香煙即使熄滅后，也會產生看不見的化學物質

香煙即使熄滅后，也會產生看不見的化學物質

Cigarettes aren't just toxic when they're being smoked. Even when the butts are scrunched up and cold, new research has found they continue to emit harmful compounds in the air.

香煙不僅有毒。新的研究發(fā)現(xiàn)，即使這些煙蒂被揉成一團并變冷，它們仍會繼續(xù)向空氣中釋放有害化合物。

In the first 24 hours alone, scientists say a used cigarette butt will produce 14 percent of the nicotine that an actively burning cigarette would. And the airborne emissions don't stop there.

科學家說，僅在開始的24小時內，一個用過的煙蒂就會產生14%的尼古丁，相當于一支正在燃燒的香煙所產生的尼古丁量。空氣中的排放物還不止這些。

While most of these chemicals are released within a day of being extinguished, an analysis for the United States Food and Drug Administration (FDA) found concentrations of nicotine and triacetin - a plasticiser in cigarette filters - had fallen by just half a whopping five days later.

雖然這些化學物質中的大多數(shù)在熄滅后的一天內就會釋放出來，但美國食品和藥物管理局(FDA)的一項分析發(fā)現(xiàn)，尼古丁和三乙酸乙酯(香煙過濾嘴中的一種塑化劑)的濃度在五天之后只下降了一半。

I was absolutely surprised, says environmental engineer Dustin Poppendieck from the United States National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST).

美國國家標準與技術研究所(NIST)的環(huán)境工程師Dustin Poppendieck說:“我非常驚訝。”

The numbers are significant and could have important impacts when butts are disposed of indoors or in cars.

“這些數(shù)字很重要，當煙蒂被丟棄在室內或車內時，可能會產生重要影響。”

While much attention has been paid to the health impacts of first-hand, second-handand now third-hand smoking - where chemical residues linger on walls and furniture - the actual butt of the matter has been paid little attention.

盡管人們對一手煙、二手煙和現(xiàn)在的三手煙對健康的影響給予了很多關注——這些化學殘留物會殘留在墻壁和家具上——但人們對實際問題的關注卻很少。

To measure airborne emissions from this forgotten remnant, Poppendieck and his team placed 2,100 recently extinguished cigarettes inside a walk-in chamber made of stainless steel.

為了測量這一被遺忘的殘留物在空氣中的排放量，Poppendieck和他的團隊將2100根最近熄滅的香煙放在一個由不銹鋼制成的房間里。

Of course, they didn't smoke all these themselves. Instead, the team built a machine to take six puffs per cigarette, mimicking the behaviour of actual humans in robotic-like movements.

當然，他們自己并不抽這些煙。相反，研究小組制造了一臺機器，可以每根香煙吸6口，模仿真實人類的動作，讓機器人做出類似的動作。

Once the freshly-extinguished ends were sealed away, the team measured eight chemicals commonly emitted by cigarettes, four of which the FDA have their eye on for being harmful or potentially so.

一旦熄滅的煙頭被密封起來，研究小組測量了香煙通常釋放的八種化學物質，其中四種是FDA關注的有害物質或潛在有害物質。

Triacetin is not one of the dangerous ones, but because it's so common in cigarette filters and doesn't evaporate easily, it's a good indicator of how other sticky chemicals are breaking down.

三乙醇胺不是一種危險物質，但因為它在香煙濾紙中很常見，不易揮發(fā)，所以它是其他粘性化學物質分解的良好指標。

Fiddling with the room's temperature, humidity and saturation, the authors tested how emissions changed under certain conditions. When the air temperature of the room was higher, for instance, they noticed the butts emitted these chemicals at higher rates.

通過改變房間的溫度、濕度和飽和度，作者測試了在特定條件下排放的變化。例如，當房間的溫度較高時，他們注意到煙頭釋放這些化學物質的速度較快。

In other words, leaving ashtrays out for days at a time, especially in the heat seems like a bad idea, and could potentially expose smokers and nonsmokers to even more harmful chemicals than we thought.

換句話說，一次把煙灰缸放在外面好幾天，尤其是在高溫下，這似乎是個壞主意，可能會讓吸煙者和不吸煙者接觸到比我們想象中更有害的化學物質。

Hence, the study authors conclude, "the emitted nicotine mass from a butt over five days could be comparable to the nicotine mass emitted from mainstream and sidestream smoke, especially at higher temperatures."

“因此，”該研究的作者總結道，“一個煙蒂在5天內釋放出的尼古丁量，可能與主流煙和側煙釋放出的尼古丁量相當，尤其是在高溫下。”

The findings are limited because they only implicate one leading brand of cigarettes and there are few other studies to compare them to. Nevertheless, if the numbers are accurate, it means we've been overlooking a big factor of cigarette smoking.

這些發(fā)現(xiàn)是有限的，因為它們只涉及一個主要品牌的香煙，沒有其他的研究可以對比。然而，如果這些數(shù)字是準確的，那就意味著我們忽略了吸煙的一個重要因素。

Today, it's estimated that more than five trillion butts are produced worldwide each year, and many of these don't get fully extinguished or thrown away properly, causing ground pollution as well, since cigarette butts are not biodegradable.

如今，據(jù)估計，全世界每年生產超過5萬億個煙蒂，其中許多煙蒂沒有完全熄滅或被妥善丟棄，也造成了地面污染，因為煙蒂是不可生物降解的。

You might think that by never smoking in your car when kids are present, you are protecting the nonsmokers or children around you, Poppendieck says.

Poppendieck說:“你可能會認為，當孩子們在場的時候，絕對不要在你的車里吸煙，這是在保護你周圍的不吸煙者和孩子。”

But if the ashtray in your hot car is full of butts that are emitting these chemicals, exposure is happening.

“但如果在你悶熱的車里的煙灰缸里，都是排放這些化學物質的煙頭，那所有人都不能幸免了。”