神奇，在水果旁边放这一小包东西，就能保鲜更久

This tiny sachet the size of a sugar packet can be placed in a crate of fruit and it makes the produce last roughly three times longer than usual.

在盛水果的箱子里放一小包东西就可以使水果的保质期比平时延长近两倍的时间，而这小一小包东西只有糖包那么大。

The technology, from a startup called Hazel Technologies, was created as a simple way to tackle one piece of the world’s problem with food waste.

一家名为Hazel Technologies的初创公司开发了这项技术，它是解决全球食物浪费问题的一种简单方法。

In the U.S. alone, each year, $218 billion is spent growing, processing, delivering, and throwing out 52 million tons of uneaten food, often because it goes bad before someone can eat it. Another 10 million tons of food never makes it off farms.

仅仅在美国，每年就有5200万吨未被食用的食物被扔掉，这往往是因为这些食物在人们食用之前就已经变质了，而种植、加工、运输以及扔掉这5200万吨食物要耗费2180亿美元。此外，还有1000万吨食物没出农场就变质了。

“Agriculture is central to human existence, but despite that, we haven’t had nearly the same level of technological revolutions that we have in other world systems like energy or transportation or medicine,” says Aidan Mouat, the CEO of Hazel Technologies. “So I saw a real opportunity there.”

“农业是人类生存的关键，但尽管如此，我们在农业上并未达到像能源、运输或医药等其他世界体系所经历过的技术革命而达到的那般水准，”Hazel技术公司总裁艾丹·穆阿特说道。“所以，我在农业上确实看到了机会。”

Mouat cofounded the company as a postdoctoral student at Northwestern University. A fellow student and cofounder was studying a way to control the pathways that make produce ripen and eventually decay by mimicking the natural process; Mouat was studying the use of biodegradable, nontoxic materials that could control the same type of material. They decided to work together, along with a group of other students.

穆阿特是美国西北大学的一名博士后研究生，也是该公司的创始人之一。他的一位同学，也就是该公司的另一位联合创始人，通过模仿自然过程来研究一种控制作物成熟及腐烂途径的方法；而穆阿特在研究用可生物降解且无毒性材料来控制同种材料的方法。之后，他们决定与其他同学一起合作进行研究。

The sachet, one of the company’s first products, works by inhibiting ethylene, a hormone molecule that fruit naturally emits and that triggers the aging process.

该公司的首批产品之一就是这种小袋，它通过抑制乙烯来发挥功效。乙烯是水果自然释放的一种激素分子，它能促使水果熟化。

It’s something that the food industry already tries to control—some storage facilities use machinery to filter ethylene out of the air or apply a coating to fruit or vegetables. But the tiny packets are simpler to use.

水果行业已经在尝试控制乙烯了，一些仓库使用机械来过滤空气中的乙烯，或者用保鲜膜把水果或蔬菜包起来。但这种小袋用起来更方便一些。

A quarter gram of the material inside the packet can protect 50 pounds of produce. The chemicals are proprietary, but the company says that the sachet time releases them to help preserve the product.

小袋里四分之一的材料就可以保存50磅产品。这种化学物质是专利产品，但该公司表示，这种小袋可以释放这种化学物质来保存产品。

Each fruit has a different package based on the ethylene sensitivity of the fruit. Other products might need different products entirely: berries need antimicrobials, for instance, but don’t have a problem with ethylene.

根据水果对乙烯的敏感度，每种水果都有不同的包装。其他水果可能需要完全不同的产品：例如，浆果需要抗菌剂，而乙烯并不会使其腐烂。