A comprehensive validation method of remotely sensed Evapotranspiration (ET) based on observation data was proposed to ensure the accuracy of estimated ET. Thus, an observation system was equipped with a large aperture scintillometer, an eddy covariance system and an automatic weather station, and then an observation network was established at Miyun, Guantao, Daxing and Xiaotangshan sites in Hai river  basin, which were set up from 2002 for ET and correlative parameters measurements at different satellite pixel scales. On this basis, rigorous data process and quality control were executed to ensure the high quality of observations. Meanwhile, a validation procedure of remotely sensed ET based on ground measurements was presented, and the method of selecting validation pixels and evaluation index were investigated intensively. According to this method, validation of remote sensing ET was performed in Beijing. Based on the LAS measurements at Miyun and Daxing sites in 2008, regional ET in Beijing area estimated by MODIS data was validated. The results demonstrated  that  the proposed validation method based on LAS observation data was feasible. The RMSE and MRE of estimated monthly and daily ET were  13.75、0.91 mm and 22.79%、18.61% respectively.

Sensible/latent heat fluxes can be obtained by Large Aperture Scintillometer (LAS) over several kilometers, which play an significant role in the analysis  of and application to agricultural and forestry, hydrology and meteorology research. Take LAS observations in Miyun and Guantao stations over Hai River Basin in 2008 as an example. The way of data screening and quality control under unstable conditions as well as the effect of different calculation method on sensible heat flux have been discussed. The results showed: the structure parameter of the refractive index (C²_n) should be calculated with the variance of the voltage of structure parameter of the refractive index; Humidity correction can be done with daily Bowen ratio; The effective height of LAS can be calculated with spatial averaged function;  The Andreas(1988) function is  used to get reliable sensible heat flux. Meanwhile, the nonlinear regression method and dynamic linear  regression method have been used to fill the 30min and daily missing data  while the 30  min missing data under stable conditions can be set to zero. The correlation relationship between daily ET measured by LAS and EC has been constructed to estimate daily ET when daily R_n<50 W/m². Based on the above analysis, a set of LAS data processing scheme has been set up, which ensures continuous and high quality sensible/latent data can be obtained over various surfaces and weather conditions.

This paper uses SIR model to back-analyze the parameters of SARS transmission based on the data released by the health authorities of Beijing and Hong Kong, we get the important parameters such as the peak period, the hospitalized cases and the removed parameter. It can be seen that these parameters of the model allow for better understanding of the SARS transmission because the result fits the actual data approximately. As a result, SIR model could be used to fit data, predict trend and simulate process of SARS transmission.

The Metropolitan region is an international model of the spatial organization for the modern Urban Agglomeration. The first part of this paper focuses on the national and international study about analysis conceptions, development tendencies and characteristics of metropolitan region. The development of research and practice about metropolitan region in the world was recognized. Based on the analysis, we made an analysis of the development of the research and the practice about metropolitan region in China. The author summed up the understanding about Metropolitan Region from Chinese scholars and packed up the practices in China in order to further understand the connotation of this conception. Then, we built up the development theory system of Metropolitan Region, including the conception and standards of Metropolitan Region which is seasoned with the situation of our country and the tendencies of development, the nature of metropolitan region which is a development pattern as well as a phenomenon, the spatial structure which circles from inside to outside, the effect, the phase of metropolitan region development and discussed how to manage this region. Lastly, we summed up the content of the metropolitan region development planning. The importance of incorporation and habitation conception for the development of Metropolitan Region was emphasized. As a kind of urban development model, Metropolitan Region is vital for the construction of urban area which has conditions to develop this model and the development of regional economy.

       Support Vector Machine (SVM) is a state-of-the-art machine learning algorithm based on statistical learning theory. It tries to find the optimal classification hyperplane in high dimensional feature space to handle complicated classification and regression problems by solving optimization problems. With the development of the theory and its applications, SVM has been used in remote sensing community successfully. SVM has been applied to land cover/land use classification for remotely sensed data, change detection for multi-temporal remote sensing data, and information fusion for multiple source data. Moreover, it has become a standard technique for hyperspectral data process. In this paper, the applications of SVM in remote sensing are reviewed. First, we introduced the basic theory of the SVM briefly. Then we reviewed the state of the art in different remote sensing applications. At last, we stated the development of several new SVM algorithms, which were derived from the SVM theory, and applications in remote sensing community.

More and more researches pay attention to extreme events because of their destructive impacts. Both observing and modeling studies found that extreme temperature and precipitation had significant changes. Further more, there may be more severe extreme events in the future with global warming. Of course, there are still many uncertainties contained in these results. Two main factors contribute to these uncertaintiesne. One is associated with models. There are usually great difference of outputs between different models; the other is the possible difference resulted from the period of different length analyzed. From the definition of extreme events, progresses about the study of extreme events in the last few years are described in detail first for both observing and modeling studies. Then the main progresses are listed, and some problems hanging in doubt are summarized.

       With the recent emphasis on understanding the role of clouds in the global radiation budget, cloud detection becomes more and more important. Although there are optical remote sensing techniques (e.g., satellite lidar, ceilometer, etc.) to measure cloud properties, optical signals cannot penetrate into thick cloud to observe the cloud′s horizontal and vertical dimensions and its internal structure. The scope of radar meteorology has expanded to include measurements of cloud properties and structure for radar′s wavelength is close to cloud′s diameter. Millimeter-wavelength radar is recognized as having the potential to provide a more sensitive probe of cloud particles ranging from a few micrometers in diameter to precipitation drops. Since the backscatter cross section of tiny drops (i.e., several tens of micrometers in diameter) increases in proportion to λ^-4, where  λ is the radar wavelength, cloud drops are more easily detected by radars of millimeter rather than centimeter wavelengths. On the other hand, attenuation of millimeter waves is much stronger, and the λ^-4 advantage gained using millimeter waves is offset by the strong attenuation these waves experience. The 10-cm-wavelength radar, used principally for storm warnings, cannot detect weak and no precipitation clouds well, compared with the mm radars. Compared to normal weather radar, millimeter wavelength radar has following superiorities in observing clouds: ①strong capability in detecting small particles like cloud, fog and dust; ②better resolution and precision of Doppler velocity; ③high special resolution result from its narrow beamwidth. In this paper, the status about cloud radar in and abroad about radars′ technology and application on clouds′ micro and macrophysics research, airports safe flight are introduced. Also present is a prospect on millimeter-wavelength radar.

The impact of climate change on water resources security is a challenging issue with widespread concern globally. It is as well the great strategic issue in the national sustainable development of China. Based on a wide review of related research, it is concluded that the research of climate change impact on the water cycle is one of the most exiting research perspectives in the study of relationship of climate change and water science. Due to the serious water resource situation plus climate change influence, the challenge and opportunity of the basic research work in the climate change impact on water resource were given. The climate change and water cycle study is the international forefront in the area of climatology, meteorology and hydrology. The detection and attribution of water cycle components change have become the international challenging problems, as well as the quantitative analysis and prediction of the uncertainties in a hydrological system; the research of water cycle response to climate change is developing from offline hydrologic simulations to coupling climate change with hydrological dynamics; study of the water resources vulnerability has become a key problem to deal with climate change and secure the water resources security. In the circumstances of the climate change, it is necessary to reexamine the hypotheses in traditional hydrological theories, as well as the spatial variability, uncertainty and hydrological extremes in regional hydrological studies. Carrying out the research of climate change impact on water resource and adoption measures is one of the  biggest scientific problems of water sciences and water resource in the 21 century. 

       Fluids are aubiquitous transport medium for heat and matter in most geological process. The presence of fluids in rocks may affect the chemical and physical properties, mineral reaction velocity and heat budget of geological systems, Direct sample of geological fluids could be preserved only in fluid inclusions that were trapped during the growth of their host mineral. Fluid inclusions can provide us unique information for the presence and composition of ancient fluids which can not be obtained by other geochemical methods (e.g. the component and evolution of diagenetic fluid; process of fluid-rock interaction; migration of trace elements in fluid). The study of fluid inclusions thus has become one of the “hottest” fields in earth sciences, and plays an important role in studies correlated with geological processes. Starting with a general introduction to the fluid inclusion properties and a summarization about the classification of primary- and secondary-fluid inclusions, this paper reveiws the most recent development in analytical methods in the fluid inclusion research field. We also review the current application of fluid inclusions to various fields in earth sciences (e.g. metamorphic fluid, ore-deposit, petroleum geology and biomarker) in the paper. Finally, we give a short outlook on potential future research topics about fluid inclusion studies.

This article provides a brief introduction of a new 973 project, entitled “Aerosol over China and their climate effect”.

A total of 31 regional floras that covered whole Yunnan province were used for making frequency maps of distribution types at generic level by Arcview software. The following results were given: 1. Tropical genera account for 29.6% to 94.1% of the total genera in regional floras with the highest proportion in the areas of southern Yunnan, while temperate genera account for 6% to 70.4% of the total genera with the highest proportion from the area of northwestern Yunnan. 2. Among tropical elements, the genera of Pantropical distribution contribute from 13.64% to 46% of the total genera in regional floras with the highest proportion in dry and hot valleys in western and southeastern Yunnan, and the genera of Tropical Asian distribution contribute from 3.33% to 42.26% with the highest proportion in southern Yunnan. 3. Among temperate elements, the genera of North temperate distribution contribute from 2% to 30.39% of the total genera in regional floras with the highest proportion in northwestern Yunnan, and the ones of East Asian distribution contribute from 2% to 14.57% with the highest proportion in Hengduan Mountains in northwestern Yunnan. 4. In relationship with vegetations of Yunnan, the genera of Tropical Asia, Old world tropics and Tropical Asia to Australia distributions occur mainly in the tropical forests in southern Yunnan; the genera of Pantropical and Tropical Asia to Tropical Africa distributions occur mainly in the vegetations on dry and hot valleys; the genera of North temperate distribution occur mainly in forests on mountains with a cold and wet climate, while the genera of East Asian, East Asian and North America disjunct, and Old world temperate distributions occur mainly in the vegetations of the area with a warm climate. 5. In biogeography, the frequent patterns of the genera of seed plants imply that the “Tanaka line” could also act as a demarcation line between the tropical Asia flora (Indo-Malaysia flora) and East Asia flora in Yunnan; the semi-savanna vegetation in the dry and hot valleys in Yunnan could have floristic affinity to savanna of Africa; the Yunnan geo-plate could have clock-wise movement by bumping of India plate during the uplift of Himalayas. It is supported that Yunnan should be a region with tropical areas as the horizontal base because almost all areas of lower elevation are tropical in nature regardless of their latitudinal location.

Researches of fixed-ammonium in mineralogy, lithology and ore-exploration and relative results of thermodynamic experiments in water fluid containing ammonia-ammonium have been commented, the action of ammonium (ammonia) in geological fluid media and some key problems in relative researches of ore deposits geochemistry have been discussed. At last, the prospects of using ammonium as an exploration tool in China has been investigated.

The measurements of surface energy and water vapor fluxes at large scale are crucial for solving the area-averaging problem from local in situ measurements to area-integrated information, validating hydrological and meteorological models, and verifying remote sensing products etc. This paper reviews the worldwide progress in surface energy and water vapor fluxes at large scale using scintillometer, from these aspects of observation instruments and experiments, and processing, analysis and application of observational  data. A  brief  outlook  about scintillometer is given.

Aerosol and cloud play important roles in determining the earth's climate. Along with the further knowledge about these important roles, the researches on the interaction between aerosol and cloud became more and more important. A comprehensive review about the research methods and the development in recent twenty years on this field is discussed in this paper. The observation by airplane, satellite and the composite method of observation and model were the main research method in this research. Some data of observation and the model results have given evidences of the influence between aerosol and the other cloud physical characteristics including radiation, cloud drop and precipitation. Aerosol can transform to the cloud condensation nucleus (CCN) in some special situations. Through this process, aerosol influences the cloud characteristics. Therefore, the CCN is an important link in all interaction theory between aerosol and cloud. There were great progresses in the observation technology of CCN. The nonlinear relationship between saturated water vapor pressure and temperature was used to make the instrument to observe the CCN. The related theories about CCN and cloud also have made some progresses. In China, the research methods were changed from the analyzing single observation data to the way of using model and the methods combining observation and model. Finally, several pieces of proposal are brought forward in this research area.

The Stratosphere-Troposphere Exchange (STE) refers to atmospheric mass exchange between stratosphere and troposphere in both directions, including Stratosphere-to-Troposphere Transport (STT) and Troposphere-to-Stratosphere Transport (TST). STE has important impacts on atmospheric chemical composition and radiative equilibrium. Therefore, it is very important to investigate STE activities for further advancement in atmospheric chemistry, climate change, and stratosphere troposphere coupling in atmospheric models. In this paper, we review major STE processes in observations, simulations, diagnoses, and mechanisms, and compare their difference either on methods or on models. Although many synoptic-scale STE studies have been conducted, STE events in meso and micro-scales remain to be further investigated, especially in physic mechanism, observations and simulations. It attracts more and more attention on stratospheric influences of troposphere pollutant transport, especially on the impacts resulting from the meso and micro-scales strong convection weather events. With the rapid global urbanization in the global, it is very essential to investigate the TST events under the background with strong convection activities over heavy air polluted metropolitan areas.

With the development of mesoscale atmospheric model, the next generation mesoscale Weather Research and Forecast Model is widely used at home and abroad, primarily because of its complete openness, easy portability, and fast update. The application of WRF model in China in recent decade is introduced from three aspects: the physical parameterization scheme, real-time simulation and comparison with MM5, which indicates the usefulness and advantage of WRF model in mesoscale simulation. Furthermore, two main prospects of WRF model in the near future are proposed: one is to develop Climate-Weather Research and Forecasting Model(CWRF), aiming to simulate and predict both weather and climate at mesoscale level, and the other is to couple WRF model with regional ocean model and construct a regional coupled model with high resolution. It is hoped that our summary can provide some necessary helps for the users of WRF model.

The eddy covariance (EC) technique can measure turbulent exchanges between surface and atmosphere directly, and is now used widely in all of the flux stations. Since this method is based on certain assumptions, the obtained surface fluxes are not true values if there are no necessary corrections. Recent development and some focal points of the eddy-covariance method are reviewed, and used in the processing of the data collected in Miyun station, which is one of the flux stations near Beijing. The analysis of EC data at Miyun station shows: Despiking and the sonic temperature and coordinate rotation corrections have a rather little effects on the surface sensible and latent fluxes (about 1%), however, coordinate rotation has large effect on the momentum flux. The air density correction (WPL correction) is important for water vapor and CO^₂ fluxes, and should be applied. The turbulent spectral checks in the data quality evaluation are satisfactory. Turbulence stationarity and integral characteristics are used in the flux data quality analysis. After rigorously data screening, the final result shows that about 75% flux data is good, and 2% flux data need to be discarded. Footprint analysis shows for all day and daytime periods, over 70% source area of the fluxes is located in the interested area (non mountainous region) with over 90% of the biggest contribution points in the area.

Ecohydrology combines the studies of hydrological and ecological processes and their interrelations in soil and water. It aims at a better understanding of hydrological factors determining the development of natural and human-driven terrestrial ecosystems, and of ecological factors influencing the hydrology. This paper analyzes the understanding of ecohydrological process by researchers from ecohydrology connotation view. Terrestrial landscape ecohydrology research is a hotspot. This paper summaries the ecohydrological process advances of mountainous region, wetland, dry land and basin integration modelling, analyzes the strategy of establishing ecohydrological model, gathers part of developed ecohydrological models, considers the three problems in model establishment, scales, data, definition. We should pay more attention to the following four aspects: ①the basic research on ecohydrological process;  ②the integration modeling research on ecohydrological process;  ③ecohydrological process on-line coupling research with database and GIS/RS technologies;  ④ecohydrological process research combining with prototype observation. To establish ecohydrological models that accord with local condition is the important task in today′s China ecohydrology research.

Water and carbon cycles are not only the cores of material cycle and energy exchange in terrestrial ecosystem, but also two basic coupling ecological processes. Managements of water and carbon of regional or global ecosystem are two key topics of global change science and sustainable development research, simultaneously, an important ecological approach for human to maintain the cycle and renewal of natural resource and the material and energy cycle in global ecosystem. In this paper we reviewed the development trend of modern applied ecology comprehensively, based on the relationship among water and carbon cycles in terrestrial ecosystem and ecosystem management, brought forward the content and framework about the processes management, and illuminated new design on the synthetic research of the mechanism and simulation of water-carbon coupling cycle in terrestrial ecosystem. 

During the last decades, reanalysis of past meteorological observations using modern data assimilation technique and restructure the long-term and consistent gridded data products have been made great progress. Such datasets provide us the most primary research tools to identify the state and evolution of atmosphere, and understand the climate change and variability at different spatial-temporal scales. In this paper, the current research status and advances in the global reanalysis datasets including some of international global atmosphere reanalysis projects and the corresponding reanalyzed products, the important applications of reanalyzed products in some research fields of the atmospheric science, the validation and evaluation of the reanalysis datasets，and some quality problems represented by the reanalyzed products in climate change studies are systematically reviewed. Moreover，the prospects of the studies on atmospheric reanalysis in the future are also discussed in this paper.

       The tropospheric oxidation is an important indicator of the cleansing capacity of the atmosphere. Most trace gases emitted into the atmosphere are removed by oxidizing chemical reactions involving ozone and the hydroxyl free radical. The  research history of tropospheric OH including the fundamental reactions, measurement techniques and the long-term trend is reviewed in this paper. Due to the increased emissions of CO, NOx(=NO+NO₂) and hydrocarbons by human activities, global mean OH concentrations have decreased since pre-industrial times, and the future trend of tropospheric OH still depends on the emissions of CO, NOx(=NO+NO₂) and hydrocarbons. Using a 3-D global chemistry and transport model (MOZART), the distributions and trend of tropospheric OH over China and its neighborhood are studied. The results show that, consistent with variations in sunlight and water vapor, the concentrations of tropospheric OH over China increase gradually from winter to summer. In addition, by reason of the various emissions strength of OH precursors or sinks, such as ozone, CO and NOx, the highest concentrations of OH in July arise in North China and Pearl River Delta, while the lowest concentrations occur in those plateau areas in West China. Analysis of the impacts of various emissions of air pollutants on tropospheric OH in East China reveals a significant increase of tropospheric OH as a result of the pronounced increase of NOx emissions in China. Looking to the future, there is urgent need for more observations of tropospheric OH to improve and ultimately validate models and further understand the oxidation processes in our atmosphere.

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This paper is an introduction to a new project of the National Basic Research Program of China, “Studies of upper ocean structure, variability and predictability based on Argo observation network”. We first discuss the great opportunities and challenges for ocean and atmosphere sciences provided by the international Argo program. Then, we briefly review the scientific advances in the studies of northwest Pacific and tropic Indian-Pacific Oceans, the focus area of our proposed research. At last we outline the key scientific questions to address and the main research components of the present project.

Analysis of the vegetation coverage changing with the time in the last 21 years is the purpose of this paper to study the regularity of the regional eco-environment in the Tibetan plateau. Based on the remote sensing data GIMMS NDVI, statistical processing and analysis, also calculation, the paper gives quantitative analyses and evaluations of the variability of vegetated rate of the Tibetan plateau. In the last 21 years, the regional vegetation coverage has been on the slow increase at the rate of 3 961.9 km²/a as a whole, except for some place degradation, and also the human have not done damage to the eco-environment. From 1982 to 1991, the vegetation coverage of the whole region increased, except for degrading region at the middle and the west of the area. The value increased is decreasing from the south and the east to the north and the west. The induction, the climate benefiting the vegetation growing, changing with degree of longitude and latitude, can be worked out. It's the main period from 1992 to 2002 that the vegetation degrade, those deteriorated regions are located in the resource regions of the Yangtze river, the Yellow river, the Lancangjiang river and the Nujiang river, which indicates the changing climate would be adverse to the vegetation. The NDVI also has two significant periods of 7 years and 3.5 years, caused by the same significant periods of the temperature, and that indicates that the plateau plant is more senstive to the temperature than to the precipitation. Over 21 years, there are 7 from 8 types vegetation coverage which are raising unstably including clod-arid-region plant with vulnerability and difficult recovery.

Porphyry copper deposit as the largest source of Cu is one of the most important deposits in the world. Porphyry Copper Deposit not only occured in Circum-Pacific ore-forming region, but also occured in Tethys ore-forming region and Middle-Asian(Paleo-Asian Oceanic) oreforming region. The mineralization materials derived from the deep. Porphyry forms through four stages: “Oceanic Crust-Mantle Lava Flow”,“Original Magma”,“Shallow Ore Magma”,“Crystallization of Magma-Minerali-zation”. In the stage of “Original Magma”, much metallogenic materials and energy gather through the process of “MASH”. Ore-forming fluids are high-grade fliuds of gas-liquid phase, which are of fluid-rich, high temperature, high pressure, high salinity, strong oxidizing, high oxygen fugacity. The characteristics of ore-forming fluids are favorable for metallogenic materials to gather from magmas to fluids in the process of magma-hydrothermal separation. The copper is transported and migrated in form of Cl-complexes. With the ascent of ore-forming fluids, lowering of temperature and pressure is the main factors resulting in copper precipitation. The crystallization of magnetite resulting from lowering temperature and pressure provides much of S^2- and  plays an important role in the formation of porphyry copper ore. From the inner to the outside, the alteration zones,in general,are composed of quartz zone,potassic zone,SCC zone and  argillic zone.The proposed genesis models which are commonly accepted,up to now, include the classical model, the system model and the model of polyphasal overprinting events.

The characteristics of the average monthly variation of the velocity distribution of water exchange across the 120°E section in the Luzon Strait is analyzed. The volume transport of this water exchange is calculated, the monthly and seasonal variation structure of the volume transport and its vertical structure are discussed based on the AIPO（The joining area of Asia and IndianPacific Ocean）data from 1993 to 2006. The results show that:①In the north-south direction of the section, the boundary of the westward flow is located at near 19.5°N, while the boundary of the eastward flow is located at near 21.5°N. The velocity distribution of the westward and eastward flows alternate, is characteristic of a two-in（west to flow into the South China Sea）two-out（out of the South China Sea）structure. The water of the South China Sea flows into the Pacific Ocean to the east direction each month throughout the year, in the area as deep as more than 300 m in south of 21.5°N, and less than 1 000 m in north of 21.5°N.②Almost all the net volume transports in the upper, the deeper and the full depth layers flow westward, which claim the largest in winter, followed by autumn and spring, and with a minimum in summer. The net volume transport of the middle layer is the largest in spring, followed by summer and autumn, with a minimum in winter.③The net volume transport of the entire section, features a sandwich structure in January-May and August-November, a two-layer structure in June and July, and a single-layer structure in December. Averagely within a year, the annual average structure of the net volume transport presents a sandwich structure.

This paper summarized six aspects such as the harm characteristics, type and index, climatic characteristics, causes, responding to globe changes, protecting technology and answering tactics of hot-dry wind and high temperature heat wave. There is distinction and relationship between hotdry wind and high temperature heat wave. This includes that both of hot-dry wind and high temperature heat wave belong to serious shorter time scale weather disasters. Lower humidity and higher temperature are their main characteristics. The two causes of abnormal circulation characteristics and impacts of the disasters from climate change are basically the same. The disasters may occur in the same area during the same period. Arid season is helphul for their development and aggravation damage. There are differences on harm characteristics, type and index, climatic characteristics, protecting technology and answering tactics in this two weather disasters in that the high temperature heat wave is the comprehensiveness meteorological disasters and dry-hot wind is the agrometeorological disasters.

The classification, abundance, distribution, exploration and exploitation technologies of low-permeability oil and gas resources at home and abroad were systematically investigated. It has become an international hot research field for the technologies of low-permeability reservoir identification and adaptation, and the drilling technologies. The current and future focus of the low-permeability oil and gas resources will be concerned as follows: low permeability reservoir quality prediction, fracturing, horizontal well, multi-branch wells, slim hole, advanced injection, explosion layer production, microbial enhanced oil recovery, etc. It is necessary for China to further develop the ultradeep drilling technique, high-resolution seismic exploration and interpretation techniques on complex surface conditions (i.e. desert mountain), complex lithologic logging layer technique, low-permeability oil-bearing zone optimization technique, micro-pore structure technique for low-permeability reservoir, pre-fissure prediction technique for low-permeability reservoirs, development and fracturing optimized injection-production system technique, horizontal wells, fracturing technique for complex structure well, gas injection enhanced oil recovery technique for low-permeability reservoirs, and slim hole technique.

      The stocks and its change mechanism of soil carbon pool in grassland are the core of grassland ecosystem carbon cycle research. Grassland are undergoing serious disturbance, such as land-use change, nitrogen input (nitrogen decomposition and fertilization), elevated CO₂ and global warming. Strengthening the research in responses of grass soil organic carbon pool to the disturbance is of great importance. Here we reviewed the effects of grazing, grassland cultivation, and external nitrogen input on soil organic carbon pool including soil active carbon fraction and their responses to global change. The main research directions in this field in the future were also suggested.

Coupled General Circulation models (AOGCMs) are widely used as an important tool of projecting global climate change. However, their resolution is too coarse to provide the regional scale information required for regional impact assessments. Therefore, downscaling methods for extracting regional scale information from output of AOGCMs have been developed. Regional climate models nested in AOGCMs, statistical downscaling, and dynamicalstatistical downscaling are usually used for downscaling. In this review paper, focus is placed on statistical downscaling techniques. These methods can be used to predict regional scale climate from AOGCM output using statistical relationship between the large-scale climate and the regional-scale climate, which offers the advantages of being computationally inexpensive. The principle and assumptions of three categories of statistical downscaling are introduced. Important issues in using statistical downscaling to create future climate change scenario is also discussed. At the same time, dynamical downscaling is briefly compared with statistical downscaling in terms of their advantages and disadvantages. Finally, prospects of developing new downscaling techniques by combining statistical and dynamical downscaling techniques are pointed out.

Phytoremediation—a technique using plants to remove contaminants from soils has become a topic in current research. The basic concept and contents of phytoremediation has been summarized with examples illustrated in this paper. Phytoremdiation can be subdivided into phytoextraction, phytostabilization, rhizofitration and phytovolotization. The technique are based on a series number of special plants which are tolerant to some toxic heavy metals or metalloids, and/or can accumulate these metals or metalloids in their above ground parts. Some kinds of such tolerant or accumulating plants have been intensively investigated and even applied in the field, in most cases with addition of chemical chelator such as EDTA to enhance phytoextraction effect, or chemical amendments such as lime, phosphor minerals, beringite, fly ash, sewage sludge and biosolids to enhance phytostabilization of toxic and hazardous elements. The authors also give a brief introduction of some case studies of phytoremediation on its effectiveness and economical advantage. 
The paper concluded that multi-channel approaches should be taken to make phytoremediation commercial and engineering available, including more deep studies on tolerance and accumulation mechanisms, field survey at more place to try to search for more tolerant and accumulating plants which may provide great values for the breakthrough of phytoremediation technique. Studies on phytoremdiation processes such as methods for enhancing biomass and accumulation capacity of plants as well as their ecological impact are also high desirable.

As a typical artificial landscape, the spatial structure of city is the type of high collective landscape and the function of city appears as the diversities of culture, high capability and high energy flow. Landscape ecology on city includes urban spatial structure and ecological process, urban landscape scene and urban ecological construction and urban landscape planning. The most direct application of landscape ecology on city is landscape planning. This paper, firstly, discusses on the valuations of urban landscape quality and value which include the valuation of landscape aesthetics and the capability of landscape vision. The topic of this paper is urban spatial structure and the principles on landscape planning, which involves urban spatial patterns, the corridor influence of urban spatial extension and the analysis on the spatial structure of urban greenbelt system. Based on the cases of greenbelt systems in Shanghai and Guangzhou, the authors analyze on the landscape change of the ecotone landscape between urban and rural. At the same time, the characteristics of the processes of urbanization are described by urban landscape patterns and its dynamics according to the typical researches in Shanghai and Shenyang.

Atmospheric transport and deposition of pollutants to the coastal oceans increase dramatically due to the impacts of climate change and human activities. The paper summarizes a number of researches after 1997 on the atmospheric inputs of nutrients and trace elements to the world coastal oceans with emphasis on the eastern China seas. The atmospheric fluxes of nitrogen and phosphorus to the coastal oceans range from 13 to 73 mmol N /(m²·a) and 0.11 to 1.6 mmol P /(m²·a), respectively. North Sea appears to be influenced by relatively higher atmospheric flux of nitrogen (70 mmol N /(m²·a)) compared to the eastern coast of North America (50 mmol N /(m²·a)) and eastern China seas (50 mmol N /(m²·a)). Mediterranean Sea and the Gulf of Aqaba (Red Sea) receive the lowest fluxes of nitrogen as well as phosphorus from the atmosphere. The deposition fluxes of trace elements vary significantly in both time and space with the highest flux approximately 3 orders of magnitude higher than the lowest one. The flux variations of crustaldominated trace elements such as Al and Fe are strongly related to the dust transport and agricultural activities of adjacent land, while atmospheric fluxes of non-crustal trace elements like Cd, Zn and Pb are mainly determined by industrial and mobile emissions. Atmospheric inputs of trace elements can partly dissolve into the seawater with the solubility ranging from a few percent to >50% and that portion may become bioavailable and thereby influence the costal ecosystem. For many coastal oceans including East China Sea and Yellow Sea, atmospheric fluxes of nutrients and certain trace elements may exceed their riverine inputs. Atmospheric deposition contributes significantly to the coastal eutrophication, and its episodic nature can enhance primary productivity within a short period, which may induce a harmful algal bloom (red tide). Trace element deposition may have toxic effects on specific phytoplankton and influence both primary productivity and ecosystem structure of the coastal area. Further studies should be conducted for accurate estimation of atmospheric fluxes of various pollutants to the coastal oceans and for understanding their roles in marine phytoplankton growth. 

Surface albedo is a critical consideration for energy balance at the land-air interface. It determines the allocation of radiant energy between the earth′s surface and atmosphere. Changes in surface albedo affect the energy balance of land-air system, which could in turn lead to climate change. Land Use/Cover Change (LUCC) is an important element of global climate change. LUCC affects surface albedo, and thus climate change. Surface albedo is controlled by solar elevation angle, land surface nature, soil moisture, weather condition, etc. This paper presents an in-depth review of the driving factors of surface albedo. Conventional observations of surface albedo are point-based, and therefore have limited spatial representation. On the other hand, surface albedo retrieved by Remote Sensing (RS) could have a large spatial representation. However, RS-driven surface albedo needs validation by ground-truth observations. Hence this paper reviews and epitomizes observational and RS-based analyses surface albedo. It also summarizes research progress in surface albedo in relation to global climate. Moreover, this review highlights the strengths, weaknesses and future directions of surfacealbedo/climate-change research. The points documented herein could profoundly augment current understanding about global climate change and  related driving factors.

The South China Sea (SCS) has achieved rapid development and become an international hot spot in the paleoceanography study since the implementation of ODP Leg 184 in 1999. This paper attempts to review the progress, especially high revolution studies on the last 200 ka in the SCS, mainly relating to changes in sea surface temperature, salinity, productivity, and the upper ocean structure, as well as paleomonsoon records. Many SCS planktonic δ¹⁸O curves show different features from the global SPECMAP δ¹⁸O standard, with relatively low peaks at MIS5.5 and MIS7.3, but high peaks at MIS3.3 and MIS6.5, and can be called “monsoon-type planktonic δ¹⁸O curves”. In contrast to the SPECMAP δ¹⁸O standard prevailed by 100 ka cycles, the monsoon type planktonic δ¹⁸O curve is dominated by 20 ka precession cycle, representing the impact of monsoon precipitation. In addition, the complete records of rapid climate change events also reveal an important role played by tropical regions in rapid climate change.

Abstract: This paper briefly introduces two marine observation systems in the United States: the Ocean Observatories Initiative (OOI) sponsored by NSF, and the Integrated Ocean Observing System (IOOS) organized by NOOA. The two programs are closely related, but differentiated from each other. As China is now developing its own marine observation systems, there is much to be learned from the US experience.

The effect of soil water on ecosystem and the development of human society was expounded. The transition and development course of soil water research, from morphology to energetics, recent research status of soil water resources, and measure method and some problems of soil water research were discussed. On this basis, some principal aspects of research on catchment soil water in future: the measure and dynamic monitoring of soil water content, the balance and cycle of soil water, the research on the relationship of soil water and ecosystem, and the construction and perfecting of forecasting model of the catchment soil water, were proposed.

Greenhouse gases(GHG) emission databases are the basis for the assessment of the greenhouse gases emission and the obligation negotiation of mitigation of greenhouse gases emission. Based on our survey of the global greenhouse gases databases worldwide, some primary organizations that built the important referenced databases were investigated. They are US Energy Information Administration, World Resource Institute, Carbon Dioxide Information Analysis Center, UNFCCC, and International Energy Agency of OECD. The situations of the five organizations, the characters of their databases as well as their usability and difference were compared and studied. Some related questions, such as why it is important to increase the reality and coverage, what the limitation of the current databases is, etc, ware discussed at the end of this paper. Some suggestions were provided finally.

Arsenic contamination in soil has become a concern worldwide. The studies of arsenic forms/species and bioavailability are the foundation for pollution recognition, risk assessment and remediation criteria setting. Methods currently employed for arsenic fractionation and speciation include chemical selective extraction, instrumental detection or resin/cartridges separation after solvent extraction and synchrotron radiation XANES direct detection. The combination of the above various methods have played a core role in the study of arsenic bioavailability. Also, various methods have been used for measurement of arsenic bioavailability in soils. Chemical extraction is cost effective and the most convenient, but limited in not really reflecting the arsenic bioavailability from soils to animals or humans, and usually is used as reference for recognition of arsenic environmental hazards; Indicator plant method rely on successful selection of sensitive plants in order to give clue to the potential hazards of arsenic to environment and health; The population and structure as well as genetic changes of microorganisms exposed to arsenic in soils are direct in interpretation of arsenic toxicity, and are in priority in future application for risk assessment of arsenic contamination. In vitro gastrointestinal method is the most efficient in simulating the state and condition of animal and/or human gastrointestinal system, and is vital in application for risk assessment of arsenic contamination. However, correlation between in vitro and in vivo results is still needed for its accurate interpretation for arsenic risks. Rabbit, young swine and monkey have been commonly used in animal model (in vivo) for measurement of arsenic availability in soils via detection arsenic contents in their urines. However, it is not yet clear which is the most suitable for the reflection of arsenic risks to humans due to limited studies on such kind of studies with relation to human arsenic exposures.