VOA慢速英语2009-Development Report - From Depths of a Librar

This is the VOA Special English Development Report.
　
Jeffrey Schwarz coordinates¹ the water filter project for North America from the Carnegie Library Pot Shop, adapting technology developed in Central America during Hurricane Mitch in 1998

The Braddock Carnegie Library in Braddock, Pennsylvania, looks like an ancient castle. The bottom floor was once a bathhouse. Today, it houses a workshop for an arts program. But the library basement also has another use -- as a studio for making ceramic² water filters for the developing world.

Placing it there was the idea of Richard Wukich, an art professor at Slippery Rock University in Pennsylvania. One of his former students, Jeffrey Schwarz, helped remake the basement to use for pottery-making classes for the community.

Jeff Schwarz is a potter and a member of the national service program AmeriCorps. He works with volunteers to produce the water purifiers.

The original design of the ceramic filter came from a chemist in Guatemala, Fernando Mazariegos. Ron Rivera, a ceramics³ artist and activist⁴ in the group Potters for Peace, saw it and recognized its value.

Ron Rivera improved the design after a deadly storm, Hurricane Mitch, struck Central America in nineteen ninety-eight. He also worked with other groups to set up places to make the filters. He died last year. By that time, hundreds of thousands of the filters were in use in developing countries.

Tests have shown that the filter produces safe drinking water.

On a good day, Jeffrey Schwarz says the studio in the library can produce twenty filters. To make one, clay is mixed with a material that burns. It could be sawdust or agricultural waste like grain hulls⁵, cocoa or coffee shells. Pine needles can also be used.

The mixture is shaped into a cone⁶ and then fired. Burning away the material added to the clay leaves tiny holes. These holes let water slowly pass through the walls of the filter.

A protective coating of colloidal⁷ silver is painted on the inside and outside of the filter to kill bacteria. Colloidal silver is made from water with microscopic⁸ particles of silver.

The water filter costs little to make. An international service project called Pure Water for All helps support the work. The Forest Hills Rotary⁹ Club in western Pennsylvania launched the project. The project Web site is purewaterforall.org.

Jeff Schwarz will end his service for AmeriCorps soon. But he plans to continue making the water filters in the depths of the library.

And that's the VOA Special English Development Report, written by Jerilyn Watson, with Rosanne Skirble in Braddock, Pennsylvania. Archives of our reports are at voaspecialenglish.com. I'm Steve Ember.

1 coordinates   

n.相配之衣物；坐标( coordinate的名词复数 )；（颜色协调的）配套服装；[复数]女套服；同等重要的人（或物）v.使协调，使调和( coordinate的第三人称单数 )；协调；协同；成为同等

参考例句：

• The town coordinates on this map are 695037. 该镇在这幅地图上的坐标是695037。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• The UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, headed by the Emergency Relief Coordinator, coordinates all UN emergency relief. 联合国人道主义事务协调厅在紧急救济协调员领导下，负责协调联合国的所有紧急救济工作。 来自《简明英汉词典》

2 ceramic   

n.制陶业，陶器，陶瓷工艺

参考例句：

• The order for ceramic tiles has been booked in.瓷砖的订单已登记下来了。
• Some ceramic works of art are shown in this exhibition.这次展览会上展出了一些陶瓷艺术品。

3 ceramics   

n.制陶业；陶器

参考例句：

• an exhibition of ceramics by Picasso 毕加索陶瓷作品展
• The ceramics bore the imprint of Luca della Robbia. 陶器上印有卢卡·德拉·罗比亚的字样。

4 activist   

n.活动分子，积极分子

参考例句：

• He's been a trade union activist for many years.多年来他一直是工会的积极分子。
• He is a social activist in our factory.他是我厂的社会活动积极分子。

5 hulls   

船体( hull的名词复数 )； 船身； 外壳； 豆荚

参考例句：

• Hulls may be removed by aspiration on screens. 脱下的种皮，可由筛子上的气吸装置吸除。
• When their object is attained they fall off like empty hulls from the kernel. 当他们的目的达到以后，他们便凋谢零落，就象脱却果实的空壳一样。

6 cone   

n.圆锥体，圆锥形东西，球果

参考例句：

• Saw-dust piled up in a great cone.锯屑堆积如山。
• The police have sectioned off part of the road with traffic cone.警察用锥形路标把部分路面分隔开来。

7 colloidal   

adj. 胶状的, 胶质的

参考例句：

• Colloidal particles are bombarded by molecules of the dispersion medium. 胶粒会受到分散介质分子的碰撞。
• Frictional behavior is modified by colloidal silica or starch deposition. 耐磨损性能可以通过在织物上沉淀胶状硅或淀粉一类物质而得到改善。

8 microscopic   

adj.微小的，细微的，极小的，显微的

参考例句：

• It's impossible to read his microscopic handwriting.不可能看清他那极小的书写字迹。
• A plant's lungs are the microscopic pores in its leaves.植物的肺就是其叶片上微细的气孔。

9 rotary   

adj.(运动等)旋转的；轮转的；转动的

参考例句：

• The central unit is a rotary drum.核心设备是一个旋转的滚筒。
• A rotary table helps to optimize the beam incidence angle.一张旋转的桌子有助于将光线影响之方式角最佳化。