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…     

Analysis of cDNA sequence, protein structure and expression of parotid secretory protein in pig

Parotid secretory protein (PSP) secreted abundantly in saliva, whose function is related with the anti-bacterial effect. The PSP cDNA has been isolated from pig parotid glands by 3′ and 5′ rapid amplification of cDNA end (RACE), based on the conserved signal peptide region among the known mammalian PSP. The result of homologous comparison shows that pig PSP and human PSP shares the high identity at the level of the primary, secondary and tertiary protein structure. A search for functionally significant protein motifs revealed a unique amino acid sequence pattern consisting of the residues Leu-X(6)-Leu-X(6)-Leu-X(7)-Leu-X(6)-Leu-X(6)-Leu near the amino-terminal portion of the protein, which is important to its function. RT-PCR, Dot blot and Northern blot analysis demonstrated that PSP was strongly expressed in parotid glands, but not in other tissues.     

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.     

Time-division phase modulated single-photon interference in a Sagnac interferometer

We introduce a stable, long-distance singlephoton Sagnac interferometer, which has a balanced configuration to efficiently compensate phase drift caused by change of the fiber-optic path. By using time-division phase modulation, single-photon interference was realized at 1550nm in a 5-km-long as well as 27-km-long Sagnac fiber loops,with a fringe visibility higher than 90% and long-term stability. The stable performance of the single-photon interference indicated that the time-division phase-modulated Sagnac interferometer might readily lead to practical applications in single-photon routing and quantum cryptography.     

Contributions of different land cover types in Otindag Sandy Land and Bashang area of Hebei Province to the material source of sand stormy weather in Beijing

Different land cover types in Otindag Sandy Land and Bashang area of Hebei Province are linked to a material source of sand stormy weather in Beijing based on results of field vegetation and soil survey and laboratory works. Results of grain size analysis show that dust release potential in per unit area of moving sandy land is small,while lowland meadow and meadow steppe in stony hills have high potential of releasing dusts in per unit area during sand stormy weather occurrence. Further considering the effects of vegetation, it is inferred that the moving sandy land served as a material source of past dust storm and the possibility of dust release in per unit area is low in current time.Typical steppe in stony hills is undergoing desertification and its dust release possibility in per unit area is high. Farmland has strong potential of release dusts when they are ploughed in spring, but a large amount of therophytes grow and thus prevent dusts from release when cultivation was terminated.Potentials of dust release in per unit area in fixed sand dunes,stony mountain meadow steppe and low land meadow are lowdue to high cover of perennials. Sand dune reactivation and desiccation of lakes and lowlands under estimated future climatic change will make them serve as a future material source of sand stormy weather.     

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.     

Evolution of the South China Sea and monsoon history revealed in deep-sea records

As the third summary report of ODP Leg 184 to the South China Sea (SCS), this paper discusses the evolution of the East Asian monsoon and the SCS basin. A multi-proxy approach, involving geochemistry, micropale-ontology, pollen and other analyses, was adopted for reconstructing the evolutionary history of the East Asian monsoon, which was characterized by a series of paleo-climate events especially at 8, 3.2, 2.2 and 0.4 Ma. The new record indicates similar stages in the development of the East and South Asian monsoons, with an enhanced winter monsoon over East Asia being the major difference. The rich spectrums of monsoon variability from the southern SCS also reveal other characteristic features of the low latitude ocean. Evidence for the evolution of the SCS includes the hemipelagic Oligocene sediments, implying the existence of deep water environments during the early seafloor spreading stage of the SCS basin. The four major unconformities and some remarkabl ediagenetic features in upper Oligocene deposits indicate the strongest tectonic events in the region. From a careful comparison of lithologies and sedimentation rates, we conclude that the prominent differences in sedimentary environments between the southern and northern SCS were established only by ～3 Ma.     

Inhibitory effect of the adenovirus type 5 E1A protein expressed in the yeast system of the human tumor cell growth

Adenovirus 5 type E1A as a tumor suppressor gene can inhibit tumor growth and enhance the censitivity of chemotherapy and radiotherapy.E1A have the ability to integrate into the host genome,resulting in long-time expres-sion that induces Rb gene inactivation and animal cells im-mortalization.This prompted us to select the E1A protein for treatment of cancer in order to overcome the limitations of E1A gene therapy.Thus,we firstly comstructed E1A eu-caryotic expression vector (pPIC9/E1A),transformated the pichia pastoris yeast cells(GS115) and screened the high-expressing recombinant strains.The positive yeast strains were cultured in the shake flask,and induced for 3d.The crude E1A protein was purified using two steps of col-umu chromatography on HiTrap Q and HiTrap SP.The pu-rified E1A protein was identified by SDS-PAGE and Western blot.E1A protein was mostly located at cellular unclear when Cheriot delivered E1A protein into cells.The analysis in vitro indicated that the E1A protein arrested LN686 cell cycle at G2/M phase,and significantly inhibited the growth of LN686 tumor cells.The current studies firstly provided an experimental basis to further develop E1A protein for tumor treatment.