Comprehension Passages

216-It may be gathered from the passage that the ancient cities of northern Syria……….. .

***A)are in very good condition despite being empty for a thousand years

B)are hard to find since they are simply shapeless piles of rocks

C)are really quite new cities but are very poorly maintained

D)have been continuously inhabited for a least a millennium

E)are also home to a large number of Christians

For the first time after the Apollo moon landings, NASA is launching a mission into outer space to bring back extraterritorial material. This time, NASA is going after comet and interstellar dust. "Stardust", the robotic spacecraft that will collect the tiny grains, is scheduled for a journey of seven years that will cover 5.1 billion kilometres. It is NASA's first attempt to bring back pieces of a comet. This particular comet, Wild-2, rarely came close to the Sun until the 1970s, and so still should contain the original, frozen components of the solar system. By studying samples from this well-preserved comet, scientists hope to better understand how icy, rocky comets may have provided the water and organics necessary for life to form on the Earth, and possibly elsewhere.