The passage given below has numbered blanks. Choose the word that best fits Blank 3. Over the past decade, the sunflower sea star has gone from a predator of the Pacific Ocean to nearing extinction. The Nature Conservancy estimates that 5.75 billion sunflower sea stars died over three years, a 94% global (1)___. The cause, scientists say, is largely climate change and warming waters, (2)___ by sea star wasting disease. Hope is slowly on the horizon. The Birch Aquarium at Scripps Institution of Oceanography near San Diego successfully (3)___ three sunflower sea stars recently, the latest success story in a sprawling collaborative effort. TBA has five sunflower stars, one of the largest populations of sunflower stars in (4)___ in California. But until recently it did not know their gender. To determine the sex, researchers induced spawning. After further testing, they can determine whether the (5)___ could survive disease or parasites. Once that’s done, the aquarium will be able to begin the fertilization process.