From ETS 10th Edition (2)

[wood]

Histocompatibility antigens that attack foreign tissue in the body cannot have been ______ through evolution expressly to ______ organ transplantation; on the contrary, they have been found to facilitate many essential biological functions.

(A) designed..retain
(B) produced..aid
(C) developed..enhance
(D) selected..promote
(E) conserved..foil

[MS]

(E)

[pamrs]

Originally posted by MS

(E)

e Foil is the only thing that these antigens could do to transplants, since they attack foreign tissue.

[wood]

Can you guys elaborate that one a little further? What about the first blank?

[MS]

HINT:concentrate on the word EVOLUTION...
These antigens have been preserved in the process of evolution(CONSERVED) not expressly to prevent(FOIL) foreign tissue in the body like by organ transplantation but, on the contrary , to facilitate many essential biological functions.

[wood]

Hummm, putting that way it makes much more sense. I believe I have a hard time getting these weird sentences... I thought that "on the contrary" was going to negate the first sentence altogether and not just the last part. Maybe because of the semi-colon ";". Is there any trick to get around this type of questions or I just need to read and read more till I get confortable with that? I hope the former is possible since my exam is tomorrow!

[Vinay]

E

look at Facilitate and u will see ETS's answer.

Facilitate is keyword and second blank shud be opposite of it.

all other choices have positive second blank.

[wood]

Right Vinay... good reasoning...!

[MS]

Wood, Are u going for Masters in Computer Science?

[wood]

I'm going for a PhD in CS. So, I'll need to have higher scores than if I'd go for master's.