The Japanese art of kintsugi involves repairing broken pottery with lacquer mixed with powdered gold. Rather than disguising the damage, the technique highlights the cracks, transforming them into luminous seams. ______ a bowl repaired through kintsugi is often considered more beautiful than one that was never broken.

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Urban planner Rosa Chen has argued that cities should replace large parking lots near transit stations with mixed-use developments that include housing, retail, and green space. Chen acknowledges that such projects require significant upfront investment. ______ she points to data from several pilot programs showing that the developments generate enough tax revenue within five years to offset the initial costs.

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The axolotl, a salamander native to lakes near Mexico City, has the remarkable ability to regenerate entire limbs, sections of its spinal cord, and even parts of its heart. Scientists studying this process have identified key genes that activate during tissue regrowth. ______ these genes exist in humans as well, they remain dormant after injury, which has led researchers to investigate what molecular signals might be needed to switch them on.

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In the 1960s, computer scientist Ivan Sutherland developed Sketchpad, one of the earliest programs that allowed users to create images directly on a screen using a light pen. The program introduced concepts such as graphical windows and object-oriented design. ______ many of the core ideas behind Sketchpad remain embedded in the design software, video games, and touchscreen interfaces that people use today.

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Ecologist Dr. Priya Nair spent three years studying how the reintroduction of wolves to Yellowstone National Park affected the park’s vegetation. She found that elk, which had previously overgrazed riverbank plants, changed their feeding patterns to avoid areas where wolves were active. ______ willow and aspen trees began to recover along streams where they had been nearly eliminated, stabilizing the riverbanks and reducing erosion.

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Historians have generally credited Johannes Gutenberg with inventing the movable-type printing press in Europe around 1440. Recent scholarship, ______ has drawn attention to the work of Bi Sheng, a Chinese artisan who developed a movable-type system using ceramic pieces nearly four hundred years earlier, during the Song Dynasty.

Which choice completes the text with the most logical transition?