Late Miocene–early Pleistocene paleoproductivity variations of the Lop Nor in the Tarim Basin and its implications on aridification in Asian Interior

Extensive lacustrine deposits in the eastern Tarim Basin provide records of climate change influenced by the westerly winds and the Asian monsoon. To char- acterize the evolution of climate change in this region, we analyze elemental concentrations of barium （Ba） from the Ls2 drill core of Lop Nor, a paleo-lakebed located in the eastern Tarim Basin. Biogenic Ba concentrations from this drill core display a large-amplitude oscillation that gener- ally follows a pattern similar to that of Artemisia content and ostracod assemblages, suggesting that is may serve as an index for climate change experienced in the basin. Our results indicate that biogenic Ba is especially sensitive to precipitation. All climatic proxies served in this study vary significantly over late Miocene to early Pleistocene time period. Strong aridification of eastern Tarim in the late Miocene to the early Pliocene may be attributed to a lati- tudinal shift in the westerly winds, which would have resulted in more moisture transported to southern and eastern Tibet. The growth of the Himalaya and Tibetan Plateau may have acted as an orographic barrier that blocked moisture sourced in the south from the northern margins of the plateau. We link weaker aridification in the late Pliocene to an increased intensity of the Indian Monsoon.     

Analysis of the matrilineal genetic structure of population in the early Iron Age from Tarim Basin, Xinjiang, China

Ancient mtDNA data of human remains were analyzed from four early Iron Age Tarim Basin sites （Yuansha, Zaghunluq, Sampula and Niya） in the southern Silk Road region. Haplogroup distributions show that ancient Tarim Basin population was comprised of well-differentiated Western and Eastern matrilineal lineages. Some West lineage of Tarim Basin population originated from Near East and Iran region. Of the East lineages, North and Northeast Asia originated lineages were the main components, and a few Southeast Asian lineages also existed, which indicated a more extensive origin and a more complex admixture. The genetic structure of ancient Tarim Basin population is relatively close to the modern populations of Xinjiang, which implied that the early Iron Age is an important period during the formation of the modern Xinjiang population.     

Phenotypic and genetic variation between two populations of the Chinese yellow pond turtle, Mauremys mutica （Cantor, 1842）

Mauremys mutica (Cantor, 1842) is an endangered species in China. Main phenotypic variations in body color, body weight, body shape, clutch size, egg size, and hatchling size were revealed between the southern and northern populations. Both populations have the phenomenon of "larger male" sexual size dimorphism (SSD), especially in the southern population. Furthermore, genetic variations between the two populations were analyzed by RAPD band patterns of 30 random individuals in each population. The average genetic distance was 0.299±0.108 among the samples of two populations. The average genetic distance between southern and northern populations was 0.305±0.046. Cluster analysis indicated that all the individuals from the southern and northern populations were clustered among themselves to form two distinct clades. A total of 20 population-specific RAPD fragments were scored from 16 primers, and could be used as RAPD markers for distinguishing the southern and the northern population. Based on the nucleotide sequences of two RAPD markers, two pairs of SCAR primers (SC1-S and SC2-S) were designed, which could be used as SCAR markers for the southern population. According to the significant phenotypic and genetic variations, we suggested that the northern population and southern population might be considered as two separate taxa, the "northern taxon" and the "southern taxon", and the conservation should be respectively conducted on the two taxa.     

Tectonic types and evolution of Ordovician proto-type basins in the Tarim region

The Ordovician system is an important target for exploration in the Tarim Basin. Restoration of the Ordovician tectono-depositional environment is a key basis for the study of the structural development history in Tarim block and the prediction of the favorable Ordovician reservoir belts （zones）. Based on the surrounding tectonic settings, the litho-facies and sedimentary fill, the palaeo-geography, palaeoclimate and palaeo-ecology, and the structural deformation and magmatic eruptions, in this paper we combine the sedimentary fill in the basin with the development of the surrounding orogenic belts and re-build the proto-type basins of the different Ordovician periods. During the Ordovician period, the Tarim region was characterized by the composite of the interior cratonic depression with the peripheral cratonic depression. The interior cratonic depression in the central and western parts is mainly the deposiUonal area of the platform facies while the peripheral cratonic depression in the eastern part is mainly the zone of deepwater basin facies, with the slope acting as the transition belt between them. During the Late Ordovician period, the closure of the Northern Kunlun Ocean and destruction of the trench-arc-basin system in the Altyn Tagh region put the southern part of the Tarim block under com- pression and uplifting and turned the central and western parts of the carbonate platform into the mixed deposiUonal continental shelf. The eastern region of the basin had the over-compensated flysch sedimentation with huge thickness, marking the drastic turn of the basin nature. The basin tectonic framework turned to the south-north differentiation of the Silurian period from the east-west differentiation of the Ordovician period.     

Possible solar forcing of climate variability in the past 4000 years inferred from a proxy record at the southern margin of Tarim Basin

A ca. 4000a decadal-resolution climate proxy record of the mean grain-size from a lake (or mash) sediment at the southern margin of the Tarim Basin, correlates visually with the atmospheric 14C record from tree ring (residual △^14C, solar proxy) and the GISP2 ice core δ^18O record (temperature proxy). In general, △^14C maxima (solar minima) are coincident with cold (wet) periods in the study area and cold periods in the Greenland ice core. Power spectrum analysis revealed statistically significant periodicities of 196a, 121a, 97a, 62a, 45a and 33--30a, which are similar to those principal solar-oscillation periods as inferred from the atmospheric radiocarbon and other proxy records. Possible solar forcing is addressed to be the main driving forcing of climate change in the southern margin of Tarim Basin.     

Late Cenozoic high-resolution magnetostratigraphy in the Kunlun Pass Basin and its implications for the uplift of the northern Tibetan Plateau

The Kunlun Pass Basin, located in the middle of the eastern Kunlun Mountains, received relatively continuous late Cenozoic sediments from the surrounding mountains, archiving great information to understand the deformation and uplift histories of the northern Tibetan Plateau. The Kunlun-Yellow River Movement, identified from the tectonomorphologic and sedimentary evolution of the Kunlun Pass Basin by Cui Zhijiu et al. （1997, 1998）, is roughly coincident with many important global and Plateau climatic and environmental events, becoming a crucial time interval to understand tectonic-climatic interactions. However, the ages used to constrict the events remain great uncertainty. Here, we present the results of detailed magnetostratigraphy of the late Cenozoic sediments in the Kunlun Pass Basin, which show the basin sediments were formed between about 3.6 Ma and 0.5 Ma and the Kunlun-Yellow River Movement occurred at 1.2 to ～0.78 Ma. The lithology, sedimentary facies and lithofacies associations divide the basin into five stages of tectonosedimentary evolution, indicating the northern Tibetan Plateau having experienced five episodes of tectonic uplifts at ～3.6, 2.69-2.58, 1.77, 1.2, 0.87 and ～0.78 Ma since the Pliocene.     

Correlations between North Atlantic Oscillation Index in winter and eastern China Flood/Drought Index in summer in the last 530 years

The time series of winter North Atlantic Oscillation Index （NAOI） in the period of 1429-1983 developed by Glueck and summer Flood/Drought Index （FDI） of eastern China in the period of 1470-1999 from I00 stations are used in this paper to study the potential impact of North Atlantic Oscillation on the climate in China. The analysis has explored some significant lag correlations between FDI and NAOI. The maximum positive correlation coefficients between NAOI and area-mean FDI in eastern and northern China lagging 2-3 years reach at 0.001 significance level, and while there are also negative correlation between NAOI and FDI in central and southern China at significance level of 0.05-0.01. The correlation between FDI and NAOI is time-dependent, i.e. the correlation coefficients between two indices vary from period to period. The highest correlation appeared in the period of 1636-1742, around the Little Ice Age, with the significant level of far above 0.001. The second significant period was from 1951 to 1999, at the level of 0.005-0.002. Both the power spectrum analysis and Morlet wavelet transformation have presented an interesting phenomenon： the area-mean FDIs in eastern and northern China share almost the same oscillation periods with NAOI in the inter-annual, decadal and centurial scales＇ oscillations, i.e. 4-5, about I0, 20-30, around 50 and 80-100 years, etc. The Mann-Kendall Rank Statistic test reveals the significant trend and decadal abrupt changes in the series of area-mean FDIs in eastern and northern China in the past 530 years, while the NAOI in the past 400 years, did not show such trend at the significance level, but presented more frequent changes than those of FDI in China. This difference is perhaps due to the fact that the amplitude of the extremes of reconstructed NAOI series is less than that from instrumental records.     

Discovery of a large area of ice-wedge networks in Ordos： Implications for the southern boundary of permafrost in the north of China as well as for the environment in the latest 20 kaBP

Deep sea deposits, ice cores and loess deposits have been used extensively and successfully, to study global climatic changes. Since permafrost is a consequence of cold climates, indicators of permafrost can also be used to reconstruct ancient climates in certain areas during certain periods. The recent discovery of large areas of ice wedge networks, and determination of their ages, have enabled us to locate the southern boundary of the permafrost that ex-isted in China about 20 thousand years…     

Genetic diversity in the male-specific <Emphasis Type="Italic">SRY</Emphasis> gene of <Emphasis Type="Italic">Lepus yarkandensis</Emphasis>

Lepus yarkandensis, an endemic hare species in the Tarim Basin of China, has been suffering from habitat fragmentation due to desert expansion. To evaluate the effect of habitat fragmentation on its genetic diversity, the genetic diversity based on male-specific SRY gene marker is examined. A relatively low level of SRY genetic diversity is found compared to previous studies with mtDNA data, possibly due to the low SRY mutation rate and positive selection. Furthermore, one haplotype exists in eight populations along the Tarim River but not in many other relatively isolated populations, suggesting that habitat fragmentation may affect population divergence. Despite this, our pairwise Fst analysis shows no significant differentiation among populations, and this may be mainly caused by positive selection on the SRY gene in that 88 percent of individuals share the same haplotype. Finally, the phylogenetic analysis shows deep differentiation between L. yarkandensis and other two hare species (L. capensis and L. europaeus).     

大风对新疆沙尘暴的影响

选取1961-1999年新疆90个气象观测站的气表-1资料,对比分析了沙尘暴及大风的时空分布特征,探讨大风对沙尘暴发生的贡献及沙尘暴发生时的最多风向和最低风速指标。分析发现,新疆沙尘暴与大风的地理分布刚好相反,沙尘暴多的地区大风较少,但有着基本一致的气候变化趋势。大风对沙尘暴的贡献北疆大于南疆。沙尘暴发生时的最多风向明显指示出引发沙尘暴的天气系统来向。引起沙尘暴的最低风速指标,北疆及东疆超过10m/s,南疆的吐鄯托盆地和焉耆盆地为10m/s,塔里木盆地为6～8m/s,盆地南缘只有6m/s.     

Focal depth research of earthquakes in Mainland China: Implication for tectonics

Focal depth data of earthquakes in Mainland China are processed and analyzed in this paper, as well as the relationship between the focal depths and large-scale tectonic structures. As a basic parameter for earthquakes, focal depth is used to investigate deep environment of seismogenic regions, tectonic backgrounds for concentration and release of seismic energy, the inner crustal deformation and its mechanic features. Depth data of 31282 ML≥2.0 events with 1st class and 2nd class precision in Mainland China from Jan. 1, 1970 to May 31, 2000 are used to get spatial features of earthquakes distributed with depth and to provide average depth for each grid area throughout China. Researches show that the average depth (D-) for all the earthquakes used in this paper is (16±7) km, and (13±6) km and (18±8) km for the events in eastern China and western China, respectively. The area with the deepest focal depth is located in southwest Xinjiang region, near the western and southwestern ends of the Tarim Basin. The focal depth related to large-scale tectonic structures, for instance, = (33±12), (21±10), (14±7), (11±5) and (10±4) km in Tibet plateau block, Xinjiang block, North China, Northeastern China and South China, respectively. The earthquakes are deeper at the bounders of the integrated tectonic blocks, including the southwestern and northern brims of the Tarim Basin, southern brim of the Zhunge'r Basin and that of the Alashan block, as well as the eastern and western sides of the Edos block and the western brim of the Sichuan Basin. The earthquakes at the newly ruptured belts are relatively shallower, for instance, at the southwestern Yunnan seismic belt and the Zhangjiakou-Bohai seismic belt. The mechanic behavior, deformation and features for the crust and mantle structures are also discussed.     

Trace-element of Tuoyun clinopyroxene: Implication for the deep processes of lithospheric mantle beneath the southwest Tianshan, West China

Based on the LAM-ICPMS analytic results on the trace elements of clinopyroxenes in peridotitic xenoliths occurring in early-Cretaceous basalts from western Xinjiang, the properties and the deep processes, including partial melting and mantle metasomatism, of the subcontinental lithospheric mantle beneath the Tuoyun Basin are analyzed. In the northern edge of the Tarim Basin (southwest Tianshan), the Mesozoic subcontinental lithosphere which has experienced the effect of partial melting (<10%) and intricate mantle metasomatism is characterized by Phanerozoic ‘ocean-type’ mantle. The superposed influence of SiO₂-unsaturated silicate melt and carbonate melt probably results in the metasomatic medium which resembles the hydrous silicated carbonate melt in some aspects. By comparing Tuoyun mantle with Cenozoic main mantle beneath eastern China, the properties are similar, while the former shows finer grain and higher diopside content of the peridotites and more conspicuous modal metasomatism.     

四川盆地古地温梯度和中-新生代构造热历史

根据27口井的镜质体反射率剖面,恢复了四川盆地早白垩世末—古新世时的古地温梯度.结果表明,古地温梯度介于20~25℃.km-1,总体呈南部略大于北部、东部大于西部的分布特征.根据古今地温梯度的对比,川西坳陷新生代早期以来地温梯度没有明显的变化,川东和川东北地区晚中生代以来地温梯度下降,而川中和川南地区晚中生代以来地温梯度升高.结合构造演化背景分析,盆地中新生代热历史主要受二叠纪末期的构造热事件、中生代晚期以来岩石圈厚度演化以及现今活动构造的影响.其中,二叠纪末期的构造热事件波及盆地大部分地区;现今活动构造对川南地区有明显的影响;中生代晚期以来的岩石圈厚度演化,可能是控制中新生代盆地大部分地区热历史的主要因素.     

柴达木盆地中新世中期以来构造的运动学模型

柴达木盆地是位于青藏高原内部的山间盆地,盆地新生代的变形受到两侧山体隆升的主导.通过贯穿盆地地震剖面的精细构造解释和分析,依据生长地层的结构,我们认为自中新世中期以来昆仑山前冲断楔体以平均4.7 mm/a的速度向盆地逆冲,导致盆地南斜坡向昆仑山方向仰冲;这为东昆仑山北麓出露的倾向北向南逆冲的多条断层和盆地南部向南逆冲的断层控制的断层相关褶皱作用所证实.盆地北部祁连山前冲断楔体向盆地方向逆冲,导致盆地北部向北逆冲的断层在地表形成北翼陡、南翼缓的断层相关褶皱背斜,向北逆冲的断层在盆地东部局部位置出露地表.昆仑山前冲断楔体和祁连山前冲断楔体的楔顶已经相向冲断至盆地中部,并造成第四系的变形.     

海河流域50年来参考腾发量的时空变化规律及其影响原因

根据海河流域34个站点1957—2007年逐日实测气象资料,结合旋转正交函数(REOF)、参数t检验法和Mann-Kendall检验方法对海河流域参考腾发量(RET)及其相关的4个气象变量(平均气温、风速、相对湿度和日照时数)的时空演变特征进行了分析,在此基础上,分析了RET对气象变量的敏感性,定量评估了气象变量对RET变化的贡献程度,探讨了影响RET变化的可能原因.结果表明,过去50年,海河流域59%的站点RET呈现显著下降趋势,主要分布在东部平原区,呈现显著上升趋势的站点主要分布在西部山地区.依据REOF分析结果,海河流域可以划分为3个区域:西部区、北部区和东部区;北部区和东部区的RET都呈现出显著的减少趋势,而西部区则呈现出显著的增加趋势;相对湿度是对RET最敏感的气象变量,风速和日照时数次之,平均气温对RET的敏感性最小;海河流域西部区RET的增加主要是由该区域显著减少的相对湿度所引起的,而北部区和东部区显著下降的风速和日照时数是导致这两个区域RET减少的主要原因.     

Recent rapid shortening of crust across the Tianshan Mts. and relative motion of tectonic blocks in the north and south

Based on the multiple-epoch Global Positioning System observations during a period from 1992 to 1999, we document directly a rapid crustal shortening of ～20 mm/a across the western Tianshan Mts. (76°E), in contrast to a 4 mm/a convergent rate across the eastern Tianshan Mts. (87°E)and the north-south convergence across the mountain belt descends laterally from west to east. The direction of current crustal movement inferred by GPS sites along the southern flank of the Tianshan Mts. is approximately perpendicular to the easterly-trending mountain belt, indicating that the Tarim Basin thrust almost rightly into the Tianshan Mts. The Tarim Basin accommodates nearly no or a minor, if any, crustal deformation and rotates clockwise, as a rigid body in a whole, at a rate of 0.64°/Ma around a Euler pole at 95.7°E, 40.3°N (Anxi, Gansu) with respect to the stable Siberia. The relative motion between the Kazakh platform and the Dzungarian Basin is quite apparent. The Dzungar should be regarded as an independent active block from the view of the Asia tectonic settings.     

大花序桉群体适应性相关的SSR位点

【目的】检测大花序桉群体与环境适应性相关的基因组位点,为种质资源保护和利用提供分子生物学信息。【方法】利用84个SSR标记(包括29个基因组SSR 和55个EST-SSR)分析引种到广西,来源于澳大利亚昆土兰州北部和南部各7个大花序桉群体,通过Mantel 检验确定群体间是否存在地理隔离;检测群体间分化系数(F_st)离群值的受选择位点;并基于空间分析法检测与群体气候因子显著相关的等位片段,将显著相关位点的序列与NCBI数据库比对进行功能注释。【结果】大花序桉北部与南部群体间存在地理隔离,基于19个气候因子的聚类分析将北方与南方群体分为独立的组,这表明气候因子亦驱动了群体的分化。共检测到F_st离群值的受选择SSR位点39个(46.4%),其中,LOSITAN软件检测到12个正向选择位点和17个平衡选择位点。5个F_st离群值位点的6个等位片段与1个或多个气候因子显著相关(P<0.001),其等位频率在北部与南部群体间差异明显,其中,Embra6-118 bp与最冷月最低气温(T_mcm)显著相关,位点DNA序列的功能注释为碱性螺旋-环-螺旋(basic helix-loop-helix, bHLH)转录因子bHLH155;Embra20-121 bp与最暖季度降水量(P_wq)显著相关,位点的功能注释为蔗糖转运蛋白(sucrose transporters);EUCeSSR676-168 bp与T_mcm、P_wq、年均气温(T_ma)和最暖月最高气温(T_mwm)均显著相关,位点的功能注释为光系统Ⅱ稳定性/组装因子HCF136 (photosystem II stability/assembly factor HCF136);另外两个显著相关位点EUCeSSR298和EUCeSSR1009的功能未知。【结论】大花序桉北部与南部群体的显著分化受长期气候的影响,在第四纪大冰期可能存在北部和南部避难所。与气候因子显著相关的SSR位点在北部和南部群体间的等位频率差异为基于正向选择的气候适应性提供了分子证据。