Discovery of the granulite xenoliths in Cenozoic volcanic rocks from Hoh Xil,Tibetan plateau

Two-pyroxene granulite and clinopyroxene granulite xenoliths have been recently discovered in the Late Paleogene toNeogene volcanic rocks (with ages in the range of 4.27～44.60 Ma) that outcropped in Hoh Xil, central Tibetan plateau. Based on theelectron microprobe analysis data, the xenoliths provide constraints for the formation equilibrium temperatures of the two-pyroxene gran-ulite being about 783 to 818℃ as determined by two-pyroxene thermometry and the forming pressure of the clinopyroxene granulite beingabout 0.845 to 0.858 GPa that is equivalent to 27.9～28.3 km depth respectively. It indicates that these granulite xenoliths represent thesamples from the middle part of the thickened Tibetan crust. This discovery is important and significant to making further discussion onthe component and thermal regime of the deep crust of the Tibetan plateau.     

Design and application of 60mer oligonucleotide microarray in SARS coronavirus detection

In April 2003, a novel coronavirus[1,2] which was associated with cases of Severe Acute Respiratory Syn-drome (SARS) was first isolated and sequenced in Canada. The genome of SARS coronavirus (SARS-CoV) is 29727[3] nucleotides in length and has 11 known open reading frames (ORFs). Although the genome organiza-tion of this virus is similar to that of other coronaviruses, phylogenetic analyses and sequence alignment show that SARS-CoV is not closely related to any of the previously ch…     

Do multiple cycles of aeolian deposit-pedogenesis exist in the reticulate red clay sections in southern China?

Since the Quaternary scientists successfully dis-closed the paleoclimatic significance of the loess-paleo- sol sequence in the Loess Plateau, Northwest China, the loess-paleosol sequence has become well-known terres-trial materials revealing the multiple cyclic changes of Quaternary climates. As a carrier of paleoenvironmental information, it could compare beauty with the deep ocean deposit[8]. In recent years, however, the researchers began to put their sights to southern China. They try t…     

Holocene lake deposits of Bosten Lake, southern Xinjiang, China

A 9.25-m-long sediment core from Bosten Lake,Xinjiang, provides detailed information about changes in the water budget and biological acticity over the last 8400 cal-endar years. The chronology is constructed from six AMS radiocarbon dates on the terrestrial plant remains. Based onanalyses of TOC, CO3, detrital compounds and biogenic SiO2,lake level fluctuations and periods of remarkably-negative water budget appeared at 8.4-8.2 cal ka, 7.38-7.25 cal ka,5.7-5.5 cal ka, 3.7-3.4 cal ka and 3.3-2.9 cal ka, respec-tively. As they are in-phase with low lake levels at Sumxl Co and Bangong Co in western Tibet Plateau and with paleo-lakes in Inner Mongolia, a climate-induced change to some-what drier and warmer conditions is inferred. A further drop in lake level after 1320 AD of about 200 yr duration may heattributed to a negative water balance prior to the main phase of the Little Ice Age. Deep and stable lake phases of 1500 yr and 1800 yr duration at 7.2-5.7 cal ka and 5.5-3.7cal ka coincide with maximum moisture during the Holocene Megathermai in China. The long term trend towards aridity since about 4.3 cal ka can dearly be recognised. The reduced water budget of Bosten Lake from 640-1200 AD may be attributed to local effects.     

The age of formation of the mirabilite and sand wedges in the Hexi Corridor and their paleoclimatic interpretation

The Hexi Corridor is located at the transition zone of the Asian summer monsoon and westerly airflow, and lies in an important position in terms of its ecological fragility and climatic sensitivity. During a recent field expedition to this region, we found a sedimentary mirabilite layer in a number of localities including Suwushan, Yanchi, Baitujing, Yanchi Gaotai, Huahai, Yumen, Halanuo扙r, and Dunhuang (Fig. 1), which have the potential to provide important information about environmenta…     

Temperature variations on the Tibetan Plateau over the last two millennia

The paleoclimate data recovered from ice cores,tree rings and lake sediments indicate regional features of cfimatic change on the Tibeta n Plateau (TP) during the last 2000 years. The composite temperature reconstructions in-dicate that several main climatic episodes, such as the “LittleIce Age“ between 1400 and 1900, the “Medieval Warm Pe-riod“ in 1150-1400, a less warm period in 800-1100, and an earlier cold period between the 3rd and 5th centuries,occurred in the TP. In addition, temperature varied from region to region. The period from AD 800 to 1100, which waswarm in northeastern TP, was contemporaneous with cool-ing in the western and southern TP. The southern TP ex-perienced warming between 1150 and 1400. For western TP,the δ^18O records of the Guliya ice core indicate that the pe-Hod 1250-1500 witnessed a clear warming. Large-scaletrends in the temperature history from northeastern TP aremore similar to those in eastern China than are the trendsfrom the Guliya ice cap far to the west and southern TP. The most prominent similarities between the temperature varia-tions of the TP and eastern China are such cold phases as 1100-1150, 1500-1550, 1650-1700 and 1800-1850, andthe latter three cold events match with three widespreadg lacial advances which occurred on the TP during the Little Ice A2e.     

A carbon- and oxygen-isotope record of recent environ- mental change from Qinghai Lake, NE Tibetan Plateau

An understanding of natural climatic variability is essential for evaluating anthropogenic impacts on recent and future climate[1—3]. Due to the lack of lengthy instrumental records, such an understanding must be gained from natural archives of climate change. Palaeolimnological indicators of past lake levels may provide a sensitive record of changes in effective precipitation in closed basins. This approach is particularly relevant on the Tibetan Plateau, where instrumental records are very…     

Climatic significance of stable carbon isotope in tree rings of Abies spectabibis in southeastern Tibet

The annually cross-dated stable carbon isotope of tree-ring a-cellulose of Abies spectabibis collected from the southeastern Tibetan Plateau is used to examine its rela-tionship with climatic parameters. The residual D13C series in treerings is constructed after removing the effects of age trend and rising CO2. We found a close relationship between D13C in tree rings and the relative humidity of September—November of the previous year measured at the nearby Ny-ingchi Meteorological Station, albeit a strong 搇agged effect? Thus we developed a transfer function to reconstruct the autumn relative humidity for the Nyingchi region, which explained 37.9% of the total variance (p < 0.001). Our results suggest a high frequency and moderate amplitude variance of the relative humidity before 1800, and the variance re-versed afterwards.     

Nanoengineering of Flux Pinning Sites in High－Tc Superconductors

Volume pinning forces were determined for a variety of bulk high-Tc superconductors of the 123-type from magnetization measurements. By means of scaling of the pinning forces, the acting pinning mechanisms in various temperature ranges were identified. The Nd-based superconductors and some YBCO crystals exhibited a dominating pinning of the δTc-type (i.e., small, superconducting pinning sites). In contrast to this, the addition of insulating 211 particles provided pinning of the δl-type; providing effective pinning in the entire temperature range acting as a “background” pinning mechanism for the peak effect. Due to the small coherence lengths of the high-Tc compounds, effective pinning sites are defects or particles of nanometer size relative to ε^3. Integral magnetic measurements of the magnetization as a function of temperature in large applied magnetic fields (up to 7 T) revealed that practically all high-Tccompounds were spatially inhomogeneous, which could becaused by oxygen deficiency (YBCO), solid solutions of Nd/Ba (NdBCO and other light rare earth compounds), intergrowths (Bi-based superconductors), and doping by pair-breaking dopants like Zn, Pr. This implies that the superconducting sample consists of stronger and weaker superconducting areas, coupled together. In large applied fields, this coupling gets broken and the magnetization versus temperature curves revealed more than one superconducting transition. In contrast, irradiation experiments by neutrons, protons,and heavy-ions enabled the artificial introduction of very effective pinning sites into the high-Tc superconductors, thus creating a large variety of different observations using magnetic data. From all these observations, we construct a pinning diagram for bulk high-Tc superconductors explaining many featuresobserved in high-Tc samples.