2. 外语
  3. A blue sedan nearly sideswipes my car. The driver gives me a weird look. No wonder: I’m at the wheel of a Ford Taurus, with a ta

A blue sedan nearly sideswipes my car. The driver gives me a weird look. No wonder: I’m at the wheel of a Ford Taurus, with a ta

admin2010-01-10  74
问题     A blue sedan nearly sideswipes my car. The driver gives me a weird look. No wonder: I’m at the wheel of a Ford Taurus, with a tangle of wires taped to my face and neck, a respiration monitor strapped around my chest, and a bunch of other gizmos sending data about my vital signs to computers stacked on the front and back seats. I look like the star of A Commuter’s Clockwork Orange.
    University of lower assistant professor of engineering Thomas Schnell is crammed into the seat behind me. Schnell created this lab-on wheels to gauge how a motorist’s body reacts to driving. He wants car-makers to use his findings to design "smart" cars that make driving less stressful. I’m taking his rolling research facility of a white-knuckle evening spin in Chicago-home to some of the nations worst rush-hour traffic — to learn what happens to the human body during a long, frustrating commute.
    So at 5:15 on a Monday, with a storm whipping in off Lake Michigan. I pull out of a downtown parking lot and begin creeping along interstate 90, heading west behind a line of cars that stretches as far as the eye can see. Now and then, the pace picks up, just as quickly, it slows to a halt, red brake lights glowing in the twilight.
     If I had to do this every day, I’d grind my teeth to dust. After 45 minutes, Schnell and I have gone just 10 miles. As the car crawls along, Schnell occasionally asks, "What is your level of fun?" He notes my responses, some of them unprintable, on a clipboard. Here’s what the computers I’m tethered to record:
    I begin breathing harder and faster. My respiration rate leaps from 12 to 17 breaths per minute. My heat rate jumps from 74 to 80 beats per minute. The electrodes taped to the muscles in my forehead show increased activity (Translation. My brow furrows and I squint a lot).
    While 1 was in no danger of keeling over, my heart rate and other symptoms offered clear evidence that I was under stress, says Robert Bonow, MD, president of the American Heart Association (AHA). Over time, that stress could take a heavy toll.
    If you are among the roughly 113 million Americans who drive to work each day, you’re probably grimacing with recognition. With traffic congestion getting worse each year, anyone who travels by car to the office or plant, or who simply shuttles kids from school to violin lessons to slumber parties, may be exposing himself or herself to serious hidden health threats.
    All that commuter combat is bound to produce casualties. "People are experiencing more congestion and we know that’s stressful," says Colorado State University psychologist Jerry Diefenbaker. Some results are predictable. Reckless driving sometimes in the form of so-called road rage — is often spurred by traffic frustration. Consider 41-year-old Chris Heard. The mild- mannered engineer used to turn into Mad Max every day as he drove the nearly 50 miles of clogged roads between his home in Brookline, N. H., and his office near Boston. "It turned me into a very aggressive driver," he says, "taking risks, cutting people off, driving fast on back roads to make up for time I lost ," the result of his congestion-fueled fury? A stack of speeding tickets and a number of near collisions. Finally he did something about it. He found a job closer to home.  
The phrase "take a heavy toll"(Para.6) is closest in meaning to______.
选项 A、grind one’s teeth
B、damage one’s health
C、increase one’s activity
D、pay more at the toll gate
答案B
解析 这是道词义辨析题。如果考生对这个词比较了解的话可以直接选出答案，如果不了解的话可以通过上下文来推测。还有一种可能就是单词会在句子中有特殊的含义或者引申意义，这个时候就要根据上下文来推测了。这个词根据文中的意思可以得出答案是B。
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