#17 - Specific Reference, Must Be True, Purpose

[Administrator]

Complete Question Explanation

The correct answer choice is (E).

Answer choice (A):

Answer choice (B):

Answer choice (C):

Answer choice (D):

Answer choice (E): This is the correct answer choice.


This explanation is still in progress. Please post any questions below!

[kristinsmith04]

I attended the crystal ball webinar on Sunday and thought I'd try my hand at this trickier reading. This question has me a bit stumped. Can you please elaborate on why answer choice C is wrong?

[Beth Hayden]

Hi Kristin,

This is certainly a tricky passage!

The author presents a problem: we want to build nanoscale electronics, but computer chips can only get so small. They then say that there are natural processes that happen in our bodies which are even smaller and extremely complex, so maybe we could harness that to make really small circuits. If we can't make really tiny transistors on our own, perhaps we can do it with help from nature, which already has this figured out!

Belcher and Hu are specifically looking at peptides--since they are able to direct calcium carbonate to crystallize, they might also be able to bind with the materials used in semiconductors and do the same thing. Try not to get too bogged down in the science here! The point is just that peptides might be a solution to the problem above, but we may need different peptides for all the different "building blocks" that go into making a nano circuit, and that's going to be a tricky needle to thread.

(E) gets at exactly that--researchers want to manipulate these peptides to create the building blocks, and it's going to require some "finesse" (creative problem solving) for them to do that.

(C) talks about observing the behavior of the tiny crystalline structures. But the problem is not that we can't see these processes or understand them, it's that we need to find a way to use them to do something new.

I hope that's helpful!

[kristinsmith04]

Came back to review this and realized I never said thank you - much appreciated, makes lots more sense now!