• Nível B2
• Interpretação de texto
• obesidade e evolução humana
• artigo de divulgacao cientifica
• Fuvest
• 2007

Obesidade e herança evolutiva — Fuvest 2007

"Researchers and public-health officials have long understood that to maintain a given weight, energy in (calories consumed) must equal energy out (calories expended). But then they learned 5 that genes were important, too, and that for some people this formula was tilted in a direction that led to weight gain. Since the discovery of the first obesity gene 10 in 1994, scientists have found about 50 genes involved in obesity. Some of them determine how individuals lay down fat and metabolize energy stores. Others 15 regulate how much people want to eat in the first place, how they know when they've had enough and how likely they are to use up calories through activities ranging from fidgeting to running marathons. People who can get fat on very little fuel may be genetically 20 programmed to survive in harsher environments. When the human species got its start, it was an advantage to be efficient. Today, when food is plentiful, it is a hazard." http://www.nytimes.com/2006/08/13/magazine/13obesity.html.

[Foto em preto e branco ao lado do texto: as pernas e os pés de uma pessoa, vistos de trás, sobre fundo preto.]

Fonte: The New York Times.

According to the text,

1. A A) today's obesity may be linked to evolutionary factors.
2. B B) the human species is programmed to eat as much as possible to survive.
3. C C) the ingestion of large quantities of food was an advantage in the past.
4. D D) obese people have some advantages over slim people.
5. E E) very little food is necessary to survive in some environments.