2008年1月31日，国家游泳中心水立方在经历了四年多的建设之后，将迎来第一次全面的检测，“好运北京”游泳测试赛将在此举行，这也意味着水立方将正式竣工并时刻准备着迎接奥运的到来。

A general view shows the interior of the National Aquatics Centre, also known as the Water Cube, in Beijing January 7, 2008.[Agencies]

The "Water Cube", or National Aquatics Center, will host its first major swimming event this month.

Final preparations are being made for the "Good Luck Beijing" Swimming China Open, which will run from January 31 to February 5.

The center will be one of the key venues during the Beijing Olympics, playing host to the swimming, diving, and synchronized swimming events, with 42 gold medals up for grabs.

The stadium has a capacity of 17,000, comprising 6,000 permanent seats and 11,000 temporary ones, which can be installed for major events.

"Our ideas for the project have almost been realized," Zhao Xiaojun, one of the Water Cube's designers, said during an interview on CCTV on Wednesday.

Some 6,700 tons of steel, 1,300 tons of welding rods and more than 3,000 pieces of special outer membrane material were used to construct the 80,000-sq-m facility just west of the National Stadium, or "Bird's Nest".

The venue has attracted worldwide attention with its unique blue bubble design.

"At the beginning of the design process, we decided the venue should express a kind of happiness that combines water and people," Zhao said.

The exterior is covered with a membrane made of an advanced material known as ethylene-tetra-fluoro-ethylene, or ETFE.

The Water Cube uses more than 100,000 sq m of ETFE, making it the world's largest single structure made of the material.

"The lifespan of the material is about 30 years so the economic returns for the whole project should be very good," Zhao said.

(China Daily)

Vocabulary:

ethylene-tetra-fluoro-ethylene: 乙烯-四氟乙烯共聚物，简称ETFE，是水立方外立面所使用的透明膜材。

（英语点津 Celene 编辑）