[语法] one of ..that 单复数问题

kennyz1120

麻烦各位看下以下两题并解释一下one of ...that的用法。。

Biologists believe that they have found one of the substances that tell individual genes both when to become active and when to remain quiescent in the earliest phases of an embryo’s development.

(A) tell individual genes both when to become active and when to remain
(B) tell individual genes both at which time they should become active or should remain
(C) tells individual genes both when to become active or remain
(D) tells individual genes both when to become active or when to remain
(E) will tell an individual gene both about when it should become active and remain


答案：A


The auto industry has experienced one of its most significant trends in the last 50 years, which is the migration of motorists from passenger cars to minivans, sport utility vehicles, and pickups.

(A) The auto industry has experienced one of its most significant trends in the last 50 years, which is
(B) Of the trends the auto industry experienced in the last 50 years has been one of the most significant
(C) In the last 50 years, one of the most significant trends that the auto industry has been experiencing has been
(D) One of the most significant trends that the auto industry has experienced in the last 50 years is
(E) In the last 50 years, the auto industry experienced one of the most significant trends that it has had, that of


答案：D

sisichen666

最简单的方法就是根据逻辑含义，看看which or that到底是修饰谁，是修饰one ，还是修饰N复数做N的定语从句
1题，Biologists believe that they have found one of the substances （that tell individual genes both when to become active and when to remain）
that明显是that定语从句修饰substances——tell用复数
2题，One of the most significant trends （修饰trends的定语从句 that the auto industry has experienced in the last 50 years） is 谓语动词用单数

DUKB24

one of.......that

is a complicated structure


I don't see a hard-and-fast-rule for dealing with this sort of issue


I do not recommend you to see such plurality or singularity as splits because two scenarios have already appeared as correct choices in the official problem


example 1 can easily get the correct choice just because of parallelim
also，example 2 can get the correct choice without dealing the issue you raise


if you really want an answer


it seems to me that that should modify the closest noun （ if it is grammatically eligible）


I think that GMAT will rarely make chose solely choose the plurality or singularity of this structure


unless the meaning clearly dictates singularity or plurality

kennyz1120

感谢两位指点，很有帮助，谢谢！