第十二篇 Men Smell of Cheese and Women of Onions
Little girls may be made of sugar and all things nice, but their armpits smell of onions. ______ (1) That’s the conclusion of research in Switzerland that involved taking armpit sweat samples from 24 men and 25 women after he had spent time in a sauna or ridden an exercise bike for 15 minute.
______ (2) “Men smell of cheese, and women of grapefruit or onion,” says Christian Starkenmann of Firmenich, a company in Geneva that researches flavours and perfumes for food and cosmetics companies.
The team found that the women's armpit sweat constrained relatively high levels of an odourless sulphur-containning compound – 5 milligrams per milliliter of sweat versus 0.5 milligrams in men.
When the researchers mixed this compound in the lab with bacteria commonly found in the armpit, the bugs turned it into a thiol - a previously discovered odour from armpits that is akin to onion.
“The more sulphur precursor we added, the more intense was the malodour,” says Starkenmann, whose team’s results appear in Chemical Senses. ______ (3)
The men, meanwhile, had relatively high levels of an odourless fatty acid which turned into a cheesy odour when exposed to the same types of bacteria. The balance of oniony to cheesy precursors in women’s sweat made it smell worse than men’s as rated by independent smell assessors.
______ (4) “We could make inhibitors that neutralise the precursors, or block the bacterial enzymes that do the conversion,” says Starkenmann.
Some researchers are sceptical that gender is the main deciding factor, arguing that the patterns found in Swiss volunteers might not apply to other populations with different diets and genetic background. ______ (5)
词汇：
armpit n. 腋(部)
malodour n.难闻的气味，恶臭
neutralize v.中和，抵消
sulphur n.硫
enzyme n.酶
thiol n.硫醇
注释：
1. smell of onions：.....闻起来像洋葱
2. ... is akin to onion：......医学.全在线.网站.搜集近似于洋葱
练习：
A Bacterial enzymes turn the otherwise odourless precursor into the malodour.
B And while free of slug or snail odours, men’s armpits pack a powerful cheesy whiff.
C Most cases of skin odor is associated with break down of the compounds found in sweat by bacteria that live on the skin.
D Nest; the team hope to develop new ingredients for deodorants that fight the smells.
E The researchers found marked differences in the sweat from men and women.
F “Other factors include what you eat. what you wash with, what you weat and what genes you inherit,” says Tim Jacob of Cardiff University in the UK.
答案与题解：
1. B 前一句讲女孩的腋下气味，后一句解释说这是一项研究成果，所以为了完整性，此处应该讲男性腋下的气味是怎么样的。所以，正确答案是选项B。
2. E 上一段结尾处介绍了这个研究的基本情况，本段又具体讲了一下试验结果，所以此处句首所填的句子应该起到承上启下的作用，并且是本段的中心句。只有选项E概括了本段的主要内容。
3. A 前一句提到加入越多的硫前体，恶臭味就越浓烈，由此可以推测出后面应该讲到恶臭味出现的原因。所以，正确答案是选项A。
4. D 根据本段第二句话可以判断出，这句应该讲研究团队接下来要怎么做。所以，正确答案是选项D。
5. F 本段第一句话在讲其他研究者怀疑有其他因素的影响，可以推测本句会进一步阐释其他因素。所以，正确答案是选项F。
