TSI Reading Practice Test

The long reign of Elizabeth, who became known as the "Virgin Queen" for her reluctance to endanger her authority through marriage, coincided with the flowering of the English Renaissance, associated with such renowned authors as William Shakespeare. By her death in 1603, England had become a major world power in every respect, and Queen Elizabeth I passed into history as one of England's greatest monarchs.

Scientists have found a new function of the nuclear membrane, the envelope that encases and protects DNA in the nucleus of a cell—it fixes potentially fatal breaks in DNA strands. Previously, the nuclear membrane was thought to be mostly just a protective bubble around the nuclear material, with pores acting as channels to transport molecules in and out. But a recent study has documented how broken strands of a portion of DNA known as heterochromatin are dragged to the nuclear membrane for repair. The reason why we don't experience thousands of cancers every day in our body is because we have incredibly efficient molecular mechanisms that repair the frequent damages occurring in our DNA.

In November 2007—after the sale of nearly 1.4 million iPhones—Time magazine named the sleek, 4.8-ounce device, originally available in a 4GB, $499 model and an 8GB, $599 model, its invention of the year. The iPhone went on sale in parts of Europe in late 2007 and in parts of Asia in 2008. In July 2008, Apple launched its online App Store, enabling people to download software applications that let them use their iPhones for games, social networking, travel planning and an ever growing laundry list of other activities. Apple went on to release updated models of the iPhone, including the 4S, which debuted in October 2011 and featured Siri, a new voice-activated digital assistant.

Marvin Freeman’s groundbreaking new study of the plays of Henrik Ibsen will alter the course of Ibsen scholarship forever. Previously, scholars limited the areas of their studies to a particular phase of Ibsen’s career, since a different scholarly approach seemed to fit each of the phases. Freeman has instead taken on the entirety of Ibsen’s work. Happily, this breadth of scholarship does not diminish the depth with which Freeman explores each work. The career of Ibsen is now liberated from arbitrary divisions and stands before us as a complete picture. It will be years before we can fully appreciate the service that Freeman has rendered.

Caused by a genetic mutation that prevents humans from synthesizing vitamin C, scurvy was inevitable in long voyages of discovery during which fresh food was hard to get, causing the body to disintegrate. One of the remarkable symptoms was an extreme receptivity to sensory impressions. Sudden sounds, such as a loud boom from a musket or a cannon blast, were known to kill scorbutic sailors. Even pleasant stimuli such as a drink of fresh water, or a long-awaited taste of fruit, could provoke a seizure and put an end to their lives.

NASA's Kepler Space Telescope has discovered a star with three planets only slightly larger than Earth. Its outermost planet orbits in the 'Goldilocks' zone—a region where surface temperatures could be moderate enough for liquid water, and perhaps life, to exist. The star ranks among the top 10 nearest stars known to have transiting planets.

The amount of time a person sits during the day is associated with a higher risk of heart disease, diabetes, cancer, and death, regardless of regular exercise, according to a recent study. More than one half of an average person's day is spent being sedentary—sitting, watching television, or working at a computer. Avoiding sedentary time and getting regular exercise are both important for improving your health and survival.

At the time Paine wrote "Common Sense," most colonists considered themselves to be aggrieved Britons. Paine fundamentally changed the tenor of colonists' argument with the crown when he wrote the following: "Europe, and not England, is the parent country of America. This new world hath been the asylum for the persecuted lovers of civil and religious liberty from every part of Europe. Hither they have fled, not from the tender embraces of the mother, but from the cruelty of the monster; and it is so far true of England, that the same tyranny which drove the first emigrants from home, pursues their descendants still."

Although much about dolphin communication remains a mystery, scientists have discovered three distinct sounds that dolphins frequently make: chirps, clicks, and whistles. Scientists have learned that dolphins use clicks to create a sonar map, which allows them to navigate and hunt. But, apart from possibly transmitting location, the clicks do not appear to serve any communication purpose. Rather, research indicates that dolphins communicate with each other by whistling. This discovery has necessitated further investigation, as scientists are not yet sure whether the whistles comprise a complex system of linguistic communication or a simple set of sonic cues, like the ones used by other animal species.

Passage 1
Beatrix Potter had a life of two halves, which makes her a difficult subject for biography. Until she was 45-ish she had twice-yearly publications of the little books that transformed childhood and made her famous. Between 1902 and 1913 characters such as Peter Rabbit, Mrs Tiggy-Winkle, Jeremy Fisher and Jemima Puddle-Duck poured from Potter's fertile sketchbooks into the imaginations of small children everywhere. After that her work slowed down and became less inventive. Previous studies of Potter have tended, inevitably, to concentrate on the first part of her working life. But there was never anything sentimental about Potter's attitude to animals. When the real Peter Rabbit or Mrs Tiggy-Winkle were sick, they were gassed, boiled down and their skeletons used to better understand anatomy. It was this ability to look closely at the natural world that brought Potter her first opportunity to break out of her limited family circle.

Passage 2
Helen Beatrix Potter, born Saturday, 28 July 1866, grew up in a fully-serviced Kensington house. A cold, uninterested mother raised the child at arm’s length, and the warmest early companionship came from pets—lizards, guinea-pigs, newts, birds, mice, bats and rabbits, cats and dogs. Her animal friends opened a portal into the widest and most powerful arena of all—the natural world. In the year she was born, her grandfather purchased a 300-acre estate in the countryside. Annual family trips to the Lake District and Scotland clinched the deal, and led to a lifelong love affair with the fields and forests of England.

Passage 1
Beatrix Potter had a life of two halves, which makes her a difficult subject for biography. Until she was 45-ish she had twice-yearly publications of the little books that transformed childhood and made her famous. Between 1902 and 1913 characters such as Peter Rabbit, Mrs Tiggy-Winkle, Jeremy Fisher and Jemima Puddle-Duck poured from Potter's fertile sketchbooks into the imaginations of small children everywhere. After that her work slowed down and became less inventive. Previous studies of Potter have tended, inevitably, to concentrate on the first part of her working life. But there was never anything sentimental about Potter's attitude to animals. When the real Peter Rabbit or Mrs Tiggy-Winkle were sick, they were gassed, boiled down and their skeletons used to better understand anatomy. It was this ability to look closely at the natural world that brought Potter her first opportunity to break out of her limited family circle.

Passage 2
Helen Beatrix Potter, born Saturday, 28 July 1866, grew up in a fully-serviced Kensington house. A cold, uninterested mother raised the child at arm’s length, and the warmest early companionship came from pets—lizards, guinea-pigs, newts, birds, mice, bats and rabbits, cats and dogs. Her animal friends opened a portal into the widest and most powerful arena of all—the natural world. In the year she was born, her grandfather purchased a 300-acre estate in the countryside. Annual family trips to the Lake District and Scotland clinched the deal, and led to a lifelong love affair with the fields and forests of England.

An overview of the United States at the end of the Civil War reveals a society which bears little resemblance to our society today. The America of Civil War days was a country without railroads, telephones, cars, electricity, skyscrapers, the internet and email, or a thousand other things that today supply the conveniences and comforts of our civilization. The cities of that period, with their unpaved streets, their dingy, flickering gaslights, and their slums, were appropriate settings for the rough-and-ready political methods of American democracy.

Only by talking with the business leaders of that time could we understand the changes that have taken place in the last hundred years. For the most part we speak a business language which our fathers and grandfathers would not have understood. The word "trust" was not part of their vocabulary; "restraint of trade" was a phrase which only the antiquarian lawyer could have interpreted; "interlocking directorates," "holding companies," "subsidiaries," "underwriting syndicates," and "community of interest"—all these words of modern business would have meant nothing to our Civil War-era ancestors.

Our nation of 1865 was a nation of farmers, city artisans, independent business men, and small-scale manufacturers. Millionaires, though they were not unknown, did not swarm all over the land. Luxury had not become the American standard of well-being. The industrial story of the United States in the last one hundred and fifty years is the story of the most amazing economic transformation the world has ever known—a true marvel.

An overview of the United States at the end of the Civil War reveals a society which bears little resemblance to our society today. The America of Civil War days was a country without railroads, telephones, cars, electricity, skyscrapers, the internet and email, or a thousand other things that today supply the conveniences and comforts of our civilization. The cities of that period, with their unpaved streets, their dingy, flickering gaslights, and their slums, were appropriate settings for the rough-and-ready political methods of American democracy.

Only by talking with the business leaders of that time could we understand the changes that have taken place in the last hundred years. For the most part we speak a business language which our fathers and grandfathers would not have understood. The word "trust" was not part of their vocabulary; "restraint of trade" was a phrase which only the antiquarian lawyer could have interpreted; "interlocking directorates," "holding companies," "subsidiaries," "underwriting syndicates," and "community of interest"—all these words of modern business would have meant nothing to our Civil War-era ancestors.

Our nation of 1865 was a nation of farmers, city artisans, independent business men, and small-scale manufacturers. Millionaires, though they were not unknown, did not swarm all over the land. Luxury had not become the American standard of well-being. The industrial story of the United States in the last one hundred and fifty years is the story of the most amazing economic transformation the world has ever known—a true marvel.

In the year 1885, the Eiffel Company, which had an extensive background of experience in structural engineering, undertook a series of investigations of tall metallic piers based upon its recent experiences with several railway viaducts and bridges. Preliminary studies for a 300-meter tower were made with the 1889 world's fair immediately in mind. With an assurance born of positive enthusiasm, Gustave Eiffel in June of 1886 approached the fair's commissioners with his idea for a unique project, the Eiffel Tower.

However, numerous difficulties, both structural and social, confronted Eiffel as the project advanced. In the wake of the initial enthusiasm—on the part of the fair’s Commission inspired by the desire to create a monument to French technological achievement, and on the part of the majority of Frenchmen by the stirring of their imagination at the magnitude of the structure—there grew a rising movement of disfavor. The nucleus was, not surprisingly, formed mainly of the intelligentsia, but objections were made by prominent Frenchmen in all walks of life.

The most interesting point is that although the Eiffel Tower’s every aspect was criticized, there was remarkably little criticism of its structural feasibility, either by the engineering profession or by large numbers of the general population. True, there was an undercurrent of what might be characterized as unease by many property owners in the structure’s shadow, but the most stubborn element of resistance was that which thought the Tower was an ugly intrusion upon the architectural and natural beauties of Paris. It wasn’t that people thought it was unsafe, just hideous. This resistance voiced its fury in a flood of special newspaper editions, petitions, and manifestos signed by such famous figures as De Maupassant, Gounod, and Dumas.

In the year 1885, the Eiffel Company, which had an extensive background of experience in structural engineering, undertook a series of investigations of tall metallic piers based upon its recent experiences with several railway viaducts and bridges. Preliminary studies for a 300-meter tower were made with the 1889 world's fair immediately in mind. With an assurance born of positive enthusiasm, Gustave Eiffel in June of 1886 approached the fair's commissioners with his idea for a unique project, the Eiffel Tower.

However, numerous difficulties, both structural and social, confronted Eiffel as the project advanced. In the wake of the initial enthusiasm—on the part of the fair’s Commission inspired by the desire to create a monument to French technological achievement, and on the part of the majority of Frenchmen by the stirring of their imagination at the magnitude of the structure—there grew a rising movement of disfavor. The nucleus was, not surprisingly, formed mainly of the intelligentsia, but objections were made by prominent Frenchmen in all walks of life.

The most interesting point is that although the Eiffel Tower’s every aspect was criticized, there was remarkably little criticism of its structural feasibility, either by the engineering profession or by large numbers of the general population. True, there was an undercurrent of what might be characterized as unease by many property owners in the structure’s shadow, but the most stubborn element of resistance was that which thought the Tower was an ugly intrusion upon the architectural and natural beauties of Paris. It wasn’t that people thought it was unsafe, just hideous. This resistance voiced its fury in a flood of special newspaper editions, petitions, and manifestos signed by such famous figures as De Maupassant, Gounod, and Dumas.