QUESTION IMAGE
Question
sea slugs
by melissa ambrovitz
- imagine eating a purple grape and turning purple! if you were a sea slug, that’s exactly what would happen. actually, sea slugs gravitate towards foods such as sea anemones, hydroids, sponges, and jellyfish, but if one of the morsels they devour happens to be purple, or some other color, the slug will automatically change to that hue.
- sea slugs store the pigments from their food in specialized cells called chromatophores. changes in the shapes and sizes of the cells cause the sea slugs to change color. camouflaged, the slug can crawl around on its favorite food without being detected by enemies.
the word gravitate in paragraph 1 features the latin root -grav-. using your knowledge of the root, choose the meaning of the word gravitate as it is used in paragraph 1.
a. produce mucus to aid movement, or \make move easily\
b. be pulled toward something, as if \drawn by a great weight\
c. hide from enemies for protection, as if \made invisible\
d. change rapidly and frequently, or \transform one’s nature\
The Latin root “-grav-” is related to weight or attraction (like gravity). In the context of sea slugs and their food, “gravitate” means being pulled toward the food. Option A is about producing mucus (unrelated), C is about hiding (not the meaning here), D is about changing (not related to the root). Option B matches the idea of being pulled toward something, as if by weight/gravity.
Snap & solve any problem in the app
Get step-by-step solutions on Sovi AI
Photo-based solutions with guided steps
Explore more problems and detailed explanations
B. be pulled toward something, as if "drawn by a great weight"