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Black Plague

CAT 2017 Slot 1 · Verbal Ability & Reading Comprehension · Hard · Verbal Ability

This is a hard Verbal Ability & Reading Comprehension question from the CAT 2017 Slot 1 paper. It tests Verbal Ability. The full answer key and a step-by-step explanation are below — try it yourself first, then reveal the solution.

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The five sentences (labelled 1,2,3,4, and 5) given in this question, when properly sequenced, form a coherent paragraph. Decide on the proper order for the sentence and key in this sequence of five numbers as your answer.

  1. The study suggests that the disease did not spread with such intensity, but that it may have driven human migrations across Europe and Asia.
  2. The oldest sample came from an individual who lived in southeast Russia about 5,000 years ago.
  3. The ages of the skeletons correspond to a time of mass exodus from today's Russia and Ukraine into western Europe and central Asia, suggesting that a pandemic could have driven these migrations.
  4. In the analysis of fragments of DNA from 101 Bronze Age skeletons for sequences from Yersinia pestis, the bacterium that causes the disease, seven tested positive.
  5. DNA from Bronze Age human skeletons indicate that the black plague could have emerged as early as 3,000 BCE, long before the epidemic that swept through Europe in the mid-1300s.
Answer

54123

Explanation

5 introduces the DNA study showing early emergence of black plague. 4 details the study (101 skeletons tested for Yersinia pestis). 1 gives the conclusion of the study regarding human migrations. 2 describes the oldest sample, and 3 links the age of skeletons to the mass exodus/migrations. So 54123 is the correct sequence.

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