China, US Ink Pacts in Science, Technology China and the United States signed an agreement on November 18 in Beijing for co-operation on industrial technology and technology information, as well as two annexes for joint development of electricity-driven motor vehicles and geothermal energy.

These documents were signed by the Chinese State Science and Technology
Commission (SSTC) and the US Commerce Department at the 8th China-US
Joint Commission Meeting on Science and Technology Co-operation which
opened in Beijing on November 18.

At the meeting, participants discussed aspects for bilateral co-operation
on science and technology in the next century, covering agricultural and
industrial technology, natural disaster mitigation, water resources
protection and effective utilization, and exchange of young scientists
and scholars between the two countries.

The meeting marked the inception of a new phase in science and technology
co-operation between China and the United States, State Councillor and
SSTC Minister Song Jian said at the meeting.

The two countries should seek more extensive co-operative areas such as
energy, environment, space, sustainable development and public
understanding of science and technology in the 21st century, Song said.

At the conference, John Gibbons, science adviser to US President Bill
Clinton, said there should be broader areas for the two countries to work
together on worldwide sustained economic and social development.

After the meeting, the US delegation will visit Shandong and Guangdong
provinces to inspect wind energy, environmental protection and electronic
motor vehicles projects.

Since 1979, China and the United States have signed 32 co-operative
agreements or memorandums of understanding in various areas.

These co-operative programmes are successful and have played an important
role in propelling economic, social and science development in the two
counties, said SSTC Vice- Minister Hui Yongzheng at the meeting.

To enhance the cooperation between China and the United States in the
fields of energy and environment and accelerate the diffusion of clean
energy technologies in China, China-US Proposal on Cooperation in the
Fields of Energy and Environment was signed on October 29, 1997 in
Washington DC.

The major contents of the Proposal are: improvement of energy efficiency,
development and utilization of clean energy, prevention and control of
urban air pollution and realization of electrification in rural areas.
The Proposal is aiming at, through formulating concrete plans and
policies and through cooperation with enterprises and other sectors,
improving public health, enhancing the adaptation capability to climate
change and raising the trade, investment and adaptive technology transfer
in the field of clean energy to a higher level in the next 5 years. The
proposal will be of important impacts on the extensive cooperation on
many environmental issues such as bio-diversity and desertification.

To ensure the smooth implementation of the Proposal, both countries have
defined their respective departments to assume responsibility. Chinese
implementation agencies are headed by State Planning Commission with the
involvement of State Science and Technology Commission and National
Environmental Protection Agency. US Department of Energy will, together
with Office of Science and Technology Policy and Department of Commerce,
oversee the implementation on US side.

In addition, both sides, through the negotiation of both governments,
reached the intent of cooperation in the field of peaceful utilization of
nuclear energy and agreed to take necessary steps to implement China-US
Agreement on the Cooperation in the Field of Peaceful Utilization of
Nuclear Energy signed in 1985.



RBSBARCH AND DEVELOPMENT

Research fellows of Institute of Contemporary Physics subordinated to
Chinese Academy of Sciences have pushed the nuclein synthesis and
research into the proton titrimetric zone. Researchers of Institute of
Contemporary Physical have recently for the first time in the world
synthesized new nucleins gadolinium and in the proton titrimetric zone
which is of physical importance and great technical difficulty, and
successfully observed and studied strange decay characteristics of
krypton-69, an important nuclein of a very short life and very close to
the proton titrimetric zone.

To break through the limitation caused by nuclein identification
technique mainly using on-line isotope separation or quality recoil
spectrometer, the research group headed by Xu Shuwei, a research fellow
of the Institute, established a fast belt transmission system equipped
with helium nozzle and realized with the help of fast separation and
multi-coincidence measurement the separation and identification of
nucleins by charge numbers and direct tracing the decay of parent
nucleins. On the said basis, they utilized sulfur-32 beams produced by
the Lanzhou heavy ion accelerator to bombard cadmium-105 and molybdenum-
92. With the assistance of "proton-gamma" coincidence measurement, they
have raised the relative sensitivity by 50 to 100 times. As a result,
they successfully synthesized gadolinium-135 and -121 with their
half-life being averaged for 1.1seconds, preliminarily studied their
strange decay characteristics including delayed proton energy spectrum
and branching ratio and established a partial decay chart. Data of
Gadolinium-135 derived from the said research have been used in the
nuclein chart newly published by Japan.

The research group headed by Prof. Xu boldly proposed the scheme of using
beam pulse modulation and fast on-line measurement to study proton
titrimetric nuclein. Thanks to their considerate and full preparation,
researchers eventually bombarded the target of natural calcium on the
nuclear reactor with sulfur-32 beams produced by Lanzhou heavy ion
accelerator. The bombardment has not only produced krypton-69 of an
extremely low yield section but also studied for the first time in the
world the strange decay characteristics of this important short-life
nuclein (half-life 32(10) and established a partial decay chart. The
result was thought highly by their overseas colleagues. The beam pulse
modulation technique developed in the research can be used to measure the
nuclein of a scale from half-life to millisecond.

The successful synthesis and identification of the said new nucleins and
study of strange decay characteristics of krypton69 earmarked Chinese
research efforts entering an important new nuclein zone, namely the
proton titrimetric zone of international frontier. It also indicates a
new stage that Chinese scientists have stepped on in observation and
studying the nucleins short lived for miliseconds.

Recently National Semi-conductor Material Engineering Research Center of
Beijing Non-ferrous Metal Research Institute has celebrated the birth of
its vertically-pulled silicon single crystal of a diameter of 12 inches
(300 mm), isolength 400 mm and weight of 81 kilos. The development
hallmarks a new stage of China's research on silicon single crystal of
large diameters and also its position in the world advanced rank.

National Semi-conductor Material Engineering Research Center of Beijing
Non-ferrous Metal Research Institute is a major base in the country
responsible for the research and development of semi-conductor materials.
It produced China's first vertically-pulled 6-inch and 8-inch silicon
single crystals in 1992 and 1995 respectively and established the
nation's first 6-inch polished silicon chip production line in 1995.

At present, the Center is busy with the construction of an 8-inch
polished silicon chip production line and will turn out China's first 200
-mm polished silicon chip production line in 1998 so as to provide base
materials for China's 0.35-0.5 micron integrated circuit production line
(socalled 909 project). The successful pulling out of China's 12-inch
non-dislocation silicon single crystal has made China one of the few
countries in the world who have mastered the technology.

On October 8, 1997, Beijing No. 8 Chemical Plant applauded the successful
test run of its 10,000-ton PBT resin production facility, the first of
its kind in China, with all indicators reaching the designed
requirements. The success will help China change its dependent import of
PBT resin from abroad.

Being a project supported by Torch Program for the 8th Five-Year period
(1991-1995), the said facility, the largest of its kind in China, was
developed by Fanwei Engineering Plastics Co. Ltd., a company founded by
Beijing Municipal Research Institute of Chemical Industry. The success of
the test run has demonstrated the capability of Fanwei Engineering
Plastics Co. Ltd. in massive production of PBT resin and made it the
largest domestic enterprise producing BPT resin by using Chinese made
facilities. The PBT resin products produced by Fanwei have found its
export in countries in Europe, US and southeast Asia.

Nanometer silicon-based ceramic powder, a breakthrough in the field of
new materials achieved under the nation's 863 Program, was put into
massive production on August 18, 1997 by Qiqiha'er Northeast Super
Micro-Powder Manufacturer. The inauguration made China the third country
in the world following US and Japan able to produce such new materials.

Nanometer silicon-based ceramic powder produced by the Manufacturer has
reached the design requirements for its different technical
specifications. The average diameters of the new product range from 8 to
30 nanometers with a fine dispersion property. The product was granted
with the award of "S&T Star of Invention and Innovation" by the United
Nations.

China's "Marine 4", an ocean going scientific expedition ship has
recently returned on November 12 to Xinzhou Port in Guangzhou,
celebrating its successful mission to explore multi-metal nodules over
the east section of Pacific Ocean. The sea area of 75,000 km2 explored by
the expedition will become a commercial mineral zone to be drilled by
China in 21st century.

Launching its sails on May 20, 1997, "Marine 4" took almost six months to
complete its three missions: 1)make a resources survey on multi-metal
nodules in the east section of the ocean so as to implement the UN
requirement for surrendering 20% of the mineral zones scheduled on March
1999. The survey is required to define the possible commercial drilling
area and calculate the geological reserves; 2) prepare and eventually
submit "explanations on the impacts on deep ocean ecological environment"
possibly caused by commercial exploration and drilling to UN legal and
technical bodies, and work out the environment baseline for the
establishment of east section; 3)find new marine resources and locate the
mineral exploration zone. Struggling with waves and winds for 177 days,
"Marine 4" established 380 drilling stations in an area of 53,000 km2,
collected metal samples of 3.4897 million grams, conducted single channel
seismological measurement of 1034.2 km and magnetic measurement of 3444
km, multi-beam ocean floor measurement of 30,000 km2. The expedition also
completed required geophysical investigations and environmental baseline
survey for 10 measuring stations.

At the ceremony on August 5th, IBM made a donation of S/390 large server
equipment to the State Education Commission of China, which is the
largest computer equipment donation the Commission has ever received. IBM
reaffirmed that it would continue its efforts to strengthen the
cooperation with Chinese universities and colleges in the disciplinary
building of information Technology so as to help improve their level in
training their students' computer skills. The value of the equipment,
software, training and supporting service contributed by IBM this time
totaled more than 32 million US dollars, which is also so far IBM's the
largest single donation for educational purpose.

This contribution is a part of the" Cooperative Program Between IBM and
Chinese Universities. Starting in 1995 when an understanding memorandum
was signed with the State Education Commission, this cooperative program
aims at promoting the development of Chinese higher education and overall
information technology. At the ceremony, S/390 Department of IBM
presented four Chinese well-known universities under the State Education
Commission (Beijing University, Fudan University, Central China
University of Science and Engineering and South China University of
Science and Engineering) with IBM large parallel enterprise servers of
the newest generation, which can ensure provision of first-class
applicability and feasibility for clients.

It is reported that besides the donation of S/390 equipment, in June this
year, cooperating with the Commission, IBM also financed 12 professors
from Chinese universities to participate in a training program conducted
by North Illinois University (NIU)in Dekalb, Illinois, USA. During the
training program from June to August, those Chinese professors were
learning how to integrate teaching of IBM large server with their own
core courses in China.

Since the signing of an understanding memorandum between IBM China and
the Commission in March, 1995 on enhancing disciplinary building of
computer science and expanding the cooperative project with China
National Education Network, more than 30 universities and institutes have
been incorporated in this cooperative program on education, among which
23 universities have been selected as technical center of IBM. The other
universities and institutes have become IBM AS/400 centers , engineering
centers and software engineering centers scattered across China. Those
IBM centers hold seminars for university teachers and undertake training
programs with regard to new products, new technologies and new teaching
methods. More than 8,400 students have taken the courses related to IBM
technologies, and over 1,200 students and teachers have obtained
professional authentication concerning special IBM technology.