F2 Revisions Passages

Tea had a reputation for being both safe and almost always beneficial. However, scientists are now suggesting that tea may not be as safe as we had previously believed. Tea contains caffeine, and caffeine has been linked to sleeplessness and to the unpleasant jumpy feeling some people get when stressed. More seriously, there is a link between miscarriages, and pregnant women are advised to reduce their intake of tea until after their baby is born. Due to its critical side-effects, some people who like tea choose to be safer and drink a beverage from which the caffeine has been removed, decaffeinated tea, but many claim that it simply doesn't taste right. The reasonable thing to do is probably moderation; continue to enjoy a cup of tea, but don't have too many!

Atoms of carbon, hydrogen and oxygen are put together to make molecules of sugar – a carbohydrate food substance. The carbon comes from carbon dioxide gas in the air. Air enters through holes, called stomata, in the plant's leaves. The hydrogen and oxygen come from water. The water is taken up from the soil by the plant's roots. The light energy is trapped by a special chemical called chlorophyll. Chlorophyll is green and gives green plants their color. The gas oxygen is left over at the end of photosynthesis and goes into the air.

He was that rare figure: a natural-born leader, tailored for greatness. When he was but a child his mother had whispered to him, "My son, you are a child of the dawn. You will be a man of glory, a great leader of your people." Sukarno never forgot those words. Liberating his land from 350 years of colonial rule, he molded many disparate peoples into a nation that became the fifth most populous in the world, one of the richest of all in natural resources. He gave his people a language of their own, raised their literacy rate from six to above 55 percent, gave them an intense from pride in being Indonesians. He had monumental talents: an oratorical gift that could sway and charm, an abundance of that indefinable mystique called "charisma." Responding, his people gave him loyalty beyond love, reverence approaching god-worship.

The Brazil nut tree is one of the Amazon's longest living trees, of an age 1,000 years. Its flowers depend on bees for pollination. Once pollinated, a coconut-sized seed containing some tiny 20 seeds, develops for over 15 months before falling to the forest floor. They are found exclusively in Amazon forests since harvesting is exhausting, even for the strong. Apart from bees and the Brazil nut harvesters, the life of many other plants and animals is intertwined with this tree. The empty seeds fill with rainwater and provide breeding grounds for flies, frogs, all of which depend on these small ponds on the forest floor. The major threat to the trees is forest clearing. Sustainable harvesting of Brazil nuts is therefore vital way to provide protection of forests and saving the Amazon.