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CHINA SCIENCE AND
TECHNOLOGY
NEWSLETTER
The Ministry
of Science and Technology
People's Republic of
China
N0.320 January 30,2003
IN THIS ISSUE
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*
Top Ten News Stories on China's S and T Progresses
*
China's Top Ten S and T Events in 2002
* Winged
Dinosaur Discovered in China
* The World First
Geochemical Map for Platinum and Palladium
* China
Mapping Glove Mountain Area
* The Third World Science
Academy Conference in China
* China's First Arctic
Station
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SPECIAL
ISSUES
Top Ten News Stories on China's S and T
Progresses
On January 26, 2003, the top ten
news stories on China's S and T progresses selected by
academicians under a screening process jointly sponsored by
the Chinese Academy of Sciences, the Chinese Academy of
Engineering and the newspaper Science Times were unveiled.
They are as follows:
1) Chinese
scientists have for the first time in the world worked out
accurate rice genome charts and accurate sequencing charts
of No. 4 rice chromosome. The accurate rice genome charts
completed by the Genome Information Center under the Chinese
Academy of Sciences and others have covered 97% of the
genetic sequencing of Chinese rice, of which 97% of the
genes have found their accurate position over chromosomes
with a 99.99% base pair accuracy for 94% of the chromosome
sequence positioning, an internationally acknowledged
criteria for accurate genome charts. In the meantime,
Chinese scientists have completed the accurate sequencing of
No. 4 chromosome assigned by the international genome
project, which has constituted the largest individual genome
chromosome worked out by China independently for its
accurate sequencing, and made a major contribution to
eventually unveiling the genetic mysteries of rice.
2) Successful and consecutive launch of
Shenzhou III and Shenzhou IV spacecrafts. In a short period
of 9 months, China has successfully launched and retrieved
its two spacecrafts, which demonstrated a major progress
made in China's manned space flight project.
3) China discovered its first world-class gas
field with a proven reserve of 600 billion cubic meters. On
the basis of a couple of years prospecting, China discovered
a super large gas field in Yikezhaomeng, Inner Mongolia with
a proven reserve amounting to 602.527 billion cubic meters,
which is equivalent to a super large oil field with a
reserve of 600 million tons. This is not only the largest
natural gas field so far discovered but also the first gas
field of the world-class reserve in the country.
4) The open diversion channel of Three Gorges
Project called a success in cutting off the river flow.
Running for a total length of 3.7 kilometers and with a
width of 350 meters, the said open diversion channel has
stood the most difficult river cutting-off mission in the
construction of hydraulic power projects in the world.
5) China successfully developed its own third
generation mobile telecommunication system. Thanks to its
3-year painstaking R and D efforts and a huge investment
nearly RMB 1 billion, China successfully worked out three
third generation mobile telecommunication systems in line
with national technical standards, of which TD-SCDMA has
become the first Chinese proposed standards officially
accepted by ITU in the history of world telecommunication.
6) China has preliminarily grasped the key
technologies for designing and manufacturing modern CPU. The
Institute of Computation Science under the Chinese Academy
of Sciences has successfully developed Longxin I CPU, the
first high performance common CPU in the country. China's
first proprietary server with the core technologies named
Longteng equipped with Longxin I CPU also made its birth,
which demonstrates that China has basically grasped the key
technologies designing and manufacturing such chips, ending
up the history that Chinese information industry had no its
own heart. The said CPU chip is sized 4 mm with
the maximum floating and fixing points calculation speed
over 200 million times per second respectively.
7) Zhejiang Provincial Academy of Agricultural
Sciences brought out the new rape species claiming the
highest oil content in the world. Applied with genetic
engineering techniques, the Atomic Energy Institute under
the Academy developed a
echnology able to
manipulate rape's oil composition, with which they worked
out two new rape varieties named Chaoyou I and Chaoyou II,
both proud of an increased oil content by 25% with Chaoyou
II claiming the world highest oil content at 52.82% among
its counterparts.
8) The successful
development of huge laser device Shenguang II. Huge laser
device Shenguang II developed by the Chinese Academy of
Sciences and the Chinese Institute of Engineering Physics
has gathered a hundred and more optic instruments in an area
of a football course size. It is located in Shanghai
Institute of Optic Machinery under the Chinese Academy of
Sciences. When eight strong laser beams hit a tiny target
ball through magnifying chains in 3 dimensional arrays, a
strong power equivalent to the total or several times the
power generated by the whole world power grids was emitted
in a blink of time as short as one billionth second and an
extremely high pressure and temperature thus formed to
trigger the fusion reaction. The success of Shenguang II
demonstrates China's world advanced level in high power
laser and laser nuclear fusion studies.
9)
Chinese scientists preliminarily unveiled the mysteries of
human cell senile decaying. On the basis of their many-year
studies, the medical study team of Beijing University has
preliminarily concluded that gene P16 dominating human cell
senile decaying process is a key link in controlling human
cell decaying process from the hereditary perspective. They
also unveiled the cause of the high expression of P16 in the
decaying, which preliminarily unveiled the mysteries of
human cell decaying and is China's original contribution to
understanding the decaying mechanism of human cells. It
created a new approach to further addressing human cell
decaying.
10) Legend's super computer.
Legend Group made in the year the debut of its
proprietary core technology super computer with an
on-the-spot measured speed over 1000 billion times per
second. The super computer has recorded a calculation speed
of 1002.7 billion times per second, reached the level of
24th place among the world top 500 super computers. The ones
sitting before the 24th are either manufactured by Japan or
USA.
China's Top Ten S and T Events in 2002
The selection of China's top ten S and T
events that caught the most public attention in 2002, an
activity co-sponsored by the Chinese Ministry of Science and
Technology, S and T Daily Press, and CCTV made the debut of
its results on January 27, 2003. They are:
1) Chinese scientists have
preliminarily unveiled the mysteries of human cell decaying.
2) Top National S and T Awards were conferred to Wang
Xuan and Huang Kun.
3) China's Shenzhou III and
Shenzhou IV spacecraft were successfully launched and
returned.
4) Chinese scientists have for the first
time in the world worked out biochips able to test cancers.
5) China made the world first continental scientific
drilling try in decomposed rocks of super high pressure.
6) China discovered its world-class gas field with a
reserve of 600 billion cubic meters.
7) China
developed the world first new technology for AC-DC power
integration.
8) Chinese scientists landed
breakthroughs in addressing plateau tundra problems in the
construction of Fenghuoshan Tunnel along Qinghai-Tibet rail
line.
9) China launched its full program for
improving its citizens' S and T quality and promulgated PRC
Law on Science and Technology Diffusion.
10) China
successfully worked out its proprietary CPU chip, Longxin I
CPU and rewrite the history that China's telecommunication
industry had no its own heart.
RESEARCH AND DEVELOPMENT
Winged Dinosaur Discovered in China
Dr. Xu Xing, Dr. Zhou Zhonghe and their
colleagues of the Institute of Vertebrate Paleontology and
Paleoanthropology under the Chinese Academy of Sciences in
Beijing not long ago announced their major breakthroughs in
the study of birds' ability to fly. They discovered through
their careful study of dinosaur fossils unearthed in
Liaoning that these dinosaurs, the ancestors of birds, had
grown 4 wings, most probably having gliding capability. The
discovery has provided critical evidence for the hypothesis
that bird's flying ability came from arboreal-gliding
animals and experienced their own gliding phase. The British
journal Nature published their story in the cover page on
January 23, 2003.
In 2000, Xu Xing and his
colleagues discovered that some dinosaurs had the features
of arboreal animals and guessed that the birds' ancestor
dinosaurs may first learned to parachute and glide by taking
advantage of gravity before getting to the phase of flapping
flight.
The new discovery confirmed the
hypothesis. The careful study of the skin structures of
dinosaur fossils in the Cretaceous period unearthed in the
west section of Liaoning has convinced Dr. Xu Xing and
others that these dinosaurs had preliminary flying
capability. They found asymmetric flying feather pattern on
these dinosaur fossils, which is considered to be connected
with flight. The most extraordinary thing is that these
dinosaurs had two sets of wings, one on the forelimbs and
the other on their legs. That means these dinosaurs have
four wings, which have never been seen among any other
vertebrate animals. Scientists guessed that the leg wings
may serve for flying balance which is extremely important to
developing early flying capability.
The World
First Geochemical Map for Platinum and Palladium
The Chinese scientists working for Henan
Provincial Mining Testing Center have successfully worked
out the world first platinum and palladium geochemical map
with the help of platinum trace elements measuring
techniques.
The Center started its development
of new platinum and palladium rock testing and analyzing
techniques from 1986. Thanks to their extended period of
exploration, the scientists there have gradually mastered
the state-of-art platinum trace elements measuring and
analyzing techniques. In 2002, the Center completed its
assignment of analyzing platinum and palladium for a
76-element geochemical map and produced the world first
platinum and palladium geochemical map.
It is
briefed that the Center has discovered brand new platinum
and palladium mines in China with the help of the said
techniques and the geochemical map. In 1994, the Center made
analysis of 24 samples provided by South Africa with the
said techniques and reached results entirely agreeable with
the real geological conditions in the country. South African
scientists found new mineral reserves in their country under
the guidance of the new map.
It is reported
that the techniques are of numerous merits such as high
accuracy and low cost and have achieved satisfactory results
at different scales, levels and regional applications. The
techniques have greatly helped China expand its areas
looking for mines with rare platinum and palladium and made
China sit in the world leading position in platinum trace
elements measuring and analyzing.
China
Mapping Glove Mountain Area
The investigators
of China's 19th Antarctic Expedition team are working on the
extensive mapping of the Glove area. This extended mapping
activity is made on the basis of China's previous remote
sensing mapping of 110 square kilometers over the area in
1998, and will cover nearly all its surface range (3200
km2). Chinese expedition team will establish 6 to
8 control points over the major sections of Glove mountain
and deploy satellite ground positioning instrument there.
They will complete Glove grid mapping before further moving
into the satellite based imaging mapping. The development is
not only the first of its kind to China but also to the
world in terms of its extensive range of remote sensing
mapping, which will provide accurate space information for
China's multi-disciplinary expeditions such as on geology
and meteorite over the Glove area.
Wild Crazy
Grass Killer Developed
Thanks to their
tireless 15-year efforts, Chinese scientists have for the
first time in the world worked out the proprietary vaccines
applicable to domestic stocks for killing cray grass toxin.
It is briefed that the crazy grass killer
developed by Shaan'xi Yanglingdanong Biotech Co. Ltd. has
been applied over animal husbandry areas on an experimental
basis for one year in Qinghai and Inner Mongolia where crazy
grass went rampant.
So far no accidents of
crazy grass toxication have been reported in these areas
while stocks have been gaining more weight and offsprings.
The vaccine has gone through the indirect blood coagulation
and ELISA testing with a protection rate reaching 88% or
more.
The project, financed by the National
Natural Science Foundation and Sweden International Science
Foundation passed its verification check in 2001. Under the
support of the Chinese Ministry of Science and Technology,
its pilot experiment has seen breakthrough progress and
passed experts approval check organized by Shan'xi
Provincial S&T Department on January 17, 2003.
NEWS BRIEFS
The Third
World Science Academy Conference in China
Lu
Yongxiang, Vice President of the Third World Science Academy
and President of the Chinese Academy of Sciences announced
on January 13, 2003 that China would host the 14th session
of Academician Conference of the Third World Science Academy
on October 16-19, 2003 in Beijing. The 9th Academic
Conference of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, the
celebration ceremony for the 20th anniversary of the
foundation of the Academy and the 8th Organizational Network
Conference of the Academy will also be held during the same
period.
At these meetings, the participating
academicians of the Third World Science Academy,
governmental officials and representatives from
international organizations will make their discussion
surrounding the main theme of science and
development, promoting the scientific development in
the third world countries and south-south cooperation.
The Third World Science Academy routinely
selects about 40 new academicians each year. As of October,
2002, the Academy has 626 academicians in total from 77
countries and regions in the world. At present, China has 86
the Third World Science academicians, of whom 74 are also
wearing academician hats of the Chinese Academy of Sciences
and 2 the academicians of the Chinese Academy of
Engineering.
During the 4-day academician
meeting, participants will enjoy scientific lectures
presented by renowned scientists such as Ding Zhaozhong and
President of US Academy of Sciences. In the meantime, a
workshop on China's scientific development will be held
during the session, covering 8 topics such as China's
scientific development, China's S&T development
strategies, life sciences, information sciences, genetic
information science, remote sensing and digital earth,
meteorological science, and science and ethics.
China's First Arctic Station
On
January 15, 2003, Wang Shuguang, Administrator of Chinese
Marine Bureau disclosed that China would establish its first
scientific expedition station in the Arctic in 2003 so as to
allow Chinese scientists to work on upper air physical
observations, geological studies and biological resources
investigation in an improved environment. It is briefed that
China will build this station into an open base for
integrated earth science studies, providing a platform for
both domestic Arctic basic studies as well as cooperation
with other countries and resources sharing. The station will
be managed under a modern scientific mechanism to
accommodate the high level scientific development of Chinese
expeditions in the region.
New World Record
for Nuclear Power Generation
On January 28,
2003, the testing of security doom of No. 2 generation unit
of Qinshan Nuclear Power Station applauded a complete
success with a leakage rate recorded at only 0.132% reactor
volume per day, or 26.4% of the verification criteria in a
short period of 8 days. The experiment met the requirements
proposed by verification regulations. The test results have
broken two world records for the lowest leakage rate and the
shortest testing period, which demonstrated Chinas
world leading position in security doom construction quality
and management. It is briefed that the previous best leakage
record of nuclear power security doom is 0.21% reactor
volume/day created by No. 1 generation unit of Qinshan
Nuclear Power Station.
The so-called security
doom test is the largest individual testing during the trial
period jointly undertaken by Qinshan No. 3 Nuclear Power Co.
Ltd. and Canadian Atomic Energy Co. Ltd. The purpose of
testing is to know if the reactor site has been up to the
designed requirement for leakage in case of infrastructure
accidents. The desired testing criteria is supposed to be
not larger than 0.5% reactor volume/day for the total
leakage rate under a pressure of 124 kpa.
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