READING PASSAGE 1

A
You should spend about 20 minutes on Questions 1-13, which are based on Reading
Passage 1 on pages 2 and 3.

Chili peppers

Origins

Chili peppers, the fruit of the capsicum plant, are believed to have originated in what is
now Bolivia in South America, home to dozens of wild species that are probably the
ancestors of each and every chili variety today, from mild green peppers to fiery hot naga
jolokia peppers. The chili pepper contains a heat-generating ingredient known as capsaicin,
which has long been known to affect human taste buds, nerve cells and nasal membranes.
People have been spicing their food with chilies for at least 8,000 years. At first they used
wild chilies, adding them to potatoes, grain and corn, says Linda Perry, archaeobalanids at
the Smithsonian Institution, Washington DC in the US. She has found traces of chilies on
ancient stones used to grind grains, and in vessels used in food preparation from the
Bahamas to southern Peru.

Based on her examination of ancient pieces of pottery, Ms. Perry concludes that people in
the Americas began cultivating chilies more than 6,000 years ago. 'Chilies were
domesticated early and spread very quickly, just because people liked them,' she says. The
chilies, it would seem, made otherwise quite bland food more enjoyable to eat. Other
researchers, such as Jennifer Billing and Paul Sherman of Cornell University in the US,
argue that people learned early on that chilies could reduce food spoilage. And some
scholars point to medical uses: ancient Mayan Indians in Central America incorporated
chilies into medicinal preparations for treating wounds, stomach problems and earaches.

Spreading chili peppers around the world

Whatever the benefits, chilies spread around the world at astonishing speed, thanks in
part to Christopher Columbus, who is credited with being the first European to reach
America in 1492, and claiming the new' land for Spain. When Columbus took chilies back
to Spain, they were initially not popular, but soon became widely accepted throughout
Europe. The Portuguese first encountered chilies in Brazil and carried them, along with
tobacco and cotton, to Africa. By 1550, chilies were being cultivated all over the world,
including in India, Japan and China.

The heat of chili peppers

When people call chilies hot, they are not just speaking metaphorically.
Capsaicin stimulates the neural sensors in the tongue and skin that also detect rising
temperatures. As far as these neurons and the brain are concerned, when someone eats a
hot chili, the effect is the same as exposure to fire. With enough heat, adrenaline flows and
the heart pumps faster. This reaction, according to some physiologists, is part of what
makes peppers so stimulating and enjoyable to eat.

The scale that scientists use to describe a chili's heat was developed in 1912 by Wilbur
Scoville, a chemist from Detroit in the US. He diluted a chili extract in sugar water until
the heat was no longer detectable to a panel of trained tasters; that threshold is the basis of
the Scoville rating. A sweet bell pepper, for instance, measures zero on the Scoville Heat
Unit (SHU) scale, while a typical hot jalapeno chili pepper from Mexico falls between 2,500
and 8,000 SHUs. Last year, the naga jolokia chili, grown in India, was rated at one million
SHUs.

The role of capsaicin

But why would chilies have evolved to produce the varying degrees of heat of capsaicin?
Chili peppers, like other fruit, lure birds and other animals to eat them and disperse their
seeds. But chilies also attract predators, largely rodents like packrats and cactus mice, that
crush seeds and make germination impossible. In order to deter animals from eating their
seeds, many plants produce toxic or foul-tasting chemicals, but these are usually found in
the plant's leaves and roots as well as its fruit. In chilies, however, capsaicin is found just
in the fruit, and becomes much stronger with ripening. Joshua Tewksbury, an ecologist at
the University of Washington in the US, suspected that at least one role that capsaicin
performs is to protect the chili seeds from rodents.

To test his theory, Tewksbury grew plants that produced hot, spicy chilies as well as
plants that yielded mild chilies (though both were from the same species). When he
offered the fruits of those plants to laboratory rats and mice, they ate the mild chilies but
avoided the ones with a strong concentration of capsaicin. He later found that birds do not
seem to mind eating even the hottest chilies and, in fact, that the capsaicin had the strange
effect of retarding birds' digestion, which helps some seeds germinate, possibly by
softening the seed coat. Even so, Tewksbury didn't believe that deterring rodents and
slowing bird digestion were enough to explain why the spicy heat of chilies evolved.
Instead, he thinks that a chili's heat protects it from disease that a certain fungus can
trigger, the primary reason chili seeds die prior to being dispersed. In looking at chili
populations that contain both hot, spicy, and mild plants, Tewksbury has found that the
more capsaicin, the less fungal infection. 1 Capsaicin demonstrates the incredible elegance
of evolution,' says Tewksbury. The capsaicin discourages rodents and deters microbes -
and humans harness this ability when they use chilies to preserve food - but capsaicin
doesn't prevent birds from eating chili fruit and spreading seeds. Once in a while, the
complex, often conflicting demands that nature places on complex traits result in a truly
elegant solution. This is one of those times.'
Questions 1 - 6

Do the following statements agree with the information given in Reading Passage 1?

In boxes 1-6 on your answer sheet, write

TRUE if the statement agrees with the information

FALSE if the statement contradicts the information
NOT GIVEN if there is no information on this

1 Archaeological evidence from pots has helped determine when people first began
to grow chilies for food.

2 Linda Perry thinks mankind began using chilies in cooking largely because they
kept food from spoiling.

3 Christopher Columbus is said to have enjoyed the new experience of eating food
spiced with chilies.

4 Explorers from Portugal were introduced to chilies in Africa.

5 The feeling of heat while eating chilies is a purely psychological effect rather than a
physical one.

6 A chemist called Scoville created a heat scale based on the collective judgement of
a group of individuals.
Questions 7 - 13

Complete the notes below.

Choose ONE WORD ONLY from the passage for each answer.

Write your answers in boxes 7-13 on your answer sheet.

The role of capsaicin

Chili seeds and capsaicin

• certain birds and other animals eat chili fruit and spread the seeds
• some animals destroy the seeds, preventing 7 ............
• unlike many other plants, chilies contain an unpleasant chemical only in their
8.............
• the 9 ............. of the chili causes an increase in the capsaicin

Tewksbury's experiments to test effects of capsaicin

• chilies offered to rodents and birds in laboratory conditions
• rodents avoided chilies with a high 10 ........... of capsaicin
• birds do not mind eating capsaicin
o capsaicin slows the digestion in birds
o this may make the 11 ............. of the seed softer
• another role of capsaicin is in reducing infection caused by a 12 ........... .
• Tewksbury considers the role of capsaicin in chilies to be an example in nature of
the beauty of 13 .......... .