I didn’t see anybody I knew’ / ‘Look again through the microscope and try to see a cell with blue particles’. Watch is similar to look at but it suggests that something is happening or going to happen: ‘Watch that animal and see when it catches the prey’ / ‘I am watching TV’.
Setup (noun); set up (verb).
Shade, shadow: the protection from the sun is shade: ‘The temperature is 30 degree Celsius in the shade’. Shadow is the ‘picture’ made by an unlighted area: ‘You can estimate how tall a tree is from the length of its shadow as compared to the length of a shadow of a known stick, by using the rule of three’ [see the entry Rule of three].
-ship (suffix): status or condition: friendship, relationship.
Sign, signal: they have very similar meanings. Sign is usually something that you ‘can find’ or ‘see’: ‘Early signs of the disease’ / ‘The first signs of spring’. Signal is something ‘done intentionally’ or suggesting that you ‘should take some action’: ‘His visit was a clear signal that he supports our project’ / ‘I got a faint signal from the internet’.
Sizeable = sizable.
Skillful = skilful (adjective); skillfully = skilfully (adverb).
Small, little: small simply refers to size and little not only refers to size, but also expresses some kind of emotion: ‘A pretty little house in the country, close to a small village’. ‘That plant is too small to be counted as a tree’. ‘A poor little animal’.
So: degree: ‘It was so cold that the animal did not come out of the cave’. Before adjectives: ‘The cheetah run so fast that it caught the prey in a few seconds’. Notice the difference between very (simply giving information) and so (referring to information which has already been given): ‘It was very warm’ / ‘If we had known it would be so warm, we would have taken lighter clothing’. Emphatic use: ‘You’re so right’! So and that: ‘It was so cold that we stopped walking’. So ... a: ‘I had never seen before so loveable [= lovable] a pet’. Substitute word: ‘The weather is stormy and will remain so over the weekend. So much: ‘The other side of the river is so much steeper’.
So that, in order that: informal: ‘I’ve put it in the oven so that it’ll be ready in one hour’. Formal: ‘We send them monthly reports in order that they may have full information on the project’.
Some time, sometime, sometimes: Some time [stresses in the two words] means ‘a considerable amount of time’: ‘It will take some time to repair the spectrophotometer’. Sometime refers to ‘an indefinite time’: ‘The equipment will be ready sometime next week’. Sometimes means ‘in some occasion’, ‘more than once’: ‘It gave sometimes signs of life’ / ‘Sometimes, in the long winter, the birds flew into my house’.
Sporebearer, sporeformer, sporeforming; but spore ball, spore case, spore fruit, spore sac.
Steam distillation (noun); steam-distill (verb).
Stop bath, stop clock, stop valve; stop-off; stopback (see a dictionary).
Sub (prefix): lower than, less than, usually combines to form a solid word (without hyphen): subhuman, subway; exceptions: sub-clan and sub-society (nouns); sub-zero, sub-Atlantic: adjectives.
T
Tapeworm, tape grass, tape measure.
Taproot, tap water, tap screw.
Threefold (see -fold).
Trademark, trade name.
Travel, journey, trip, voyage: Compare: ‘He is only interested in travelling’ [travelling in general] / ‘She always spends lots of money on her travels’. Journey is the act of travelling: ‘Did you have a good journey’? [you talk about your experience] / ‘How long is your journey to work’ [an act of travelling from one place to another] / ‘Amundsen made his journey to the South Pole in 1911’. Trip is a journey to a place and back (especially short): ‘A business trip’. Voyage is a long journey especially by sea or in space: ‘The Titanic sank on its first voyage’.
Twofold (see -fold).
U
U shape (noun); U-shaped (adjective).
Ultra, prefix: most words with this prefix are solid, ultracentrifuge, ultraviolet; but ultra-atomic.
un- (prefix): negatory prefix: unfair, unexpected; it also refers to reverse action: unscrew, undo; most words beginning with this prefix are solid (see the exceptions in a dictionary).
under- (prefix): too little: undercook, underestimation (see over-).
V
Various: of different kinds or aspects.
Varying: = changing = causing to change.
W
-wards (suffix): direction: upwards, downwards, onwards, backwards, eastwards.
Washout (noun); wash out (verb).
Water bath, water vapour (AmE vapor): but waterfowl, waterline; and water-resistant, water-soluble (see the dictionary).
Wave form, wave guide, wave height, wave number: nouns; wave-built, wave-worn (adjectives); wavelength, wavemeter (nouns).
Wildlife, wildfowl: but wild canary, wild duck.
Windbreak, windfall: but wind drift, wind tunnel.
-wise (suffix): in the manner of: clockwise (anticlockwise), crabwise; as far as: lengthwise.
Work curve, work load: but workboat, workday.
Write-off (noun); write off (verb).
Write-out = printout (noun); write out (verb).
X
X ray (noun): ‘the X ray of the solar radiation spectrum’; X-ray (verb and adjective): ‘the X-ray photograph’.
Y
Y form (noun); and Y-shaped (adjective).
Z
Zero drift, zero group, zero hour, zero time, zero potential (nouns); zerovalent (adjective).
(II) FALSE FRIENDS
FALSE FRIEND IS A WORD THAT ‘LOOKS’ (OR SOUNDS) SIMILAR TO A WORD IN YOUR OWN LANGUAGE
[“algumas palavras foram traduzidas para o português, entre colchetes”]
Abstract (n.): a piece of writing containing the main ideas in a document (= summary).
Actual (adj.) / Actually (adv.): real, existing in fact / really: ‘The actual cost was much higher than we had expected’ / ‘The food was not actually all that expensive’.
Adept (adj.): good at doing something that is quite difficult (= skilful). [“perito”]
Alias (adv., n.): used when a person, especially a criminal or an actor, is known by two names. [“cognome”]
Cargo (n.): the goods carried in a ship or plane/aircraft or other large vehicle. ‘The tanker spilled its cargo of oil’.
Casualty: a person who is killed or injured in war or in an accident.
Claim (v.): to say that something is true (although not proved and other people may not believe it). [“alegar”]
Commodity: something that can be traded, bought or sold. [“mercadoria, bem consumível”]
Comprehensive (adj.): including all, the items, details, facts, information etc., that may be concerned (= complete, full). [in England, Comprehensive School = secondary school for young people of all levels of ability. [“abrangente, amplo”]
Discrete (adj.): separate; distinct: ‘The organisms can be divided in discrete categories’.
Discreet (adj.): intentionally not attracting attention: ‘He’s always discreet about his successes’.
Discretion (n.): 1) The freedom or power to decide what should be done in a particular situation: ‘To tell the truth to terminally ill patients is left to the discretion of the doctor’. 2) Care in what you say or do: ‘This is confidential, but can I rely on your discretion’?
Disgust (n., v.): a strong feeling of dislike or disapproval for somebody or something. ´I can only feel disgust for these criminals´. [“nojo”]
Enrol (v.): to join (officially) a course, school etc. [“matricular-se”]
Eventual (adj.) and Eventually (adv.): happening at the end of a period of time or of a process: ‘War is possible to predict with the eventual lack of water in many parts of the world’. ‘The increasing emissions of CO2 will eventually cause global warming’.
Exit (n.): a way out of a public building or vehicle. ‘There is a fire exit on each floor of the library’. [“saída”]
Expansive (adj.): covering a large amount of space or a large subject area: ‘We’re looking for a more expansive definition of the term’.
Expensive (adj.): costing a lot of money: ‘Art books are expensive’.
Exquisite (adj.): extremely beautiful or carefully made; delicate and sensitive. ´An exquisite sense of timing´. [“refinado”]
Fabric (n.): material (cotton, silk, wool…) used for making clothes, curtains etc.
Facilities (n.): buildings, services, equipment…that are provided for a particular purpose. [“infra-estrutura, instalações, condições”]
Incipient (adj.) and Insipient (adj./n.): incipient: just beginning; insipient: lacking in wisdom, foolish.
Inexistent and Non-existent: inexistent means existing in something, inherent; non-existent means that does not exist.
Ingenuity (n.): the ability to invent things or solve problems in clever new ways. ‘Being a man of ingenuity, he soon repaired the machine’. [“engenhosidade]
Ingenious (adj.): (for objects, ideas…) that is very suitable for a particular purpose; and (for persons) having a lot of clever new ideas. [“engenhoso”]
Intend (v.): to have a plan, purpose or result in your mind. ´We finished later than we intended´. [“pretender, planejar”]
Journal (n.): a newspaper or magazine that deals with a particular subject or profession: ‘Journal of Ecology’. [“periódico”]. Journalist (n.): a person whose job is to write for newspapers, magazines, radio or TV.
Library (n.): a building with collections of books, tapes etc. for people to read or borrow. ‘There are not many books in the university library’.
Mayor (n.): the head of a town or city elected by the public [“prefeito”]
Notorious (adj.): well known for being bad: a notorious criminal.
Novel (n., adj.): a story (usually imaginary) long enough to fill a complete book. [“romance”]
Oil: 1) A thick liquid that is found in rock underground (= petroleum). 2) A form of petroleum that is used as fuel(= gasoline, AmE) and to make parts of machines move smoothly.
Parent (n.): [usually plural]: a person’s father and mother: ‘I live with my parents’.
Prejudice (n.): an unreasonable dislike of or preference for a person, group, custom, etc. especially when it is based on their race, religion, sex, etc.: ‘’A victim of racial prejudice’ / ‘Their decision was based on ignorance and prejudice’. Prejudice (v.): 1) To influence somebody so that they have an unfair or unreasonable opinion about somebody or something: ‘The lawyers tried to prejudice the jury against her’. 2) To have a harmful effect on something: ‘Any delay will prejudice the child’s welfare’.
Pretend (v.): to make other people to believe something that is not true. Used by children: not real, imaginary. [“fingir”] (see intend)
Private (adj.): belonging to or for the use of a particular person on group. ‘Private property. Keep out’!
Privative (adj.): denoting privation or absence of a quality or attribute.
Professor (n.): a teacher of the highest rank in department (in GB and USA): ‘Professor Stephen Hawking’.
Push (v.): to use your hands / arms / body to move somebody or something forward or away from you: ‘You push and I’ll pull’.
Resume (v.): it (an activity, conversation…) begins again or continues after an interruption. ´The noise resumed louder than before´. ´Then they resumed their conversation´. [“reiniciar, recomeçar”]
Scholar (n.): (FORMAL) a scholar is a person who studies an academic subject and knows a lot about it. ´The library attracts thousands of scholars and researchers´. [“intelectual, erudito”]
Sensible (adj.): ability to make good judgement: ‘Be sensible my son’! / ‘Say something sensible’! [“sensato”; “que tem juízo”]
Sensitive (adj.): 1) Aware of and able to understand other people. 2) To understand art, music etc.. 3) To be easily offended, upset ...; 4) Reacting quickly or more than usual to something (to cold etc.). [“sensível”]
Sort (n.): a group or type of people or things that are similar in a particular way (= kind). [“tipo”]
Sympathetic (adj.): showing that you understand and care for someone´s problems.[“compreensivo”]
Ultimate (adj.): 1) Final: ‘The ultimate decision is yours’. 2) Most extreme; best; worst: ‘This test will be the ultimate one of your academic life’. 3) Fundamental: ’The ultimate principles of ecology’. Ultimate (n.): the best, most advanced ...: ‘The ultimate in modern design’. Ultimately (adv.): 1) Finally: ‘A poor diet will ultimately lead to illness’. 2) At the most basic and important level: ‘All life depends ultimately on water’!
Vacant (n.): (of a seat, hotel room, house…) empty, not being used (=unoccupied). [“vaga, desocupado, vago”]
Vague (adj.): not clear in a person’s mind.
(III) LATIN NAMES AND EXPRESSIONS
addendum (pl. addenda): ‘thing that is to be added’ (addenda: ‘material added at the end of a book’).
ante meridiem (abbreviation a.m.): ‘before midday’.
circa (abbr.: ca.): about, approximately (with reference to a date or quantity).
cf. (abbrev. of confer): compare.
editio citato (abbr. ed. Cit.): edition cited.
et al. (abbrev. of et alii): ‘and others’.
et cetera (abbr. etc.): and so on, and so forth.
et sequens: and the following.
exempli gratia (abbr. e.g.): ‘for example’.
ibidem (abrev. ibid): ‘in the same passage, article etc previously mentioned’.
id est (abbr. i.e.): ‘that is’.
in loco: ‘in place’; ‘in the proper place’.
in loco citato (abbr. in loc. cit.): ‘in the place cited’.
in natura: ‘raw material’; ‘not industrialized’, ‘as it occurs in nature’.
in situ: ‘situated in the original, natural, or existing place or position’.
ipso facto: ‘by the fact itself’.
momentum: ‘importance, consequence’; ‘movement, moving power’.
Nota Bene (abbrev. N.B.): ‘observation’.
per se: by or in itself
post meridien (abbrev. p.m.): ‘after midday’.
postscriptum (abbrev. PS): or postcript, ‘an additional passage at the end of any text’.
viva voce: ‘examination or oral examination’.
viz. (abbrev. of videlicet; the z represents the contraction -et): ‘namely’; ‘that is to say’; ‘specifically’.
LET’S PRACTISE ENGLISH – Chapter IX
BASIC ENGLISH REVIEW
9. ADJECTIVES / ADVERBS
9.1 ADJECTIVES
9.1.1 COMPARATIVE AND SUPERLATIVE ADJECTIVES
The three degrees of comparison:
Absolute: young / easily.
Comparative: younger / more easily.
Superlative: youngest / most easily.
The inflectional suffixes are -er for the comparative and -est for the superlative. A small group of adjectives form comparatives and superlatives in a different way: good ... better ... best; bad ... worse ... worst; far ... further / farther ... furthest / farthest. See the changes in spelling (final): big ... bigger ...biggest; early ... earlier ... earliest; brave ... braver ... bravest; free ... freer ... freest.
Inflection of adverbs: well ... better ... best; little ... less ... least; badly ... worse ... worst; much ... more ... most.
9.1.2 QUANTIFIERS (ADJECTIVES)
Many / a few / several occur only with plural count nouns: ‘the few words were well chosen’. ‘He found a few individuals [= several] / ‘He found few individuals’ [= not many]. ‘It contains a little sugar [= some/ / ‘It contains little sugar’ [= not much]. NOTICE: the quantifier little must be distinguished from the homonymous adjectives as in ‘A little bird is singing’.
Some/any. Some means ‘a certain (not large) number or amount of’, and is mostly used in affirmative sentences: ‘She’s got some interesting ideas’. But also in questions when a yes is expected: ‘Could I have some coffee’? Any is used in negative sentences, in most questions, with if, and with words like hardly, without, doubt ... [= a negative kind of meaning]. ‘Do you know any good books on biology’? ‘If you find any mistakes, tell me’. ‘We got there without any difficulty’. ‘There’s hardly any book left’.
Enough: used with count and non-count nouns: ‘There are enough plants in this area’ / ‘He has enough experience’. It can also be used alone (without noun): ‘I can give some pieces if you haven’t enough.
Too: it has sometimes, a negative force as in ‘She’s too old to do any work’ / ‘The grass is too short to cut’ / ‘He’s too poor to own a car’. It has the sense of ‘more than enough’ as in ‘It’s too long’.
NOTICE: the opposite of ‘He didn’t pass the exams because he didn’t work hard enough’ is ‘He passed the exams because he worked too hard’.
NOTE on usage of also / too / as well: ‘He speaks English and he also writes it’ [= it seems more formal]. ‘I’ve read her articles on this subject and I’ve read her book as well / too [= are less formal and usually come at the end of the sentence].
9.1.3 ADJECTIVES: ORDER BEFORE NOUNS
a) colour // origin // material // purpose // noun
brown // Brazilian // leather // riding // boots
a Venetian // glass // flower // vase
b) SIZE, LENGTH and HEIGHT COME FIRST
'a long, flexible steel rod'; 'a tall, thick ancient oak-tree'.
c) NUMBERS USUALLY COME FIRST
'six large eggs'; 'the second big explosion'.
9.2 ADVERBS (and CONJUNCTS)
ADVERBS WITH THE VERB (WORD ORDER):
a) Before the verb (when using always and almost): ‘I always go by walking’. ‘She almost fell as she was going down the stairs’.
b) Before the negative: ‘He probably will not see you’.
c) After am / is / are / was / were: ‘Besides feeling tired I am also hungry’. ‘The traffic is not usually bad’. ‘After the field work we were terribly thirsty’. ‘You are never on time’.
d) After the first verb: ‘I can never remember her name’. ‘Are you definitely going tomorrow’? ‘His car has probably been stolen’.
AS MODIFIERS:
a) An adverb may premodify an adjective: ‘That was a very funny situation’. ‘It is extremely good what happened’. ‘The bird has a really beautiful colour’.
b) An adverb postmodifies an adjective: ‘high enough’.
c) Besides very, other adverbs are intensifiers: so / pretty / rather / unusually / unbelievably. Many are restricted to a small set of words: deeply / highly / strikingly / sharply. There are also expressions like ‘technically possible’, ‘theoretically sound’ ...
d) Intensifiers: quite / rather. ‘The animal is quite strong but rather slow-moving’ [quite with a positive idea and rather with a negative idea]. Rather is mainly used with a negative idea: ‘It’s rather difficult, I’m afraid’! Quite is less than ‘very’ but more than ‘a little’: ‘That scientist is quite famous’ / ‘It’s quite cold today’.
Quite means completely with a number of adjectives, especially: sure / certain / right / wrong / true / safe / clear / obvious / different / unnecessary / incredible / extraordinary / amazing / impossible. We can say ‘I quite agree with you’ [= I completely agree] and ‘I don’t quite understand what you mean’ [= not completely].
e) Still / yet / already
Still is used to say that a situation or action is continuing: ‘It’s 10 o’clock and she is still in bed’. ‘Is it still raining’? [it usually goes in the middle of the sentence].
Yet means ‘until now’; it is used mainly in negative sentences and questions: ‘It’s 10 o’clock and she hasn’t got up yet’. ‘Has it stopped raining yet’? ‘I have written the letter but I haven’t posted it yet’. ‘I am hungry. Is dinner ready yet’?
Already is used to say that something happened sooner than expected. It usually goes in the middle of the sentence: ‘They’ve arrived already’. ‘I’ve only just had lunch and I’m already hungry’. NOTICE the difference between already and yet in questions: ‘Haven’t you seen him already’? [= it expects an affirmative answer] / ‘Haven’t you seen him yet’? [= yet leaves open whether the answer is negative or positive].
AS INTENSIFIERS:
‘Emphasizers’ (most are adverbs): actually, certainly, clearly, definitely, indeed, obviously, plainly, really, surely, for certain, for sure, of course; and frankly, honestly, literally, simply, fairly (BrE), just. Maximizers: absolutely, altogether, completely, entirely, fully, quite, thoroughly, utterly; in all respects; most. Boosters: badly, deeply, greatly, heartily, much, so, violently, well; a great deal, a good deal, a lot, by far; exclamatory how; more.
See some differences: ‘They wounded him deeply’ (emotional wounding) / ‘They wounded him badly’ (physical wounding). Greatly is used with verbs having a favourable implication: ‘Your help would be greatly appreciated’; and utterly with verbs having an unfavourable implication: ‘She utterly failed in her MSc thesis’.
‘Downtoners’ with a lowering effect on the force of the verb: the diminishers partly, slightly, somewhat; in part, to some extent; a little; a bit; the negative minimizers barely, scarcely, hardly, little; in the least, in the slightest, at all; and the approximators: almost, nearly, as good as, all but.
OF FREQUENCY
a) always, continually, frequently, occasionally, often, once, twice, periodically, repeatedly, sometimes, usually etc.
b) ever, hardly ever, never, rarely, scarcely ever, seldom.
CONJUNCTS
Most conjuncts are adverb phrases or prepositional phrases (see PREPOSITIONAL PHRASES, in 7). A list of common conjuncts (the majority is used in ‘Scientific English’) is given below:
Enumerative: first (ly), secondly, thirdly, to begin with, to start with, in the first place, in the second place; next, then; finally, last, lastly; to conclude.
Reinforcing: also, furthermore, moreover, in addition, above all, what is more.
Equative: equally, likewise, similarly, in the same way.
9.3 EXERCISE
Match the expressions of the left with the ones on the right:
1 chocolate milk........a)book describing cases
2 milk chocolate........b)chocolate made with milk
3 book case.............c)leather for making shoes
4 case book.............d)drawing done in ink
5 leather shoe..........e)garden with flowers in
6 shoe leather..........f)ink used for drawing
7 flower garden.........g)milk flavoured with chocolate
8 garden flower.........h)piece of furniture for books
9 ink drawing...........i)flower that grows in gardens
10 drawing ink..........j)shoe made of leather
ANSWERS
1g; 2b; 3h; 4a; 5j; 6c; 7e; 8i; 9d; 10f.
Try to get the best understanding on the sentences below (and the best 'understandable' translation)
1. a) The new government measures angered employers and employees alike.
b) The government new measures angered employers and employees alike.
2. A recent nuclear accident in Japan was worse than previously realized.
3. a) The actual safety procedures raise suspicious that the government may be guilty of negligence.
b) The safety procedures actually raise suspicious that the government may be guilty of negligence.
4. a) Learning systems is important.
b) Learning systems are important.
5. ‘Forest precedes civilization, deserts follow them’ [François Auguste René de Chateubriand].
6. a) It was not apparent how the whale died, it seemed to have no injuries.
b) The solution to the problem was apparent to all.
c) He was the apparent winner of the election.
7. 'Pontal dos Seixas' is the easternmost point of Brazil.
8. See the difference:
a) I used to study hard every night.
b) I am used to study hard every night.
9. ‘Experience is the name that every one gives to their mistakes’ [Oscar Wilde]
10.‘The first aim of education should not be to prepare young people for careers, but to enable them to develop a respect for life’ [Norman Cousin]
11. ‘There is no “applied science”, but application of science’ [Louis Pasteur]
12. ‘The aim of science is not to open the door to infinite wisdom, but to set a limit to infinite error’ [Bertolt Brecht]
13. ‘God is an invention of Man. So the nature of God is only a shallow mystery. The deep mystery is the nature of Man’ [Nanrei Kobori, Buddhist Sanctuary, Kyoto]
14. ‘Many are called but few are chosen’ [The Bible]
15. ‘Brush your teeth with the best toothpaste. Then rinse your mouth with industrial waste’ [Tom Lehrer]
16. ‘Religion without science is blind; science without religion is lame’ [Albert Einstein]
17. ‘We abuse land because we regard it as a commodity belonging to us. When we see land as a community to which we belong, we may begin to use it with love and respect’ [Aldo Leopold]
18. ‘I thought I saw a blue jay this morning. But the smog was so bad that it turned out to be a cardinal holding its breath’ [Michael J. Cohen]
19. ‘We are guilty of many errors and many faults, but our worst crime is abandoning the children, neglecting the fountain of life. Many of the things we need can wait. The child cannot. Right now is the time his bones are being formed, his blood is being made and his senses are being developed. To him we cannot answer, Tomorrow. His name is Today’ [Gabriela Mistral, Noble Prize-winning Poet from Chile]
20. ‘True growth occurs as civilizations transfer an increasing proportion of energy and attention from the material side of life to the nonmaterial side and thereby develop their culture, capacity for compassion, sense of community, and strength of democracy’. [Arnold Toynbee]
21. ‘It is by the goodness of God that in our country we have those three unspeakably precious things: freedom of speech, freedom of conscience, and the prudence never to practise either of them’ [Mark Twain]
22. ‘A little sincerity is a dangerous thing, and a great deal of it is absolutely fatal’ [Oscar Wilde]
23. ‘...I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the colour of their skin but by the content of their character’ [Martin Luther King]
24. ‘A technological society has two choices. First, it can wait until catastrophic failures expose systemic deficiencies, distortions, and self-deceptions...Second, a culture can provide social checks and balances to correct for systemic distortions prior to catastrophic failures’ [Mahatma Gandhi]
25. ‘He knows nothing; and he thinks he knows everything. That points clearly to a political career’ [Bernard Shaw]
26. ‘Alcohol is a very necessary article...It enables Parliament to do things at eleven at night that no sane person would do at eleven in the morning’ [Bernard Shaw]
27. ‘Some people think football is a matter of life and death...I can assure them it is much more serious than that’ [Bill Shankly]
28. ‘All animals are equal but some animals are more equal than others’ [George Orwell]
29. ‘When I give food to the poor they call me a saint. When I ask why the poor have no food they call me a communist’ [D. Helder Pessôa Câmara]
30. ‘Every form of addiction is bad, no matter whether the narcotic be alcohol or morphine or idealism’ [Carl Gustav Jung, Swiss psychologist]
31. ‘What is the worst ethical sin in science? Fraud. What next? Plagiarism’ [CBE, Scientific Style and Format]
32. ‘There are three kinds of lies: lies, damned lies, and statistics’. [Disraeli, nineteenth-century British prime minister]
33. ‘I hate to spread rumours, but what else can one do with them’? [Amanda Lear]
SCIENTIFIC TEXT
Since 1988 hundreds of lives have been saved by the three ounces of blood contained in a typical placenta and umbilical cord. That blood is now known to be a rich source of so-called hematopoietic stem cells, the precursors of everything in the blood from infection-fighting white blood cells to the red blood cells that carry oxygen to the platelets that facilitate blood clotting after an injury. The stem cells from a single placenta are sufficient to rebuild the blood and immune system of a child with leukemia, whose own white blood cells are abnormally dividing and must be killed by chemotherapy. In the past, physicians had to seek a living donor to provide such children with transplants of bone marrow, which also contains stem cells that produce blood and immune cells. Cord blood, which can be stored, is more likely to provide a suitable match and less likely to cause complications, because its stem cells are immunologically different from and more tolerant than those in adult bone marrow.
The umbilical cord blood transplantation can also help to restore normal red blood cells in people with sickle cell anemia, to reconstitute the immune system of infants born with severe combined immunodeficiency and to treat fatal inherited enzyme deficiencies.
Recognizing the apparent advantages of umbilical cord blood transplantation, a number of medical centres have established banks so that a mother can donate her baby’s cord blood for use by a stranger in need. But like many new scientific discoveries, umbilical cord blood transplantation brings with it a set of ethical questions. The New York Blood Center’s Placental Blood Program now has 13,000 banked donations. Who owns umbilical cord blood: the parents, the mother, or the infant? What happens if a mother donates her baby’s cord blood to a bank but the child later develops leukemia and needs it? Is it right for the company that maintain the bank to market their services which can cost $1,500 for collection and $95 per year for storage when the chance a child will ever need his or her cord blood ranges from 1 in 10,000 (according to New York Blood Center) to 1 in 200,000 (according to the National Institutes of Health)?
There are more exciting uses for cord blood. One day an infant born with a genetic defect of the bone marrow or blood may be able to have his umbilical cord blood harvested at birth, repaired by genetic engineering and then re-infused, so that he would never need suffer the negative effects of his or her genetic inheritance.
N.B. The title of this text is: CORD STEM CELLS SAVE LIVES BUT RAISE QUESTIONS (Scientific American, April 2001: 32-37)
QUESTIONS
1. Why could blood from placenta and umbilical cord be deemed as a rich source of life?
2. Which cells in the organism play the role to stop bleeding?
3. Why stem cells would be important for children with leukemia?
4. Which old technique would be replaced by the use of stem cells in children with leukemia?
5. What is said in the text about the use of stem cells for treating anemia, enzyme deficiencies, and immunodeficiencies?
6. What is alleged in the text, in statistics terms, about the right of the company to exploit stem cells transplantation?
7. How would genetic engineering would make use of cord blood?
9. ADJECTIVES / ADVERBS
9.1 ADJECTIVES
9.1.1 COMPARATIVE AND SUPERLATIVE ADJECTIVES
The three degrees of comparison:
Absolute: young / easily.
Comparative: younger / more easily.
Superlative: youngest / most easily.
The inflectional suffixes are -er for the comparative and -est for the superlative. A small group of adjectives form comparatives and superlatives in a different way: good ... better ... best; bad ... worse ... worst; far ... further / farther ... furthest / farthest. See the changes in spelling (final): big ... bigger ...biggest; early ... earlier ... earliest; brave ... braver ... bravest; free ... freer ... freest.
Inflection of adverbs: well ... better ... best; little ... less ... least; badly ... worse ... worst; much ... more ... most.
9.1.2 QUANTIFIERS (ADJECTIVES)
Many / a few / several occur only with plural count nouns: ‘the few words were well chosen’. ‘He found a few individuals [= several] / ‘He found few individuals’ [= not many]. ‘It contains a little sugar [= some/ / ‘It contains little sugar’ [= not much]. NOTICE: the quantifier little must be distinguished from the homonymous adjectives as in ‘A little bird is singing’.
Some/any. Some means ‘a certain (not large) number or amount of’, and is mostly used in affirmative sentences: ‘She’s got some interesting ideas’. But also in questions when a yes is expected: ‘Could I have some coffee’? Any is used in negative sentences, in most questions, with if, and with words like hardly, without, doubt ... [= a negative kind of meaning]. ‘Do you know any good books on biology’? ‘If you find any mistakes, tell me’. ‘We got there without any difficulty’. ‘There’s hardly any book left’.
Enough: used with count and non-count nouns: ‘There are enough plants in this area’ / ‘He has enough experience’. It can also be used alone (without noun): ‘I can give some pieces if you haven’t enough.
Too: it has sometimes, a negative force as in ‘She’s too old to do any work’ / ‘The grass is too short to cut’ / ‘He’s too poor to own a car’. It has the sense of ‘more than enough’ as in ‘It’s too long’.
NOTICE: the opposite of ‘He didn’t pass the exams because he didn’t work hard enough’ is ‘He passed the exams because he worked too hard’.
NOTE on usage of also / too / as well: ‘He speaks English and he also writes it’ [= it seems more formal]. ‘I’ve read her articles on this subject and I’ve read her book as well / too [= are less formal and usually come at the end of the sentence].
9.1.3 ADJECTIVES: ORDER BEFORE NOUNS
a) colour // origin // material // purpose // noun
brown // Brazilian // leather // riding // boots
a Venetian // glass // flower // vase
b) SIZE, LENGTH and HEIGHT COME FIRST
'a long, flexible steel rod'; 'a tall, thick ancient oak-tree'.
c) NUMBERS USUALLY COME FIRST
'six large eggs'; 'the second big explosion'.
9.2 ADVERBS (and CONJUNCTS)
ADVERBS WITH THE VERB (WORD ORDER):
a) Before the verb (when using always and almost): ‘I always go by walking’. ‘She almost fell as she was going down the stairs’.
b) Before the negative: ‘He probably will not see you’.
c) After am / is / are / was / were: ‘Besides feeling tired I am also hungry’. ‘The traffic is not usually bad’. ‘After the field work we were terribly thirsty’. ‘You are never on time’.
d) After the first verb: ‘I can never remember her name’. ‘Are you definitely going tomorrow’? ‘His car has probably been stolen’.
AS MODIFIERS:
a) An adverb may premodify an adjective: ‘That was a very funny situation’. ‘It is extremely good what happened’. ‘The bird has a really beautiful colour’.
b) An adverb postmodifies an adjective: ‘high enough’.
c) Besides very, other adverbs are intensifiers: so / pretty / rather / unusually / unbelievably. Many are restricted to a small set of words: deeply / highly / strikingly / sharply. There are also expressions like ‘technically possible’, ‘theoretically sound’ ...
d) Intensifiers: quite / rather. ‘The animal is quite strong but rather slow-moving’ [quite with a positive idea and rather with a negative idea]. Rather is mainly used with a negative idea: ‘It’s rather difficult, I’m afraid’! Quite is less than ‘very’ but more than ‘a little’: ‘That scientist is quite famous’ / ‘It’s quite cold today’.
Quite means completely with a number of adjectives, especially: sure / certain / right / wrong / true / safe / clear / obvious / different / unnecessary / incredible / extraordinary / amazing / impossible. We can say ‘I quite agree with you’ [= I completely agree] and ‘I don’t quite understand what you mean’ [= not completely].
e) Still / yet / already
Still is used to say that a situation or action is continuing: ‘It’s 10 o’clock and she is still in bed’. ‘Is it still raining’? [it usually goes in the middle of the sentence].
Yet means ‘until now’; it is used mainly in negative sentences and questions: ‘It’s 10 o’clock and she hasn’t got up yet’. ‘Has it stopped raining yet’? ‘I have written the letter but I haven’t posted it yet’. ‘I am hungry. Is dinner ready yet’?
Already is used to say that something happened sooner than expected. It usually goes in the middle of the sentence: ‘They’ve arrived already’. ‘I’ve only just had lunch and I’m already hungry’. NOTICE the difference between already and yet in questions: ‘Haven’t you seen him already’? [= it expects an affirmative answer] / ‘Haven’t you seen him yet’? [= yet leaves open whether the answer is negative or positive].
AS INTENSIFIERS:
‘Emphasizers’ (most are adverbs): actually, certainly, clearly, definitely, indeed, obviously, plainly, really, surely, for certain, for sure, of course; and frankly, honestly, literally, simply, fairly (BrE), just. Maximizers: absolutely, altogether, completely, entirely, fully, quite, thoroughly, utterly; in all respects; most. Boosters: badly, deeply, greatly, heartily, much, so, violently, well; a great deal, a good deal, a lot, by far; exclamatory how; more.
See some differences: ‘They wounded him deeply’ (emotional wounding) / ‘They wounded him badly’ (physical wounding). Greatly is used with verbs having a favourable implication: ‘Your help would be greatly appreciated’; and utterly with verbs having an unfavourable implication: ‘She utterly failed in her MSc thesis’.
‘Downtoners’ with a lowering effect on the force of the verb: the diminishers partly, slightly, somewhat; in part, to some extent; a little; a bit; the negative minimizers barely, scarcely, hardly, little; in the least, in the slightest, at all; and the approximators: almost, nearly, as good as, all but.
OF FREQUENCY
a) always, continually, frequently, occasionally, often, once, twice, periodically, repeatedly, sometimes, usually etc.
b) ever, hardly ever, never, rarely, scarcely ever, seldom.
CONJUNCTS
Most conjuncts are adverb phrases or prepositional phrases (see PREPOSITIONAL PHRASES, in 7). A list of common conjuncts (the majority is used in ‘Scientific English’) is given below:
Enumerative: first (ly), secondly, thirdly, to begin with, to start with, in the first place, in the second place; next, then; finally, last, lastly; to conclude.
Reinforcing: also, furthermore, moreover, in addition, above all, what is more.
Equative: equally, likewise, similarly, in the same way.
9.3 EXERCISE
Match the expressions of the left with the ones on the right:
1 chocolate milk........a)book describing cases
2 milk chocolate........b)chocolate made with milk
3 book case.............c)leather for making shoes
4 case book.............d)drawing done in ink
5 leather shoe..........e)garden with flowers in
6 shoe leather..........f)ink used for drawing
7 flower garden.........g)milk flavoured with chocolate
8 garden flower.........h)piece of furniture for books
9 ink drawing...........i)flower that grows in gardens
10 drawing ink..........j)shoe made of leather
ANSWERS
1g; 2b; 3h; 4a; 5j; 6c; 7e; 8i; 9d; 10f.
Try to get the best understanding on the sentences below (and the best 'understandable' translation)
1. a) The new government measures angered employers and employees alike.
b) The government new measures angered employers and employees alike.
2. A recent nuclear accident in Japan was worse than previously realized.
3. a) The actual safety procedures raise suspicious that the government may be guilty of negligence.
b) The safety procedures actually raise suspicious that the government may be guilty of negligence.
4. a) Learning systems is important.
b) Learning systems are important.
5. ‘Forest precedes civilization, deserts follow them’ [François Auguste René de Chateubriand].
6. a) It was not apparent how the whale died, it seemed to have no injuries.
b) The solution to the problem was apparent to all.
c) He was the apparent winner of the election.
7. 'Pontal dos Seixas' is the easternmost point of Brazil.
8. See the difference:
a) I used to study hard every night.
b) I am used to study hard every night.
9. ‘Experience is the name that every one gives to their mistakes’ [Oscar Wilde]
10.‘The first aim of education should not be to prepare young people for careers, but to enable them to develop a respect for life’ [Norman Cousin]
11. ‘There is no “applied science”, but application of science’ [Louis Pasteur]
12. ‘The aim of science is not to open the door to infinite wisdom, but to set a limit to infinite error’ [Bertolt Brecht]
13. ‘God is an invention of Man. So the nature of God is only a shallow mystery. The deep mystery is the nature of Man’ [Nanrei Kobori, Buddhist Sanctuary, Kyoto]
14. ‘Many are called but few are chosen’ [The Bible]
15. ‘Brush your teeth with the best toothpaste. Then rinse your mouth with industrial waste’ [Tom Lehrer]
16. ‘Religion without science is blind; science without religion is lame’ [Albert Einstein]
17. ‘We abuse land because we regard it as a commodity belonging to us. When we see land as a community to which we belong, we may begin to use it with love and respect’ [Aldo Leopold]
18. ‘I thought I saw a blue jay this morning. But the smog was so bad that it turned out to be a cardinal holding its breath’ [Michael J. Cohen]
19. ‘We are guilty of many errors and many faults, but our worst crime is abandoning the children, neglecting the fountain of life. Many of the things we need can wait. The child cannot. Right now is the time his bones are being formed, his blood is being made and his senses are being developed. To him we cannot answer, Tomorrow. His name is Today’ [Gabriela Mistral, Noble Prize-winning Poet from Chile]
20. ‘True growth occurs as civilizations transfer an increasing proportion of energy and attention from the material side of life to the nonmaterial side and thereby develop their culture, capacity for compassion, sense of community, and strength of democracy’. [Arnold Toynbee]
21. ‘It is by the goodness of God that in our country we have those three unspeakably precious things: freedom of speech, freedom of conscience, and the prudence never to practise either of them’ [Mark Twain]
22. ‘A little sincerity is a dangerous thing, and a great deal of it is absolutely fatal’ [Oscar Wilde]
23. ‘...I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the colour of their skin but by the content of their character’ [Martin Luther King]
24. ‘A technological society has two choices. First, it can wait until catastrophic failures expose systemic deficiencies, distortions, and self-deceptions...Second, a culture can provide social checks and balances to correct for systemic distortions prior to catastrophic failures’ [Mahatma Gandhi]
25. ‘He knows nothing; and he thinks he knows everything. That points clearly to a political career’ [Bernard Shaw]
26. ‘Alcohol is a very necessary article...It enables Parliament to do things at eleven at night that no sane person would do at eleven in the morning’ [Bernard Shaw]
27. ‘Some people think football is a matter of life and death...I can assure them it is much more serious than that’ [Bill Shankly]
28. ‘All animals are equal but some animals are more equal than others’ [George Orwell]
29. ‘When I give food to the poor they call me a saint. When I ask why the poor have no food they call me a communist’ [D. Helder Pessôa Câmara]
30. ‘Every form of addiction is bad, no matter whether the narcotic be alcohol or morphine or idealism’ [Carl Gustav Jung, Swiss psychologist]
31. ‘What is the worst ethical sin in science? Fraud. What next? Plagiarism’ [CBE, Scientific Style and Format]
32. ‘There are three kinds of lies: lies, damned lies, and statistics’. [Disraeli, nineteenth-century British prime minister]
33. ‘I hate to spread rumours, but what else can one do with them’? [Amanda Lear]
SCIENTIFIC TEXT
Since 1988 hundreds of lives have been saved by the three ounces of blood contained in a typical placenta and umbilical cord. That blood is now known to be a rich source of so-called hematopoietic stem cells, the precursors of everything in the blood from infection-fighting white blood cells to the red blood cells that carry oxygen to the platelets that facilitate blood clotting after an injury. The stem cells from a single placenta are sufficient to rebuild the blood and immune system of a child with leukemia, whose own white blood cells are abnormally dividing and must be killed by chemotherapy. In the past, physicians had to seek a living donor to provide such children with transplants of bone marrow, which also contains stem cells that produce blood and immune cells. Cord blood, which can be stored, is more likely to provide a suitable match and less likely to cause complications, because its stem cells are immunologically different from and more tolerant than those in adult bone marrow.
The umbilical cord blood transplantation can also help to restore normal red blood cells in people with sickle cell anemia, to reconstitute the immune system of infants born with severe combined immunodeficiency and to treat fatal inherited enzyme deficiencies.
Recognizing the apparent advantages of umbilical cord blood transplantation, a number of medical centres have established banks so that a mother can donate her baby’s cord blood for use by a stranger in need. But like many new scientific discoveries, umbilical cord blood transplantation brings with it a set of ethical questions. The New York Blood Center’s Placental Blood Program now has 13,000 banked donations. Who owns umbilical cord blood: the parents, the mother, or the infant? What happens if a mother donates her baby’s cord blood to a bank but the child later develops leukemia and needs it? Is it right for the company that maintain the bank to market their services which can cost $1,500 for collection and $95 per year for storage when the chance a child will ever need his or her cord blood ranges from 1 in 10,000 (according to New York Blood Center) to 1 in 200,000 (according to the National Institutes of Health)?
There are more exciting uses for cord blood. One day an infant born with a genetic defect of the bone marrow or blood may be able to have his umbilical cord blood harvested at birth, repaired by genetic engineering and then re-infused, so that he would never need suffer the negative effects of his or her genetic inheritance.
N.B. The title of this text is: CORD STEM CELLS SAVE LIVES BUT RAISE QUESTIONS (Scientific American, April 2001: 32-37)
QUESTIONS
1. Why could blood from placenta and umbilical cord be deemed as a rich source of life?
2. Which cells in the organism play the role to stop bleeding?
3. Why stem cells would be important for children with leukemia?
4. Which old technique would be replaced by the use of stem cells in children with leukemia?
5. What is said in the text about the use of stem cells for treating anemia, enzyme deficiencies, and immunodeficiencies?
6. What is alleged in the text, in statistics terms, about the right of the company to exploit stem cells transplantation?
7. How would genetic engineering would make use of cord blood?
segunda-feira, 7 de novembro de 2011
LET’S PRACTISE ENGLISH – Chapter VIII
Starting with the continuation of
SOME REASONS NOT TO MESS WITH A CHILD:
4. A teacher was giving a lesson on the circulation of the blood. Trying to make the matter clearer she said: “Now, class, if I stood on my head, the blood, as you know, would run into it, and I would turn red in the face”. “Yes”, the class said. “Then why is it that, while I am standing upright the blood doesn’t run into my feet”? A little fellow shouted: “Cause [= Because] your feet ain’t* empty”.
[* ain’t = am not / is not / are not (non-standard or humorous)]
BASIC ENGLISH REVIEW
8. SPECIAL DIFFICULTIES
8.1 REMIND (-ed, -ed) and REMEMBER (-ed, -ed)
a) ‘This note is only a reminder’ / ‘I remind you to post my letter’ / ‘That girl reminds me his sister’ / ‘This sort of weather reminds me of my home’.
b) ‘Remember me to your mother’ / ‘Remember we have an experiment tomorrow’. / ‘This sort of weather makes me remember my home’.
8.2 TO GIVE (give, gave, given): IN / AWAY / UP
a) ‘Give in your annotated list of plants to me’.
b) ‘I gave away my collection of stamps to my nephew’.
c) ‘He has given up smoking’ (= she has stopped)
8.3 REALIZE (= REALISE) and UNDERSTAND
a) Realize, -ed, -ed: ‘I realized he was lying’ (= I observed he was not telling the truth) / ‘He didn’t realize he had made a mistake’.
b) Understand, understood, understood: ‘I can’t understand what you are saying’ / ‘I can’t understand English very well’.
8.4 INSTEAD OF ... WHO / WHICH / THAT / WHOSE, WE CAN SAY ...
Instead of saying // We can say
a) ‘The teacher whom you met yesterday is a very clever woman'.// ‘The teacher you met yesterday is a very clever woman’.
b) ‘The book which you lent me is very interesting' // ‘The book you lent me is very interesting'.
c) ‘The beach that I like best is Tambaú’. // ‘The beach I like best is Tambaú’.
NOTICE: it is not possible leave out who, which, that, or whose in these sentences:
d) ‘Mary is one of those rare people who believe in ancient myths’.
e) ‘That is the new laboratory which was built last year’.
f) ‘This is the new equipment that was bought by the Head of the Department’.
g) ‘The driver whose car crashed yesterday is not hurt’.
8.5 WHICH? and WHAT?
a) We ask which? when there is a limited choice: ‘Which size do you want, small, medium or large’?
b) We ask what? When there is a wide choice: ‘What is your shoe size’?
8.6 SO and SUCH
a) ‘I was so tired that I could not wake up’ / ‘The spider monkey and the golden lion tamarin were so fierce that I kept them in the cages all time’.
b) ‘The plant with such chlorophyll content is able to survive in poor light conditions’ / ‘When the flask on the hotplate exploded I got such a fright that I dropped all my plate dishes’ / ‘You should not work in such situation’.
8.7 CONTINUOUSLY and CONTINUALLY
a) ‘The river flows continuously’ (= it does not stop at all).
b) ‘It rained continually yesterday’ (= at frequent intervals) / ‘You must make readings in the apparatus continually’.
8.8 MAKE and DO
a) Make, made, made: when we are talking about building and creating things: ‘We teach our children to make their beds every morning’ / ‘I made a promise never to see him again’ / ‘He is always making trouble when he comes’ / ‘Does it make any difference?’ / ‘You are making much progress in English’ / ‘He thinks he will make a lot of money working with science!’ / ‘They asked me to make a speech in the opening of the seminar’ / ‘Before starting again I know I have to make up my mind / ‘The manager makes decisions every day’.
b) Do, did, done: when we are talking about work or when we don’t say exactly what the activity is, and when we use the determiner + -ing form to talk about longer or repeated activities (mostly jobs and hobbies): ‘I did my best’ / ‘Please do your homework before I come back home’ / ‘Do me a favour please’ / ‘I think I did a good job for the research group’ / ‘He is rich because he always does very good business’ / ‘We did good experiments’ / ‘I received my first salary and I did a lot of shopping’ / ‘We did a lot of walking and swimming during our holiday’.
8.9 LOOSE / LOOSEN / LOSE / MISS
a) Loose, loosed, loosed: ‘Loose the dog’ (= release an animal)
b) Loosen, loosened, loosened: ‘loosen the lid of the jar’ / ‘the knot is loosening’ (it means ‘to become or make loose’) [loose, adj. = not tied up]
c) Lose, lost, lost: ‘I walked to his house several times. I don’t like losing my way’ / ‘I’ve lost all the reprints I received from England’.
d) Miss, -ed, -ed: ‘I missed the hour to determine the plant respiration’ / ‘I missed the 9 o’clock bus’.
8.10 EXPECT / WAIT / HOPE
These are regular verbs: ‘The trip took me longer than I expected’ / ‘I’m expecting that she finishes her work before 5 o’clock’, but I will wait for her until 5:30’. ‘She’s expecting a baby and she and her husband hope it will be a girl’; they are just waiting for the doctor’. [look forward: see 7.5].
8.11
1) Arise, arose, arisen [begin, appear]: ‘A discussion arose about the best way to do the experiment’.
2) Rise, rose, risen [get higher, come/go up]: ‘The temperature keeps rising’. ‘What time does the sun rise in summer in Brazil’?
3) Arouse, ...ed, ...ed [often used with an abstract noun]: ‘Dr Grisi’s examination attitude aroused the students suspicious he is not fair’!
4) Rouse, ...ed, ...ed [to wake somebody up, to make somebody interested …]: ‘Professor Silva’s speech failed to rouse his audience’.
8.12 SOME PHRASES WITH ON
‘There were many new computers on display in the “Informatics Exposition” but the most wonderful on show was the IBM model’ / ‘He has gone to São Paulo on business’ / ‘I came here on foot’ / ‘I asked to see the officer on duty’ / ‘On the whole, I think it was a successful year’ / ‘The oven is on fire because you used it at a very high temperature’ / ‘I don’t think he dropped the vase on purpose’ / ‘I made six phone call, on average, today’ / ‘You mustn’t on any account sign the contract before you read it’ / ‘Though I agreed to let you go to the cinema, on second thoughts, you should first do your homework’
8.13 CAN / COULD; MAY / MIGHT; SHALL / SHOULD; WILL / WOULD; MUST; OUGHT TO
a) Can / could; ‘he can speak English but he can’t write it well’ [= be able to, be capable of, know how to]. ‘I think I can smoke anywhere in this building’ [= be allowed to, be permitted to] or ‘may I smoke here’? [more formal than can, in this sense]. ‘I never could play the piano’ [past ability]. ‘If I had more money I could buy a car’ [a contingent possibility or ability in unreal conditions].
b) May / might: ‘you may borrow my camera if you want’ [permission]. ‘The road may be blocked’ [possibility]. ‘What you say might be true’ / ‘We might go to the symposium’ [possibility: theoretical or not].
c) Shall / should: ‘you shall do exactly as you wish’ [willingness; restricted use]. ‘You should do as he says’ [= ought to; obligation and logical necessity]. ‘I am sorry that this should have happened’ [= I am surprised that; used after certain expressions].
d) Will / would: ‘he will help you if you ask him’ / ‘Will you please open the window’? [= willingness; used in polite requests]. ‘I’ll answer to your letter as soon as I can’ [intention]. ‘She will do it, whatever you say’ [insistence]. ‘The game will be finished by now’ / ‘He’ll talk for hours if you give him the chance’ [prediction, specific or habitual]. ‘Would you excuse me’? [willingness]. ‘He would keep talking if I didn’t stop him’ [contingent use]. ‘That would be his sister’ [probability].
e) Must: ‘you must be here by 10 o’clock’ [obligation or compulsion in the present tense]. ‘There must be a mistake’ [logical necessity].
f) Ought to: ‘you ought to start at once’ / ‘They ought to be here by now’ [obligation, logical necessity or expectation].
NOTICE: ought to and should both denote obligation and logical necessity, but are less categorical than must and have to.
8.14 WHETHER and IF
Both are used in reporting questions which expect ‘yes’ or ‘no’ as the answer. Whether is usually considered more formal and more suitable for written English. ‘I’m not sure whether / if I’ll have time to do that’. Whether sounds more natural with particular verbs such as discuss, consider and decide; and before to-infinitives: ‘He can’t decide whether to get back home now or later’. After prepositions, only whether is possible: ‘There was a big discussion about whether we should repeat the experiment’.
8.15 SOME COMPOUND NOUNS
a) London transport; petrol tank; river bank; hall door
(noun + noun).
b) Fruit picking; weight-lifting; bird-watching; coal-mining
(noun + gerund).
c)Waiting list; dining-room
(gerund + noun).
d) College library; garden gate; window frame
(the second noun as part of the first).
e) City street; country lane (and name of certain roads or street: Penny Lane); street market
(the first noun can indicate the place of the second).
f) Summer holiday; spring flowers; November fogs
(the first noun can indicate the time of the second).
g) Steel door; stone wall; silk screen
(the first noun can state the material of which the second is made).
h) Notice board; reading lamp; tin opener; coffee cup
(the first word can indicate the purpose of the second).
i) Fish-farm; decompression chamber; gold-mine
(work areas can be preceded by the name of the article produced).
j) Sheep farming; sheep farmer; wind surfing
(combinations of occupations, sports, hobbies ...).
k) We buy: bus / train / plane tickets. We pay: water / telephone / fuel bills and income tax, entry / registration fees, car insurance, parking fines.
l) It is similar with committees, departments, conferences
Exams committee; biology department; peace talks.
SCIENTIFIC TEXT
In this Chapter VIII I hope you enjoy a cartoon, which is on top of the present assay.
IMPORTANT: in all three questions there is more than one correct answer.
1-The statements which propose the aims of the cartoon are:
I. To recommend the use of fossil fuel to clean the Earth.
II. To illustrate the consequences of bio ethanol on human life.
III. To denounce negative social effects of the use of corn as fuel.
IV. To encourage poor people to go begging on the streets.
V. To show people’s misery as the result of the use of bio ethanol.
2-According to the cartoon, identify the correct statements.
I-Corn as fuel especially affects the poor population.
II-Bio fuel is directly connected with global food crisis.
III-Many people are unconscious of the impact of bio ethanol.
IV-Bio ethanol is a harmless substitute for fossil fuel.
V-Ethanol is dangerous for people who cannot drive a car.
3-On the man’s car, the expression Go Green communicates the messages:
I-People have to use fossil energy.
II-People ought to plant more trees.
III-People must care for the environment.
IV-People should wear green colour clothes.
V-People need to save the planet.
sábado, 29 de outubro de 2011
LET’S PRACTISE ENGLISH – Chapter VII
Starting with the continuation of
SOME REASONS NOT TO MESS WITH A CHILD:
3. The children were lined up in the cafeteria of a Catholic elementary school for lunch. At the head of a table was a large pile of apples. The nun made a note, and posted on the apple tray: “Take only one. God is watching”. Moving further along the line, at the other end of the table was a large pile of chocolate chip cookies. A child had written a note: “Take all you want. God is watching the apples”.
BASIC ENGLISH REVIEW
7. PREPOSITIONS (II) and CONJUNCTIONS
7.1 PREPOSITIONS AND CONJUNCTIONS
7.1.1 PREPOSITIONS: FOR / DURING / SINCE / LIKE
FOR:
‘I have been waiting for two hours’!
‘Let the solution warming up for half an hour’
[both used ‘with a period of time’].
‘I went to the college for an interview’
‘Is that cake for eating or just for looking at’?.
[both used for ‘purpose’]
‘They punished the child for lying’ [used for ‘cause of reaction’]
DURING:
‘I met a lot of people during the day, except you’.
‘I fell asleep during the English lecture (or class)’
[both used ‘before known periods of time’].
SINCE:
‘I have been in the University since 8 o’clock’ (AM) [notice: ‘in the University’ because the person is really in there, but: ‘I work at the University’].
‘It is two years now since we last saw Gerry’.
‘How long is it since we went to a Congress?’
[these three situations used ‘with a point in time’].
LIKE:
‘He runs like the wind’ [a preposition used before a noun].
‘She looks like me’ [a preposition used before a pronoun].
7.1.2 CONJUNCTIONS: AS / WHEN / ONCE / WHILE
AS:
‘As I left the library I remembered the book was in my bag’ [a second action occurred before the first is finished].
‘As she was tired she went to bed’ [with the meaning of because].
‘Tired as he was he repeated the exercise’ [with the meaning of although].
‘Nobody knows her as I do’ [a conjunction used before subject + verb].
‘On Friday, as on Monday, we meet at eight’ [a conjunction used before a prepositional expression].
See the difference between as and like: 1) ‘The “muriqui” or woolly spider monkey is endemic to the Atlantic forest. As a target for hunters, it is an endangered species. Like the muriqui, the golden lion tamarin is also an endemic and endangered species’. 2) ‘I am the manager of the company. As the manager, I have to make many decisions. My wife is the assistant manager. Like the manager, she also has to make many decisions’.
WHILE:
‘What have you been doing while I was working in the lab?’ (or laboratory).
‘I saw Bob while I was going to the library’
[both with the meaning of ‘during the time that’].
WHEN:
‘When the sun is shining the plant transpiration must be measured’ [simultaneous actions].
‘When I pressed the red button the apparatus stopped’ [when one action follows another].
ONCE:
‘Liquids are important because, once substances are dissolved, their molecules can readily come together to react’.
‘Once you understand the basic rules, you will have no further difficulties’
7.2 FOR and AGAINST
‘Are you for or against the plan?’.
7.3 WAY. Observe the following phrases with the word way:
a) In the way: ‘Could you move this chair? It is in the way’.
‘Do the work in the way I have shown to you’.
b) On the way: ‘I bought some envelopes on the way to the post office’.
c) In this way: ‘John has a SOHO [small office home office]. In this way he saves money’.
d) By the way: ‘By the way, have you seen Teresa recently?’
e) In a way: ‘In a way, it is an important scientific paper (or article)’.
7.4 WORDS FOLLOWED BY: for / with / of / to / at / from / in / on / about.
Use this list as reference:
FOR: enough, famous, fit, grateful (or to), qualified (or in), ready (or to), responsible, sorry, sufficient, thankful (or to), valid.
WITH: angry (with someone; at something), busy (or at), consistent, content, familiar (or to), identical, patient, popular.
OF: afraid, ahead, aware, capable, careful (or with), certain, conscious, envious, fond, guilty, ignorant, independent, jealous, kind (or to), north/south/east/west [and their respective derivatives: northern ...], short, shy, sure, worthy.
TO: close, contrary, cruel, dear, equal, faithful, fatal, harmful, indifferent, inferior, liable, new, obedient, obvious, polite, previous, rude, sensitive, similar, useful.
AT: bad, clever, efficient, expert (or in), good, indignant, quick, sad (or about), slow, skilful (or in).
FROM: away, different, far, resulting, safe.
IN: deficient, fortunate, honest, weak.
ON: dependent, intent, keen.
ABOUT: curious, doubtful (or of), enthusiastic, reluctant (or to), right (or in), uneasy.
7.5 LOOK... AT / OUT / FOR / AFTER / FORWARD TO / UP / IN / INTO / TO / THROUGH
a) ‘The girl looked at me curiously’.
b) ‘Look out! A bus is coming’. (= be careful).
c) ‘Look for my child of eight. He got lost in the fair’.
d) ‘Look after this animal’. ‘Look after my son, please’!
e) ‘I am looking forward to receiving news from you’ / ‘We are looking forward you coming home soon’. ‘We are looking forward hearing from you soon’
f) ‘Look the word up in the dictionary’ / ‘Look up the time of the bus in the timetable [search for].
g) ‘Would you look in at the library and collect my books I left at the reception’? / ‘Would there be time to look in John and Mary’? [... a brief visit].
h) ‘I’ve offered to look into the problem for him’ [... when you investigate it].
i) ‘She has always looked to her parents for support’ [when someone rely on ... and expect to be helped or provided with ...]. ‘They are now looking to the future with confidence’ [when the future is considered].
j) ‘I looked through my clothes but I couldn’t find nothing suitable for the occasion’ [when you examine one by one]. ‘I only got about one hour to look through his thesis early this morning’ / ‘I only get about ten minutes at breakfast to look through the headlines on the newspaper’ [read briefly].
7.6 BY / UNTIL
BY: ‘If you post the letter today, she will receive it by Monday’. ‘I have to be at home by 6 o’clock in the evening’. ‘Where’s Helen? She should be here by now!’ ‘Tell me by Friday whether or not you are able to come to my house for repairing the machine’ [DO NOT SAY ‘until Friday’].
Notice the expression by the time: ‘Hurry up! By the time we get to the cinema, the film will already have started’.
UNTIL (use until to say how long a situation continues: ‘Shall we go now? No, let’s wait until (or till) it stops raining’. ‘On Sundays I stay in bed until 9 o’clock’.
NOTICE the differences: ‘John will be away until Monday’ / But ‘Peter will be back by Saturday’. ‘I’ll be working until 5 o’clock in the evening; I’ll have finished all my experiments by then’.
7.7 BY / ABOVE / BELOW / OVER / UNDER (UNDERNEATH / BENEATH) / BEFORE / IN FRONT OF / BEHIND / OPPOSITE / AFTER (preposition) / AFTERWARDS (adverb)
‘He is standing by the blonde girl’ (= ‘at the side of’).
The prepositions that follow express relative position vertically. NOTICE that over and under indicate a direct vertical relationship and/or spatial proximity: ‘A fluorescent lamp hanging over the desk’/ ‘The stool (= a seat without a back and arms) is under the bench’. ‘The doctor was leaning over the body when the policeman arrived’ / ‘There was a gun under the body’. Above and below indicate simply on a higher or lower level than: ‘The Research Institute stands on a hill above the valley’ / ‘The picture is above the shelf on that wall’ / ‘The shelf is below the picture’. / ‘The valley below the hill is a very beautiful green micro-basin’. Other prepositions expressing position vertically: ‘The book on plant physiology is on top of the bookcase’. (NOTICE: beneath (formal word) and underneath are less common substitutes for under; underneath indicates a contiguous relation; e.g. ‘he wears a chamois leather jacket and a wool sweater underneath) [N.B.: chamois is a goatlike antelope from the mountains of Europe and Asia Minor].
The prepositions that follow express relative position horizontally (see the figure on top): ‘A man is standing after the car, in front of the wall’ / ‘The wall is behind the car’. ‘The stop signal is opposite the wall’.
Before indicating time: ‘I’ll have lunch before going to work’; and indicating position: ‘The people in the church knelt before the priest’ / ‘Before you is a list of the participants in the event’. With the sense of future: ‘The task before us is a very hard one’. Indicating the presence of somebody: ‘He made a good speech before the Congressmen’. After must be followed by a noun, pronoun or gerund, but if there is none of these words we use afterwards: ‘It is unwise to bathe immediately after a meal’ / ‘It is unwise to have a meal and bathe immediately afterwards’.
7.8 ACROSS / THROUGH / PAST
There is a sense of passage in the meaning of these prepositions. The difference between across and through is like the difference between on and in; examples: ‘we walked quickly across the street’ or 'we walked across the ice' (we were on the street or we were on the ice). ‘The water flows to that tank through this pipe’ or 'the water flows through the forest' (the water is in the pipe or in the forest).
‘I live in a house just past (= after, AmE) the church’. ‘There is a bus every 20 minutes past the hour’.
7.9 UP / DOWN / ALONG / AROUND
There is a sense of direction in the meaning of these prepositions; examples: ‘I walked up and down the platform at the bus station’ / ‘I saw her walking along the corridor’. ‘Travel around the world’. ‘It’s around here somewhere’.
7.10 BEYOND / THROUGHOUT / ALL OVER
Use of beyond indicating a specified time: ‘I will not work today beyond 6 o’clock in the evening’. Use indicating at or to the further side of something: ‘The road continues beyond the village’.
Use of throughout with a sense of time: ‘ Tropical fruits are abundant throughout the year’. As a substitute of all through: ‘The news quickly spread throughout the city’. Use of all over: ‘The ants spread all over the lawn (= a short cut grass in the garden)’.
7.11 BETWEEN / AMONG, AMONGST (BrE)
‘There is a fight between those two scientists’.
‘The members of the Department never agree among(st) themselves’.
7.12 TOWARDS
‘This meeting is the first step towards greater unity between the two groups’. ‘Walk towards the river’. ‘We must be very friendly towards tourists’.[See ‘-wards’, a suffix, in ‘10. WORDS ...’]
7.13 BUT / EXCEPT
‘Everyone but me was tired’. ‘The problem is anything but easy’ [it means ‘apart from’, ‘other than’]. ‘Nobody but you could be so selfish’.
‘The weather is good today except in the South-east or Southeast of Brazil’. ‘All students except/but Peter passed the test’.
7.14 OF / WITH / WITHOUT (having ...)
‘A man of courage’.
‘Bean with rice is the Brazilians favourite dish’. ‘I am very glad you are coming with us’. ‘It’s nearly impossible for me to lunch bean without rice’. ‘She is a woman without children (= a childless woman)’.
7.15 AWAY FROM / OFF / OUT OF
‘John went away from the door’ (= ‘John was not at the door’).
Off: this preposition is used with many verbs: ‘get off the room’; ‘get off the bus’; ‘fall off a ladder’; ‘keep off the grass’ ... .
‘Fish can survive for only a short time out of water’. ‘Jump out of bed’. ‘Go out of the lab’. NOTICE the use of out as a prefix of nouns and verbs: ‘an outburst of microorganisms...’ (outburst = bursting out, explosion); ‘an outfit’ (= all the equipment or articles needed for a particular purpose); ‘an outbreak of dengue’ (= appearance or start, especially of disease or violence).
7.16 IN SPITE OF / DESPITE
‘In spite of / despite the rain, we did our field experiment’
7.17 ALTHOUGH / THOUGH / EVEN THOUGH
‘Although it rained a lot, we enjoyed our holiday’ / ‘We did the field experiment though the rain started early’ / ‘Even though I was really tired, I couldn’t sleep’ [= it’s a stronger form of although].
7.18 AS LONG AS / PROVIDED / SO THAT and PROVIDING / UNLESS
‘You can use this apparatus as long as / provided (that) / providing (that) you observe the instructions in the manual’. ‘We put on our raincoats so that we could do our field experiments even if it rained. ‘You can’t use this apparatus now unless you read carefully the instructions in the manual’ / ‘We’ll be late unless we hurry’.
7.19 ALL and WHOLE / ALL and EVERY
ALL and WHOLE: they both can be used with singular nouns to mean complete or every part of: ‘I spent my whole life studying English’. ‘I spent all (of) my life studying English’. Use whole with indefinite article: ‘He’s eaten a whole loaf’. ALL and EVERY: there is a little difference of meaning between them, but every is generally used with singular nouns: ‘Every child needs love’ / ‘I’ve written to every friend I have’; and all is used with plural nouns: ‘All children need love’ / ‘I’ve written to all my friends’.
7.20 EXERCISES
Put in the correct preposition:
1. I’ve spent the day ….. York.
2. Why don’t you take Joe ….. the cinema?
3. Your key’s ….. the reception desk.
4. We usually meet ….. the pub.
5. They’re delivering the furniture ….. my flat on Tuesday.
6. What’s the easiest way to get ….. Bristol?
7. Stop shouting ….. me.
8. Throw the keys down ….. me and I’ll let myself in.
9. Let’s throw snowballs … Mrs Anderson.
10. Can you shout ….. Paul and tell him it’s supper time?
11. When you smile ….. me like that I’ll do anything for you.
12. Promise you’ll write ….. me every day.
13. I went ….. Canada to see my father.
14. I went to see my father ….. Canada.
Put in like or as
1. He died ….. he lived, fighting.
2. Being in love is ….. an illness.
3. It’s mended, ….. you can see.
4. In Paris, ….. in Rome, traffic is heavy.
5. His eyes are ….. knives.
6. My brother isn’t at all ….. me.
7. She left ….. me, silently.
8. You’re shy, ….. me.
9. Your smile is ….. your sister’s.
10 ……. I said, you’re too late.
Using conjunctions: put the beginnings and ends together
Beginnings Ends
1. Although he was very bad-tempered, after you have a meal.
2. Always brush your teeth and I’ll hit you.
3. Always wash your hands but everybody liked him.
4. As Liz told you, before you have a meal.
5. Because I knew her family, he had lots of friends.
6. Talk to me like that again I did what I could for her.
7. Don’t do that again her mother left for Berlin last Friday.
8. He had a terrible temper, or I’ll hit you.
9. Liz explained to you so I tried to help her.
10. I was sorry for her, that your mother went back home last week.
11. If you do that again, unless you stop that.
12. There’ll be trouble you’ll be sorry.
Using conjunctions: join the beginnings and ends with so that or as long as
Beginnings Ends
1. He went to Switzerland he could learn French.
2. I don’t mind you singing it doesn’t rain.
3. We moved the piano that’s OK with you.
4. We took some blankets there would be room for the Christmas tree.
5. We’ll come back this afternoon we would be warm enough.
6. We’ll play tennis you do it quietly.
Put in, at, on, or NOTHING
1. ….. Easter.
2. ….. Tuesday.
3. ….. 1994.
4. ….. the evening.
5. …..Friday evening.
6. ….. May.
7. ….. next Wednesday.
8. I don’t know ….. what time.
9. ….. supper time.
10. …. this Sunday.
11. …. that afternoon.
12. ….. Sunday afternoon.
SCIENTIFIC TEXT
Some old people are oppressed by the fear of death. In the young there is a justification for this feeling. Young men who have reason to fear that they will be killed in battle may unjustifiably feel bitter in the thought that they have been cheated of the best things that life has to offer. But in an old man who has known human joys and sorrows, and has achieved whatever work it was in him to do, the fear of death is somewhat abject and ignoble. The best way to overcome it, so at least it seems to me, is to make your interests gradually wider and more impersonal, until bit by bit the walls of the ego recede, and your life becomes increasingly merged in the universal life. An individual human existence should be like a river, small at first, narrowly contained within its banks, and rushing past boulders and over waterfalls. Gradually the river grows wider, the banks recede, the waters flow more quietly, and in the end, without any visible break, they become merged in the sea, and painlessly lose their individual being. The man who, in old age, can see his life in this way, will not suffer from the fear of death, since the things he cares for will continue. And if, with the decay of vitality, weariness increases, the thought of rest will be not unwelcome. I should wish to die while still at work, knowing that others will carry on what I can no longer do, and content in the thought that what was possible has been done. Bertrand Russell.
[Text extracted from “Alexander, L.G. (1967) New Concept English. Fluency in English, p. 46”]
QUESTIONS
1. Why is it justifiable for a young man to fear death?
2. How does the author regard the fear of death in old people?
3. What, in the opinion of the author, is the best way for an old person to overcome the fear of death?
4. Which of these statements best expresses the main idea of the passage?
a) Old people fear death.
b) While it is justifiable for a young man to fear death, it is not so in an old man who has known human joys and sorrows and has accomplished whatever work it was in him to do.
c) It is justifiable for young people to fear death.
d) An old man will not fear death if he knows that there are others who will carry on what he can no longer do.
Assinar:
Postagens (Atom)