While harmful, single-use plastics like bags, and other packaging make life easier, they’re hard to give up without an alternative, but that’s where Lucy Hughes’ creative idea comes in. The 24-year-old is a University of Sussex graduate whose school project in product design led to a brilliant invention. Lucy Hughes initially intended to figure out how to either reduce fish waste produced by the fishing industry or to turn it into something useful. What she came up with not only does both,but offers up a great alternative to single-use plastics.
While Lucy was studying various waste streams at a fish processing plant in England, the fish skins and scales she touched felt surprisingly flexible and strong, which gave her a new idea. She began playing around in her kitchen with different combinations of fish waste and red algae(海藻). After more than 100 experiments, she knew she struck gold. She created MarinaTex, a stronger bio-plastic material that takes just four to six weeks to break down. It’s even fit to be eaten! And according to Lucy, just one Atlantic cod-a type of fish-can produce 1,400 MarinaTex bags. In 2019,Lucy was named the James Dyson Award UK winner for her invention, which she hopes to eventually produce in much larger quantity. She’ll be using her prize money for further MarinaTex research and development.
Globally,320 million tones of plastic gets produced each year-a figure that’s set to double by 2034, according to Surfers Against Sewage. Yet 90.5% of all plastic has never been recycled. That means that a lot of plastic gets burnt-creating greenhouse gases that then may warm the planet, causing climate change-or sent to landfill, and eventually, some plastic reaches the oceans, harming sea creatures that often consume the materials by accident, and even end up back in the human food chain too. Now MarinaTex could be used to settle the problems.
【小题1】What is Lucy’s original purpose of the school project in product design?
| A．To invent a new kind of plastic. | B．To produce new food for fish. |
| C．To deal with fish waste better. | D．To break down used plastics. |
【小题2】How did Lucy create MarinaTex?
| A．By accident completely. | B．By her hard research work. |
| C．Under the plant’s guidance. | D．With her prize money’s help. |
【小题3】Which of the following can best describe MarinaTex?
| A．It’s environmental-friendly. | B．It’s convenient to produce. |
| C．It’s been used in large quantity. | D．It can be used to feed fish. |
【小题4】What do we know about the present global plastic use?
| A．It’s helping to reduce climate changes. | B．More people have realized it’s harmful. |
| C．It is under control in parts of the world. | D．People tend to rely more and more on it. |
