Integrated Listening and Reading — 11

Read the text about Super Glue (you have 7 minutes to read), then listen to the talk on the same topic. You will notice that some ideas coincide and some differ in the two materials. Answer questions 1–9 by choosing A if the idea is expressed in both materialsB if it can be found only in the reading textC if it can be found only in the audio, and D if neither of the materials expresses the idea.

Super Glue, also known as cyanoacrylate, was originally discovered in 1942 by Dr. Harry Coover.  Coover was attempting to make clear plastic gun sights to be put on guns used by Allied soldiers in WWII.  One particular formulation he came up with didn’t work well for gun sights, but worked fantastically as an extremely quick bonding adhesive.  Surprisingly, despite the commercial potential of such a product, Coover abandoned that formulation completely as it obviously wasn’t suitable for his current project, being too sticky.

Nine years later, in 1951, now working at Eastman Kodak, Dr. Coover was the supervisor of a project looking at developing a heat resistant acrylate polymer for jet canopies.  Fred Joyner was working on that project and at one point used the rediscovered Super Glue and tested it by spreading ethyl cyanoacrylate between a pair of refractometer prisms.  To his surprise, the prisms became stuck very solidly together.  This time, Coover did not abandoned the cyanoacrylate (Super Glue), rather,  he realized the great potential of a product that would quickly bond to a variety of materials and only needed a little water to activate, which generally is provided in the materials to be bonded themselves.

Super Glue was finally put on the market in 1958 by Eastman Kodak and was called the slightly less catchy name of “Eastman #910”, though they later re-named it “Super Glue”.  Eastman #910 was soon licensed to Loctite who then re-branded it again to a somewhat uninspired name of “Loctite Quick Set 404”. Although, they later developed their own version, calling it “Super Bonder”.  By the 1970s, numerous manufactures of cyanoacrylate glues had popped up, with Eastman Kodak, Loctite, and Permabond accounting for around 3/4 of all “Super Glue” sales.

Source of the text

1. The inventor of the glue is no longer alive.


A

B

C

D

2. Glue was discovered accidentally during a military-oriented research.


A

B

C

D

3. It was only after WWII that Coover understood he could make use of the cyanoacrylate qualities.


A

B

C

D

4. Glue was used during WWII by wounded soldiers.


A

B

C

D

5. Coover was working in Tennessee when doing aviation-related research.


A

B

C

D

6. The first name of the glue invented by Cover was different from the one which is in use nowadays.


A

B

C

D

7. During the Vietnam War glue saved a lot of soldiers.


A

B

C

D

8. Cyanoacrylates need a little water to activate.


A

B

C

D

9. Nowadays Super Glue is very often used for household purposes.


A

B

C

D

© Екатерина Яковлева, 2016–2022