British designer Anna Bullus is on a mission to recycle chewing gum into useful objects, cleaning up our streets in the process.
英國設計師安娜布勒斯的任務是回收口香糖，將其變廢為寶，從而清理街道。
More than ?14bn is spent on chewing gum around the world each year, but a lot of that gum will end up stuck to the ground.
世界各地每年處理口香糖費用超過140億英鎊,但很多口香糖還是留在了地面上。
Gum is the second most common type of street litter after cigarette materials.
口香糖是僅次於香菸的第二常見的街頭垃圾。
In the UK, councils spend around ?50m each year cleaning up the mess.
英國議會每年花費約5000萬清理口香糖。
But Anna had an idea. What if the sticky stuff could actually be recycled and turned into useful objects?
但是安娜有個主意。如果這些黏糊糊的東西真的可以循環利用，變成有用的東西呢?
Around 10 years ago, she began a project looking at kerbside litter. She examined random samples, looking at things like crisp packets and cigarette butts. She then tried to figure out which elements could be recycled.
大約10年前，她開始研究路邊垃圾。隨機抽樣看到了一些像薯片和菸頭之類的東西。然後她試圖找出哪些元素可以回收利用。
"One of the litters I found was a piece of chewing gum and as a designer I was completely amazed there was nothing actually being done to recycle it," she said.
她說:「我發現的其中一種垃圾口香糖，作為一名設計師，我完全驚呆了，其實沒有什麼東西可以回收口香糖。」
Researching the chemistry of chewing gum, she discovered that its main ingredient, the gum base, is commonly a synthetic rubber, a type of polymer similar to plastic.
研究口香糖化學成分時，她發現口香糖的主要成分是膠基，通常是一種合成橡膠，一種類似塑料的聚合物。
"It’s called polyisobutylene," explains Anna, "the same stuff you find in the inner tube of bicycle wheels."
安娜解釋說：「就是聚異丁烯，自行車內胎就是這種物質。」
It is obtained from petrochemicals, which are refined from fossil fuels like crude oil.
從原油等化石燃料中提煉出石化產品，從石化產品中提煉出聚異丁烯。
She realised that chewing gum, even once it has been finished with, is a versatile and potentially useful material.
她意識到，即便是嚼過的口香糖也是一種用途廣泛且可能有用的材料。
Collecting gum
收集口香糖
But how do you persuade people to donate their gum - instead of carelessly tossing it on to the street?
但是如何說服人們捐贈口香糖而不是隨意地把它吐在街道上?
As part of her strategy, Anna created bright pink, bubble-shaped bins specially for disposing of gum called Gumdrop, which can be hung at head-height.
作為其策略的一部分，安娜設計了亮粉色、泡沫狀的箱子，專門用來處理被稱為Gumdrop的口香糖，它可以與頭部等高。
These bins are themselves made of recycled chewing gum. A message next to the bins explains that any gum collected will be recycled into new objects.
這些箱子用來回收口香糖。垃圾箱旁邊的標識解釋說，回收的口香糖將用來製作新物品。
But would gum-chewers use them?
但是嚼口香糖的人會用嗎?
The University of Winchester was one of the first places to sign up to use the bins. Around 8,000 people live and work on its campus and the authorities wanted to keep it clean of gum litter.
溫徹斯特大學是最早報名使用該垃圾箱的地方之一。大約有8000人在校園中生活和工作，學校希望保持清潔沒有口香糖垃圾。
It adopted a twin-pronged strategy to tackle the problem.
該校採取了雙管齊下的策略來解決這個問題。
It installed 11 of Anna’s special bins and to reinforce the message that gum can be recycled if disposed of responsibly, it gave out hundreds of coffee cups made of recycled gum to first-year students.
學校安裝了11個安娜設計的專用垃圾桶，並宣傳道：如果處理得當，口香糖可回收利用，將分發幾百個由回收口香糖製成的咖啡杯給大一新生。
"Students would give the cup a sniff to check it didn’t smell of mint or bubble gum," recalls Liz Harris, the university’s environmental officer.
「學生們會用鼻子嗅一嗅，看看能否聞到薄荷味或泡泡糖的味道，」該校環境官員利茲哈裡斯回憶道。
It’s because so much of the chewing gum sold on the high street is a polymer [so it] can be used to make new products.
這是因為大街上賣的口香糖是一種聚合物，可以用來製造新產品。
When people get it, it’s a really nice moment.
嚼口香糖是一個非常美好的時刻。
Eighteen months later, the university noticed a drop in gum litter and is expanding the scheme.
18個月後，該校注意到口香糖垃圾減少，不斷擴大該計劃。
Heathrow Airport also ran a three-month trial which it said led to a "noticeable improvement" and saved it ?6,000 in cleaning costs. Great Western Railway has installed the bins in more than 25 of its railway stations and is rolling out the scheme further.
希思羅機場也試用了三個月，表示情況「明顯改善」,節約了6000英鎊的清理成本。大西部鐵路在超過25個火車站安裝了該垃圾箱，並將進一步推廣該計劃。
In each case, the bins did not suddenly solve the problem of gum litter, but they did seem to begin to change people’s behaviour.
垃圾箱並沒有解決口香糖垃圾的問題，但似乎開始改變人們的行為。