Exploring seven hundred years of transhumance,climate dynamic,fire and human activity through a historical mountain pass in central Spain

A high-altitude peat sequence from the heart of the Spanish Central System (Gredos range) was analysed through a multi-proxy approach to determine the sensitivity of high-mountain habitats to climate, fire and land use changes during the last seven hundred years, providing valuable insight into our understanding of the vegetation history and environmental changes in a mountain pass close to a traditional route of transhumance. The pollen data indicate that the vegetation was dominated by shrublands and grasslands with scattered pines in high-mountain areas, while in the valleys cereals, chestnut and olive trees were cultivated. Strong declines of high-mountain pines percentages are recorded at 1540, 1675, 1765, 1835 and 1925 cal AD, which may be related to increasing grazing activities and/or the occurrence of anthropogenic fires. The practice of mountain summer farming and transhumance deeply changed and redesigned the landscape of the high altitudes in central Spain (Gredos range) since the Middle Ages, although its dynamics was influenced in some way by climate variability of the past seven centuries.     

Rank-size distributions of Chinese cities: Macro and micro patterns

A large number of studies have been conducted to find a better fit for city rank-size distributions in different countries. Many theoretical curves have been proposed, but no consensus has been reached. This study argues for the importance of examining city rank-size distribution across different city size scales. In addition to focusing on macro patterns, this study examines the micro patterns of city rank-size distributions in China. A moving window method is developed to detect rank-size distributions of cities in different sizes incrementally. The results show that micro patterns of the actual city rank-size distributions in China are much more complex than those suggested by the three theoretical distributions examined(Pareto, quadratic, and q-exponential distributions). City size distributions present persistent discontinuities. Large cities are more evenly distributed than small cities and than that predicted by Zipf′s law. In addition, the trend is becoming more pronounced over time. Medium-sized cities became evenly distributed first and then unevenly distributed thereafter. The rank-size distributions of small cities are relatively consistent. While the three theoretical distributions examined in this study all have the ability to detect the overall dynamics of city rank-size distributions, the actual macro distribution may be composed of a combination of the three theoretical distributions.     

Extraction of basic trends of urban expansion in China over past 40 years from satellite images

If urban sprawl is to be avoided in China in the next ten years, it is not only crucial to understand the overall history, current status, and future trends of urban expansion there, but also these differences, and this is presently lacking. In this study, remotely sensed images with approximately 30 m spatial resolution were used to quantitatively assess the spatial and temporal patterns of urban expansion of 60 Chinese cities(1973–2013). Urban-expansion-process curves of the cities studied were drawn using annual expansion area as an indicator. Curve similarity analysis generated four basic process modes of urban expansion in China. These included cities that: 1) peaked around 2004 and then decelerated; 2) peaked around 2010 and then decelerated; 3) showed sustained acceleration, and 4) showed continued deceleration. Four basic process modes represented cities under different levels of development stage. Geographic location was found to be the most related characteristic to urban expansion process. Regional development policies at the national level in each region also showed highly temporal consistency with fluctuation characteristics of urban expansion process. Urban characteristic such as population size and administrative level were not found to be significantly related to urban expansion-process modes. Understanding the basic process-mode categories well is extremely important for future regional-balance planning and development of macroeconomic policies.     

Tide and current observations in the central Chukchi Sea during the summer of 2012

Current data from a moored Acoustic Doppler Current Profiler(ADCP) deployed at 69?30.155′N,169?00.654′W in the central Chukchi Sea during 2012 summertime is analyzed in the present paper.Characteristics of tidal and residual currents are ob-tained with Cosine-Lanczos filter and cross-spectral analyses.The main achievements are as follows:1) Along with the local inertial frequency of 12.8 h,two other peaks at ~12-h and ~10-d dominate the time series of raw velocity;2) The M_2 dominates the 6 resolved tide constituents with significant amplitude variations over depth and the ratios of current speed of this constituent to that of the total tidal current are 54% and 47% for u and v components,respectively.All the resolved tidal constituents rotate clockwise at depth with the exception of MM and O1.The constituents of M_2 and S_2 with the largest major semi-axes are similar in eccentricity and orientation at deeper levels;3) The maximum of residual currents varies in a range of 20–30 cms~(-1) over depth and the current with lower velocities flow more true north with smaller magnitudes compared to the current in surface layer.The ~10 d fluctuation of residual current is found throughout the water column and attributed to the response of current to the local wind forcing,with an approximate 1.4 d lag-time at the surface level and occurring several hours later in the lower layer;4) Mean residual currents flow toward the north with the magnitudes smaller than 7 cms~(-1) in a general agreement with previous studies,which suggests a relatively weaker but stable northward flow indeed exists in the central Chukchi Sea.     

Effect of benzo[a]pyrene on detoxification and the activity of antioxidant enzymes of marine microalgae

The objective of this study was to examine the effect of benzo[a]pyrene(Ba P) on the detoxification and antioxidant systems of two microalgae,Isochrysis zhanjiangensis and Platymonas subcordiformis.In our study,these two algae were exposed to Ba P for 4 days at three different concentrations including 0.5 μg~(L-1)(low),3 μg~(L-1)(mid) and 18 μg~(L-1)(high).The activity of detoxification enzymes,ethoxyresorufin O-deethylase(EROD) and glutathione S-transferase(GST) increased in P.subcordiformis in all Ba P-treated groups.In I.zhanjiangensis,the activity of these two enzymes increased at the beginning of exposure,and then decreased in the groups treated with mid-and high Ba P.The activity of antioxidant enzyme superoxide dismutase(SOD) increased in I.zhanjiangensis in all Ba P-treated groups,and then decreased in high Ba P-treated group,while no significant change was observed in P.subcordiformis.The activity of antioxidant enzyme catalase(CAT) increased in I.zhanjiangensis and P.subcordiformis in all Ba Ptreated groups.The content of malondialdehyde(MDA) in Isochrysis zhanjiangensis increased first,and then decreased in high Ba P-treated group,while no change occurred in P.subcordiformis.These results demonstrated that Ba P significantly influenced the activity of detoxifying and antioxidant enzymes in microalgae.The metabolic related enzymes(EROD,GST and CAT) may serve as sensitive biomarkers of measuring the contamination level of Ba P in marine water.     

Development of three multiplex PCR primer sets for ark shell (<Emphasis Type="Italic">Scapharca broughtonii</Emphasis>) and their validation in parentage assignment

Scapharca broughtonii is a commercially important and over-exploited species. In order to investigate its genetic diversity and population structure, 43 novel polymorphic microsatellites were isolated and characterized. The number of alleles per locus ranged from 3 to 22 with an average of 6.93, and the observed and expected heterozygosities varied between 0.233 and 1.000, and 0.250 and 0.953, with an average of 0.614 and 0.707, respectively. Three highly informative multiplex PCRs were developed from nine of those microsatellites for S. broughtonii. We evaluated and validated these multiplex PCRs in 8 full-sib families. The average polymorphism information content (PIC) was 0.539. The frequency of null alleles was estimated as 3.13% of all the alleles segregation based on a within-family analysis of Mendelian segregation patterns. Parentage analysis of real offspring demonstrated that 100% of all offspring were unambiguously allocated to a pair of parents based on 3 multiplex sets. Those 43 microsatellite loci with high variability will be helpful for the analysis of population genetics and conservation of wild stock of S. broughtonii. The 3 sets of multiplex PCRs could be an important tool of pedigree reconstruction, population genetic analysis and brood stock management.     

Numerical study on inter-tidal transports in coastal seas

Inter-tidal(subtidal) transport processes in coastal sea depend on the residual motion, turbulent dispersion and relevant sources/sinks. In Feng et al.(2008), an updated Lagrangian inter-tidal transport equation, as well as new concept of Lagrangian in- ter-tidal concentration(LIC), has been proposed for a general nonlinear shallow water system. In the present study, the LIC is nu- merically applied for the first time to passive tracers in idealized settings and salinity in the Bohai Sea, China. Circulation and tracer motion in the three idealized model seas with different topography or coastline, termed as ‘flat-bottom', ‘stairs' and ‘cape' case, re- spectively, are simulated. The dependence of the LIC on initial tidal phase suggests that the nonlinearities in the stairs and cape cases are stronger than that in the flat-bottom case. Therefore, the ‘flat-bottom' case still meets the convectively weakly nonlinear condi- tion. For the Bohai Sea, the simulation results show that most parts of it still meet the weakly nonlinear condition. However, the de- pendence of the LIS(Lagrangian inter-tidal salinity) on initial tidal phase is significant around the southern headland of the Liaodong Peninsula and near the mouth of the Yellow River. The nonlinearity in the former region is mainly related to the complicated coast- lines, and that in the latter region is due to the presence of the estuarine salinity front.     

Effect of bioactive peptides (BPs) on the development of Pacific white shrimp (<Emphasis Type="Italic">Litopenaeus vannamei</Emphasis> Boone, 1931)

The present study was conducted to evaluate the feasibility of replacing fish meal (FM) with bioactive peptides (BPs) in diet of white shrimp (Litopenaeus vannamei). The changes in growth performance, body composition, non-specific immunity, and water quality were examined after the shrimp were fed four diets, in which 0% (control), 33.3%, 66.7% and 100% of FM was replaced by BPs, respectively. The groups were designated as Con, 1/3BPs, 2/3BPs, and 3/3BPs. A total of 720 shrimp with an initial body weight of 1.46 ± 0.78 g were fed the experimental diets for 56 days. The results revealed that: 1) the weight gain rate (WGR) in 1/3BPs, 2/3BPs, and 3/3BPs was significantly higher than that in Con (P < 0.05), while no significant difference was found on survival rate and feed conversion ratio (FCR); 2) the whole-body crude protein (CP) and crude lipids (CL) were significantly different among groups, while there was no significant difference between crude ash and phosphorus contents; 3) the levels of acid phosphatase (ACP), lysozyme (LZM), superoxide dismutase (SOD), phenol oxidase (PO) and bactericidal activity increased significantly with the inclusion of BPs; 4) in terms of water quality, no significant difference was found in pH and dissolved oxygen among diets during the whole experimental period. Moreover, even though nitrite and ammonium levels tended to increase with time, there was no significant difference among groups. The results indicated that BPs is an applicable alternative of protein source, which can substitute FM in the diets of L. vannamei; it is able to effectively promote growth performance and improve immunity. Moreover, BPs in the diets had no negative impact on water quality.     

Growth performance of larval and juvenile manila clam (<Emphasis Type="Italic">Ruditapes philippinarum</Emphasis>) from divergently selected individuals of a full-sib family

In this study, the method of divergent selection was employed to test the larval and juvenile growth performance within a full-sib family of Manila clam Ruditapes philippinarum. The 10% largest and 10% smallest clam individuals (on the basis of shell length) of a full-sib family were selected as parents for the fast and slow growing lines, respectively. The difference in shell length was significant among the three lines (fast, control, and slow) tested. The sequence of shell length were fast line > control line > slow line. The responses to selection, realized heritability, and genetic gain were 0.06%–0.81%, 0.04%–0.47% and 0.58%–18.89% in the fast direction, respectively; and were 0.14%–1.27%, 0.08%–0.73%, and 0.31%–49.03% in the slow direction, respectively. The results suggested that there was a large portion of additive genetic variance affecting the growth in the full-sib family. Selection in the fast direction within the full-sib family would greatly improve the growth of R. philippinarum.     

Temporal and spatial variations in extreme temperatures in the Qilian Mountains-Hexi Corridor over the period 1960-2013

Based on daily maximum and minimum temperatures at 18 meteorological stations in the Qilian Mountains and Hexi Corridor between 1960 and 2013, temporal and spatial variations in extreme temperatures were analysed using linear trends, ten-point moving averages and the Mann-Kendall test. The results are as follows: The trends in the majority of the extreme temperature indices were statistically significant, and the changes in the extreme temperatures were more obvious than the changes in the extreme values. The trends were different for each season, and the changes in rates and intensities in summer and autumn were larger than those in spring and winter. Unlike the cold indices, the magnitudes and trends of the changes in the warm indices were larger and more significant in the Hexi Corridor than in the Qilian Mountains. Abrupt changes were detected in the majority of the extreme temperature indices, and the extreme cold indices usually occurred earlier than the changes in the extreme warm indices. The abrupt changes in the extreme temperatures in winter were the earliest among the four seasons, indicating that these temperature changes were the most sensitive to global climate change. The timing of the abrupt changes in certain indices was consistent throughout the study area, but the changes in the cold indices in the Hexi Corridor occurred approximately four years before those in the Qilian Mountains. Similarly, the changes in the warm indices in the western Hexi Corridor preceded those of the other regions.