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Atoms Can ‘Climb’
Wang Enge study team of the Institute of Physics under the Chinese Academy of Sciences have, together with their Italian and American colleagues, discovered a new quantum spots forming mechanism: atoms are able to diffuse upwards. In other words atoms can diffuse from the surface to the atom islands. The finding was published in the Magazine Physics Review Express in July 2003.
In the course of the extended homogeneous growth of aluminum surface, Wang Enge and others have for the first time directly confirmed the upward movement of atoms both experimentally and theoretically. They firstly observed the coexistence of the large quantum spots and the atom islands in the growing system. The systematic study has later found that the quantum spots having the specific small surface are in a quasi-stable condition. These quantum spots only can be in an area of special temperatures for growth. Only when the thickness of the thin film exceeds a certain value, can they take place. This phenomenon cannot be explained by the existing growing theory. Researchers have eventually unveiled the mystery with the help of the in-depth functional density calculation. It has turned out that there exists a 'real' upward diffusion movement in the growing process. This is because in this system, the barrier potential corresponding to the stage edge along which atoms move and the internal angle where atoms cross for upward diffusion movement is in some circumstances negative. This new discovery has deepened people's understanding of the thin film growing dynamics. This ‘new’ atom movement regularity can be used to better control the preparation of the thin film and enrich the existing material system.
It is reported that the study was jointly financed by the National Natural Science Foundation and the Ministry of Science and Technology.
China-UK young scientists exploring life mysteries
2003 marks the 50th anniversary in memory of UK scientists' discovery of dual spiral structure of DNA. To memorize the day, 15 UK young scientists have recently visited Shanghai and gathered together with their Chinese counterparts to explore more about life mysteries.
Being an important component of series activities “creative UK” sponsored by the British Government, the first workshop dedicated to Chinese and British young scientists lifted its curtain. It is reported the young scientists would have a two-day gather-together followed by a tour to Shanghai based research centers, universities and research institutes, discussing with Chinese biologists on the issues of common interest such as biological information and the relationship between biology and nanometer technology. In addition, a China-UK exchange program dedicated to young scientists will be launched. Jointly financed by UK National S&T Office and Chinese Ministry of Science and Technology with an amount of RMB 2 million, the new exchange program is designed to promote and encourage exchanges and cooperation between young scientists of two countries.
Safe Flight “Roadmap” for Manned Spacecraft
It is reported that the orbit cabin of Shenzhou IV spacecraft is still running in the orbit, though its return cabin touched down the earth on January 5, 2003. Equipped with a number of space environment monitoring instruments, the orbit cabin has made a full record of the space environment where the spacecraft stays during its half-year flight. So far the orbit cabin has sent back the basic data on the orbit environment, a successful “safe roadmap” for the flight of China's manned spacecraft in the future.
It is reported by the experts working for the Space Science and Application Center under the Chinese Academy of Sciences that there is a red area on the roadmap, which is termed by experts as “high risk area over the south Atlantic”. When passing there, the spacecraft may encounter several hundred thousand hazardous electriferous particles every second, though these particles may not be able to get into the spacecraft. According to the roadmap, experts have proposed that astronauts should not get out of the cabin when the manned spacecraft flies through the area. The Center is now continuing its monitoring on the basis of the collected data on the space environment so as to provide the security report for the future flight of the manned spacecraft. At present, the Center has established a human radiation-sheltering model against the high-energy particle radiation environment. Meanwhile, they also analyzed the possible radiation volume that the astronauts would have encountered in different space environments and presented an assessment report on the possible radiation risks that the astronauts might run.
Progresses on Deep Water Oil-Gas Prospecting
To address the key technical problems encountered in the field of deep water oil-gas prospecting in the major coastal and basin reserves, the National 863 Program under the 10th Five-Year Plan(2001-2005) has approved the establishment of the topic on “deep water oil-gas geophysical prospecting technology”. Its purpose is to raise the overall technical level of deep-water oil-gas investigation and prospecting through R&D efforts. The so-called long-array and large-volume seismological prospecting is the first technical choice for addressing the difficulties.
On May 7, 2003, China kicked off its first trial on the joint in-phase operation of the long-array and large-volume seismological prospecting and other physical prospecting approaches with the help of the sea floor seismograph. The operation has collected clear seismological echoes on the middle and deep layers of the sediment basin and the deep part of the earth in the deep-water zone of the northern part of the South Sea. The result has marked a breakthrough in the required key technologies and has provided an important technical support for China's mastery of the technology of deep-water oil-gas prospecting under 300m at an early date.
Environment Repairing Bacteria
Researchers of Lanzhou Institute of Chemophysics under the Chinese Academy of Sciences have recently achieved the major finding in the field of microorganism study. Researchers have not only established two new model bacteria but also discovered that the bacteria bear the practical value for repairing the environment and activating the molecular oxygen.
Respectively named as Hydrojenophaja palleronii LHJ38 and Hydrojenophaja pseudoflava LHJ39, the two new bacteria varieties were separated from the bacteria grown in the special environmental soil in Lanzhou. The expert verification panel of China Typical Culture Conservation Center has recently evaluated the new bacteria and inked the patent protection for them. Experts believe that being the first domestic discovery, the two bacteria have a wide spectrum in comparison with their international counterparts and can produce degrading effects on aryl pollutants. There has been so far no other world reports on their metabolism model.
The finding will make China possess the biotechnology necessary for degrading aryl pollutants. With a broad application perspective in the fields of biology and chemical industry, the finding can be industrialized through the approach like “drip irrigation” in the actual environment repairing.
Fluid Based Hair Weeds
On the basis of their many-year study, researchers of the Institute of Marine Biology under Shantou University have successfully grown out hair weeds, or Nostoc for its academic name from nutritional fluid, the first of its kind in the country.
Hair weeds, formally called Nostoc flagelliforme, named after its human-hair-like shape are a land based wild algae extensively grown over the arid pastureland, the wild land and hills in Gansu, Shaanxi, Qinghai, Xinjiang and other places in China. Hair weeds have very high nutritional and medicinal values with promising market perspectives. As briefed by researchers of the Institute, the fluid based hair weeds in the lab environment were grown from individual Nostoc cells. The experiment has shown that under right conditions such as temperature and sunshine, Nostoc cells may grow into hair weeds from the liquid base. The liquid based hair weeds have exactly the same structure and shape as those of the land based hair weeds.
The only difference lies in their color. The liquid based hair weeds are lighter. Now the Institute is working hard to turn the liquid based hair weeds into something like soil based seeds for massive growing.
The Small Satellite System for Disasters and Environment
Monitoring and Forecasting
As is disclosed by China National Space Administration, from now on till 2010, China will work on the two-phased small satellite system of long and stable operation capacity for the purpose of monitoring and forecasting the disasters and the environment on an integrated earth-space basis.
Phase I has a so-called “two plus one” plan, which means China will launch two small optic satellites and one synthetic aperture radar satellite during the 10th Five-Year Plan period(2001-2005), which will roughly complete the construction of the ground receiving, processing and application system and will develop the preliminary disasters and environment monitoring and forecasting capacity.
Phase II will see the accomplishment of the plan called “four plus four”. Namely China will work out a constellation made up of 4 small optic satellites and four synthetic aperture radar satellites during the 11th Five-Year Plan(2006-2010) period, improving its ground receiving, processing and application system and realizing the dynamic monitoring and forecasting of the disasters and the environment for China and its adjacent countries or regions.
The system is designed with three major missions: the extensive, all-weather, 24-hour dynamic disasters and the environment monitoring; the prediction and pre-warning for the occurrence and development of the disasters such as floods, earthquakes and forest fire; and the prediction for the disasters development trend.
China's new aircraft maintenance simulation system
The new aircraft maintenance simulation system developed by No. 1 Institute of Aeronautics under the China's Air Force has presented with numerous unique innovations on integrated technical applications. The system has built the first new aircraft maintenance simulation platform, manipulating simulation based training through graphic control technique, instrument and meter simulation technology and online data exchange techniques. The system offers full simulation courses for new aircraft and associated maintenance, which greatly reduces the expenditure on maintenance training and saves actual equipment from consumption in the course of training. The new system is of perspective practical value in upgrading the means for equipment maintenance training and ensuring fast improvement of new aircraft maintenance capability.
China's second Arctic expedition
On July 15, 2003, Chinese scientists launched their second Arctic tour. The expedition team will have 50 days or so scientific investigations over the Arctic region. The expedition will accomplish two major missions: understand the response and feedback of the Arctic to the global changes, and understand the impacts of Arctic changes on China's climate environment. To accomplish the said two objectives, the expedition team will create a basic Arctic marine and meteorological observing system. Scientists will, by taking advantage of historical data, analyze and study the variations of Arctic ocean-atmosphere-sea ice system and associated relations with Arctic climate changes and their impacts on China's climate system.
The field investigations of the expedition include Arctic circumfluence, matter exchange and sea water diffusion and associated structures, Arctic sea ice changing process and sea-air exchange flux, and Arctic atmospheric boundary layer and environment. On the impacts of Arctic climate variations on China's climate, scientists will, through studying the climate variations over the Arctic region and the cold air routes that affect China and associated regularities, work out the physical mechanism telling how the Arctic ocean and sea ice affects east Asia monsoon and China's climate.
Supercomputer for 100 billion times a second
On July 23, 2003, Shuguang Information Industrial Corporation Ltd. announced that it would work out China's first supercomputer with a computation speed of 10000 billion times a second in the next 8 months.
Named as Dawning 4000A, the supercomputer is as big as the 1/4 football court and is integrated with 2000 and odd 64-digit AMD Opteron processors that were seen on the market by AMD, the world well-known chip manufacturer, just three months ago. The supercomputer is designed to meet different needs of its clients.
Guo Kezun, Vice President of AMD and General Manager of China Area, AMD expressed that AMD has forged a partnership with Dawning Company for joint development of the mass supercomputer of the best performance in the world.
In the meantime, the National Intelligent Computer Center under the Institute of Computation Science of the Chinese Academy of Sciences announced the timetable for the development of the new supercomputer: the supercomputer knots will be put into mass production in September 2003 and the clients will start their trial work on the supercomputer in January 2004. After that, Darning 4000A System will call March its day of completion and will be delivered to the clients for installation in June.
China's Reusable Space Carrier
Zhang Qingwei, General Manager of China Space S&T Group disclosed recently that China would develop its reusable space carrier. On the basis of achieving breakthroughs in the key technologies for the space carrier to get to the orbit at a single phase, China will eventually work out a single phased reusable orbit carrier characterized by speed, mobility, economy and reliability. China is now working on the new concept space carrier so as to support the materialization of its objectives such as the deep space exploration, the manned interstellar flight and the establishment of the space stations.
Mr. Zhang also expressed that as shown by the international statistics on carrier rocket launching, the small carrier rocket has seen a steadily ascending trend for its launching volume. In this context, while working on reusable space carriers, China will spend more efforts in developing small carrier rockets so as to win a place in this new area.
China's Great Interest in Transgenic Plants
Upon the approval of the Chinese State Council, the Ministry of Science and Technology and the Ministry of Finance jointly initiated the special national project on genetically modified plants study and associated industrial process in 1999. Up to date, the special project has financed altogether 116 topic based studies, through which came out 26 proprietary genes (including 7 destination genes), 18 genetically modified crop species and 36 new variety series. These genetically modified crops have grown over an area of 28 million mu(1mu=0.0667ha.) and have created direct economic returns of RMB 2 billion and more for farmers. In the meantime, these projects have resulted in 201 domestic invention patent applications and 9 foreign patent applications. In addition 1,024 papers were published, of which 264 were collected by SCI. The implementation of the special project has greatly raised the S&T level of China's genetic modification and has made it the 4th largest country in the world for growing genetically modified crops.
Comments or inquiries on editorial matters or Newsletter content should be directed to:Mr. Cheng Jiayi, Department of International Cooperation, MOST 15B, Fuxing Road Beijing 100862, PR China Tel: (8610)68512650 Fax: (8610) 68512594
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