The consequences of heavy drinking are well documented: failing health, broken marriages, regrettable late-night phone calls. But according to Gregory Luzaich"s calculations, there can be a downside to modest drinking, too—though one that damages the wallet, not the liver. The Pek Wine Steward prevents wine from spoiling by injecting argon, an inert gas, into the bottle before sealing it airtight with silicon. Mr. Luzaich, a mechanical engineer in Windsor, Calif—in the Sonoma County wine country—first tallied the costs of his reasonable consumption in October 2001. "I"d like to come home in the evening and have a glass of wine with dinner", he said. "My wife doesn"t drink very much. so the bottle wouldn"t get consumed. And maybe I would forget about it the next day, and I"d check back a day or two later, and the wine would be spoiled". That meant he was wasting most of a $15 to $20 bottle of wine dozens of times a year. A cheek of the wine-preservation gadgets on the market left Mr. Luzaich dissatisfied High-end wine cabinets cost thousands of dollars—a huge investment for a glass-a-day drinker. Affordable preservers, meanwhile, didn"t quite perform to Mr. Luzaich"s liking; be thought they allowed too much oxidation, which degrades the taste of a wine. The solution, he decided, was a better gas. Many preservers pumped nitrogen into an opened bottle to slow a wine"s decline, even though oenological literature suggested that argon was more effective. So when he began designing the Pek Wine Steward, a metal cone into which a wine bottle is inserted, Mr. Luzaich found that his main challenge was to figure out how best to introduce the argon. He spent months fine-tuning a gas injection system. "We used computational fluid dynamics to model the gas flow", Mr. Luzaich said, referring to a computer-analysis technique that measures how smoothly particles are flowing. The goal was to create an injector that could swap a bottle"s oxygen atoms for argon atoms; argon is an inert gas, and thus unlikely to harm a nice Chianti. Mr. Luzaich, who had previously designed medical and telecommunications products, also worked on creating an airtight seal, to secure the bottle after the argon was injected. He experimented with several substances, from neoprene to a visco-elastic polymer (which he dismissed as "too gooey"), before settling on a food-grade silicon. To save wine, a bottle is placed inside the Pek Wine Steward, the top is closed, and a trigger is pulled for 5 to 10 seconds, depending on how much wine remains. When the trigger is released, the bottle is sealed automatically, preserving the wine for a week or more. The company says. "We wanted to make it very easy for the consumer", Mr. Luzaich said. "It"s basically mindless". The device, which resembles a high-tech thermos, first became available to consumers in March 2004, and 8,000 to 10,000 have been sold, primarily through catalogs like those of The Wine Enthusiast and Hammacher Schlemmer The base model sells for $99; a deluxe model, which also includes a thermoelectric cooler, is $199.

单选题 According to Gregory Luzaich. the disadvantage of modest drinking is______.

【正确答案】 B

【答案解析】解析：事实细节题。关于Gregory Luzaich对于适度饮酒的观点，第一段有些论述："there can be a downside to modest drinking. too—though one that damages the wallet, not the liver"。但对这句话的理解本身有一定的难度，会给考生造成一定的田难，这句话意思是"适度饮酒也有不好的方面，尽管不是损害肝脏，却损害钱包(浪费钱)"。要准确理解这句话，需要结合第二段，第二段讲到Luzaich每天喝酒不多，酒还没喝完就变质了，因此很浪费钱。可见，适度喝酒的不利之处就是会多花钱。

单选题 The word "tallied"(Para. 2) probably means______.

【正确答案】 A

【答案解析】解析：猜词题。单词所在的句子为"Mr. Luzaich, a mechanical engineer in Windsor, Calif.—in the Sonoma County wine country—first tallied the costs of his reasonable consumption in October 2001."(Luzaich先生是加利福尼亚州温莎的机械工程师，他2001年10月第一次…适度饮酒的费用。)文中后面他说的话是他浪费了好多酒的事实，而并未给出他饮酒的费用，因此，四个选项"计算"，"符合"，"列出"，"给出"中，仅有答案选项符合逻辑，通过计算他得出自己喝酒其实浪费许多。

单选题 According to the text, the "Pek Wine Steward" is______.

【正确答案】 D

【答案解析】解析：事实细节题。Pek Wine Steward在文中多次提到，最开始是第二段开头"The Pek Wine Steward prevents wine from spoiling by injecting argon, an inert gas, into the bottle before sealing it airtight with silicon."这可以说是对其功效及原理的一个解释—它通过在把酒用硅封盖之前注入惰性气体氩来防止酒变质，而究竟是什么东西还得看下面的论述。后面提到其发明者对市面上酒的保存工具不满意才自己研制出这种器具，第五段又讲到其具体的工作原理，也是为了使酒保鲜。那么大致可以判断是酒保鲜器具。"金属圆锥体"，第四段提到"the Pek Wine Steward, a metal cone into which a wine bottle is inserted"，但这只是其外形而已；"热电冷却器"是豪华版Pek Wine Steward包括的一个部分；"气体注入"不符合文意；所以答案选项是正确的。

单选题 Mr. Luzaich created the seal to prevent the wine from declining with______.

【正确答案】 C

【答案解析】解析：事实细节题。题目，问的是Luzaich先生创造的防止酒变质的盖子是什么做的。这个题目具有—定的迷惑性，因为全文讲的是防止酒变质的设备，而不是单独的盖子，这个设备的主体原理是注入氩来防止变质，但是盖子的材料却不一样。全文有几处提到，第二段一开始"before sealing it airtight with silicon"，第四段"He experimented with several substances，from neoprene to a visco-elastic polymer (which he dismissed as "toogooey")，before settling on a food-grade silicon."(他试验了几种材料，从氯丁橡胶到黏性聚合体(他觉得"太黏了"所以没用)，最后选定了食品用硅)。因此，做盖子的材料是硅。