科学家将污染物变成打印机墨水

 　　Anirudh Sharma doesn't just want to pull harmful carbon from the air. He wants to offer a cheaper alternative to the exorbitant¹ costs of ordinary printer ink.

　　阿尼鲁德·夏尔马不仅想除掉空气中的有害炭物质，还希望创造一种更便宜的普通打印机油墨，解决墨水价格高昂的问题。

　　Sharma recently invented "Kaala," a device that can gobble up harmful pollutants² and instantly repurpose them, with a little help from alcohol and oil, into black printer ink.

　　夏尔马最近发明了一种名叫“Kaala”的装置，它能吞掉有害污染物并迅速将其变成有用物质，只需加点酒精和油，就能生成黑色打印机墨水。

　　One day, Sharma hopes to commercialize the device so it can live in every home around the world.

　　将来，夏尔马希望能将这个设置商业化，希望世界上的每家每户都能使用它。

　　The idea came to him after one-too-many smog-filled trips to his home country of India.

　　他经常去烟雾严重的祖国印度，如此往返，就有了灵感。

　　科学家将污染物变成打印机墨水

　　"On a hot summer day, if you take a handkerchief and rub it on your skin, the handkerchief actually turns a little brownish-blackish in color," says Sharma, a scientist at MIT's Media Lab. "So we thought, 'How do we repurpose something we complain about on an everyday basis into something that is a utility?'"

　　“在酷热的夏日，如果你拿手帕擦皮肤，手帕就会变得乌黑，”麻省理工学院（MIT）媒体实验室的科学家夏尔马说，“所以我们就想‘能不能把这种我们天天抱怨的东西变成日常用品呢？’”

　　For the device to work, it first needs to be exposed to exhaust. In his demo, Sharma uses the flame of a candle.

　　要让这个设置运行，得先把它放在废气中。做实验时，夏尔马用的是蜡烛燃烧产生的废气。

　　While the candle burns, a suction pump pulls in the surrounding air to a simple mechanism³ that separates the carbon black — a byproduct of combustion⁵ — from the rest of the air. It then traps the soot⁶ in a small chamber⁷ to be mixed with alcohol — in this case, vodka — and a drop of olive oil.

　　蜡烛燃烧时，用真空泵吸走周围的空气，令黑色的炭物质——即燃烧产物——与其余空气分开。接下来，黑灰聚焦到一个小隔间，加入酒精——此例中用伏特加——和一滴橄榄油。

　　Lastly, the newly formed liquid can be injected into an ordinary ink cartridge⁸ for everyday use.

　　最后，混合而成的液体就能放到普通墨盒中每日使用了。

　　Sharma admits the black could still be blacker. Since it was designed as a research project, Kaala would also need to hold up against formal toxicity⁹ standards before it can hit the market.

　　夏尔马承认墨水还可以更黑。但这只是个研究项目，投入市场前，Kaala也得满足正式的无毒标准。

　　"With a little bit of research," he says, "it can become as good as the printing ink HP sells to you."

　　他说：“只需再研究研究，它就能跟惠普（HP）卖的打印墨一样好了。”

　　Sharma estimates a 4-year-old diesel¹⁰ engine could produce enough carbon to fill an HP cartridge within 60 minutes. A chimney would take only 10 minutes approximately.

　　夏尔马估计一个使用了四年的柴油内燃机60分钟内产生的炭能填满一个惠普墨盒。一个烟囱大约只需要10分钟。

　　Recreating that ink wouldn't take much effort.

　　制造这种墨并不费事。

　　"Usually, people don't know about this, but the ink you're buying is nothing," he says. "It's just carbon black mixed with a few chemicals, and that's all. If you're making your own ink, the cost would definitely be much, much lower."

　　“一般来说，人们不了解这点，不过大家买的墨真没什么特殊的，”他说，“炭黑掺些化学品就制出来了，就这些。如果自己制墨，成本绝对非常非常低。”

　　Sharma hopes that his handheld device could scale to a size that sits on par⁴ with leading carbon-capture systems: huge walls of fans that trap carbon lurking¹¹ in the air.

　　夏尔马希望他的手持装置再大点，能用到主流炭捕集系统上：比如捕集空气中隐藏的炭的巨型风扇墙。

　　Vocabulary

　　exorbitant: （要价等）过高的

1 exorbitant   

adj.过分的；过度的

参考例句：

• More competition should help to drive down exorbitant phone charges.更多的竞争有助于降低目前畸高的电话收费。
• The price of food here is exorbitant. 这儿的食物价格太高。

2 pollutants   

污染物质（尤指工业废物）( pollutant的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• Pollutants are constantly being released into the atmosphere. 污染物质正在不断地被排放到大气中去。
• The 1987 Amendments limit 301(g) discharges to a few well-studied nonconventional pollutants. 1987年的修正案把第301条（g）的普通排放限制施加在一些认真研究过的几种非常规污染物上。 来自英汉非文学 - 环境法 - 环境法

3 mechanism   

n.机械装置；机构，结构

参考例句：

• The bones and muscles are parts of the mechanism of the body.骨骼和肌肉是人体的组成部件。
• The mechanism of the machine is very complicated.这台机器的结构是非常复杂的。

4 par   

n.标准，票面价值，平均数量；adj.票面的，平常的，标准的

参考例句：

• Sales of nylon have been below par in recent years.近年来尼龙织品的销售额一直不及以往。
• I don't think his ability is on a par with yours.我认为他的能力不能与你的能力相媲美。

5 combustion   

n.燃烧；氧化；骚动

参考例句：

• We might be tempted to think of combustion.我们也许会联想到氧化。
• The smoke formed by their combustion is negligible.由它燃烧所生成的烟是可忽略的。

6 soot   

n.煤烟，烟尘；vt.熏以煤烟

参考例句：

• Soot is the product of the imperfect combustion of fuel.煤烟是燃料不完全燃烧的产物。
• The chimney was choked with soot.烟囱被煤灰堵塞了。

7 chamber   

n.房间，寝室；会议厅；议院；会所

参考例句：

• For many,the dentist's surgery remains a torture chamber.对许多人来说，牙医的治疗室一直是间受刑室。
• The chamber was ablaze with light.会议厅里灯火辉煌。

8 cartridge   

n.弹壳，弹药筒；(装磁带等的)盒子

参考例句：

• Unfortunately the 2G cartridge design is very difficult to set accurately.不幸地2G弹药筒设计非常难正确地设定。
• This rifle only holds one cartridge.这支来复枪只能装一发子弹。

9 toxicity   

n.毒性，毒力

参考例句：

• The hoarse grunt or squeal is characteristic of toxicity.嘶哑的哼声和叫声是中毒的特征。
• Dieldrin is related to aldrin,and its toxicity to earthworms is similar.狄氏剂与艾氏剂有关，对蚯蚓的毒性是相似的。

10 diesel   

n.柴油发动机，内燃机

参考例句：

• We experimented with diesel engines to drive the pumps.我们试着用柴油机来带动水泵。
• My tractor operates on diesel oil.我的那台拖拉机用柴油开动。

11 lurking   

潜在

参考例句：

• Why are you lurking around outside my house? 你在我房子外面鬼鬼祟祟的，想干什么？
• There is a suspicious man lurking in the shadows. 有一可疑的人躲在阴暗中。 来自《现代英汉综合大词典》