Question ID:PT49 S3 Q22 Passage:Every culture that has adopted the cultivation of maize‚ also known as corn‚ has been radically changed by it. This crop reshaped the cultures of the Native Americans who first cultivated it, leading to such developments as the adoption of agrarian and in some cases urban lifestyles, and much of the explosion of European populations after the fifteenth century was driven by the introduction of maize together with another crop from the Americas, potatoes. The primary reason for this plant's profound influence is its sheer productivity. With maize, ancient agriculturalists could produce far more food per acre than with any other crop, and early Central Americans recognized and valued this characteristic of the plant. But why are maize and a few similar crops so much more bountiful than others? Modern biochemistry has revealed the physical mechanism underlying maize's impressive productivity.To obtain the hydrogen they use in the production of carbohydrates through photosynthesis, all plants split water into its constituent elements, hydrogen and oxygen. They use the resultant hydrogen to form one of the molecules they need for energy, but the oxygen is released into the atmosphere. During photosynthesis, carbon dioxide that the plant takes in from the atmosphere is used to build sugars within the plant. An enzyme, rubisco, assists in the sugar-forming chemical reaction. Because of its importance in photosynthesis, rubisco is arguably the most significant enzyme in the world. Unfortunately, though, when the concentration of oxygen relative to carbon dioxide in a leaf rises to a certain level, as can happen in the presence of many common atmospheric conditions, oxygen begins to bind competitively to the enzyme, thus interfering with the photosynthetic reaction.Some plants, however, have evolved a photosynthetic mechanism that prevents oxygen from impairing photosynthesis. These plants separate the places where they split water atoms into hydrogen and oxygen from the places where they build sugars from carbon dioxide. Water molecules are split, as in all plants, in specialized chlorophyll-containing structures in the green leaf cells, but the rubisco is sequestered within airtight tissues in the center of the leaf. The key to the process is that in these plants, oxygen and all other atmospheric gases are excluded from the cells containing rubisco. These cells, called the bundle sheath cells, surround the vascular structures of the leaf‚ structures that function analogously to human blood vessels. Carbon dioxide, which cannot enter these cells as a gas, first undergoes a series of reactions to form an intermediary, nongas molecule named C-4 for the four carbon atoms it contains. This molecule enters the bundle sheath cells and there undergoes reactions that release the carbon dioxide that will fuel the production of carbohydrates (e.g., sugars). Taking its name from the intermediary molecule, the entire process is called C-4 photosynthesis. Such C-4 plants as sugar cane, rice, and maize are among the world's most productive crops. Stem:Which one of the following most accurately describes the organization of the material presented in the second and third paragraphs of the passage? Correct Answer Choice:BChoice A:The author suggests that the widespread cultivation of a particular crop is due to its high yield, explains its high yield by describing the action of a particular enzyme in that crop, and then outlines the reasons for the evolution of that enzyme. Choice B:The author explains some aspects of a biochemical process, describes a naturally occurring hindrance to that process, and then describes an evolutionary solution to that hindrance in order to explain the productivity of a particular crop. Choice C:The author describes a problem inherent in certain biochemical processes, scientifically explains two ways in which organisms solve that problem, and then explains the evolutionary basis for one of those solutions. Choice D:The author describes a widespread cultural phenomenon involving certain uses of a type of plant, explains the biochemical basis of the phenomenon, and then points out that certain other plants may be used for similar purposes. Choice E:The author introduces a natural process, describes the biochemical reaction that is widely held to be the mechanism underlying the process, and then argues for an alternate evolutionary explanation of that process.