The food people eat is often brought in from miles away and stored using traditional cooling systems before the products hit store shelves. Ice is the most common cooling method that is used. When ice melts, it’s not reusable. Luxin Wang, one of the project’s leaders, saw the massive amounts of unrecyclable ice being used to store the fish at a fishing processing plant and the cross-contamination (交叉污染) that meltwater could spread among products or down the drain (下水道). This inspired her to look for a sustainable solution. The team got to work and created what they refer to as “jelly ice cubes”.

The ice cube scan take on various shapes and sizes and withstand temperature and pressure changes. That means that the jelly ice cubes won’t melt in hotter temperatures but rather the technology will change colors to indicate that the ice cube needs to be re frozen. The cubes won’t lose their form either. The novelty cubes can be used for 13 hours of storage and can easily be rinsed with bleach (漂白剂), and frozen again for reuse.

The research team knows that using these has huge potential to reduce water waste and food waste across the food supply chain. Food contamination is one of the biggest factors in food waste and can happen at any stage. Once ice turns to water, it can pick up bacteria and subsequently spread it between neighboring produce. However, if the jelly ice cubes are used, they can offer a reusable solution to conserve water and have a big impact on reducing food waste. These solid cubes can prevent cross-contamination that comes from melted ice.

Already mitigating (减轻) two major threats facing food production, the team plans to take their research one step further and use agricultural waste and by products as the cooling agents in their future ice cube designs. And these new innovative jelly ice cubes appear to be real winners in helping create greener food industry.

【小题1】What motivated Wang to create the jelly ice cubes?

A．Dealing with food waste at a fishing processing plant.

B．Transporting products with ice cube smelting halfway.

C．Seeing problems of storing the fish in a traditional way.

D．Receiving boxes with many unrecyclable ice cubes inside.

【小题2】What does the underlined word “withstand” in paragraph 2 probably mean?

A．Resist.

B．Measure.

C．Reduce.

D．Sense.

【小题3】What is Paragraph 3 mainly about?

A．The cause of food contamination.

B．The advantages of the jelly ice cubes.

C．The process of manufacturing new ice cubes.

D．The methods of keeping food clean and fresh.

【小题4】What can we infer from the last paragraph?

A．The jelly ice cubes will reach food producers soon.

B．The new ice cubes could promote the marketing of green food.

C．Researchers have discovered effective ways to ensure food safety.

D．Researchers will make the production of ice cubes more eco-friendly.