The past, present and future of phycology in China

Algae have been part of Chinese life for thousands of years. They are widely used as food and have been cited in Chinese literature as early as 2500 years ago. However, formal taxonomic studies on Chinese algae were initiated by foreign scientists only about 200 years ago, and by Chinese phycologists only about 90 years ago. This paper summarizes the history of modern phycological studies on Chinese algae and provides an overview of the achievements of phycological studies by Chinese scientists, especially on algal taxonomy, morphology, genetics, ecology and environmental research, physiology, biotechnology, algal culture, applied phycology and space phycology, in the last century. Recent development in phycological research focuses on algal floristic and molecular systematics, algal molecular biotechnology, applied phycology including micro and macroalgal cultivation and algal product development, and the roles of algae in environmental pollution control. These areas will also be the main focuses of Chinese phycological research in the foreseeable future.

Relative paleointensity of the geomagnetic field during the past 200 ka from the West Philippine Sea and its chronological significance

Our rock magnetic analysis of core Ph05 from the West Philippine Sea demonstrates that the core preserves a strong, stable remanent magnetization and meets the magnetic mineral criteria for relative paleointensity (RPI) analyses. The magnetic minerals in the sequence are dominated by pseudosingle-domain magnetite, and the concentration of magnetic minerals is at the same scale. Both the conventional normalizing method and the pseudo-Thellier method were used in conjunction with the examination of the rock magnetic properties and natural remanent magnetization. Susceptibility (chi), anhysteretic remnant magnetization (ARM) and saturation isothermal remnant magnetization (SIRM) were used as the natural remanent magnetization normalizer. However, coherence analysis indicated that only ARM is more suitable for paleointensity reconstruction. The age model of core is established based on oxygen isotope data and AMS(14)C data, which is consistent with the age model estimated from RPI records. The relative paleointensity data provide a continuous record of the intensity variation during the last 200 ka, which correlates well with the global references RPI stacks. Several prominent low paleointensity values are identified and are correlated to the main RPI minima in the SINT-200 record, suggesting that the sediments have recorded the real changes of geomagnetic field.

History and variability of Asian interior aridity recorded by eolian flux in the Chinese Loess Plateau during the past 7 Ma

Eolian flux in the Chinese Loess Plateau was reconstructed by measuring the dry bulk density and CaCO3 content of the late Cenozoic loess-paleosol-red clay sequences in the Lingtai profile. Comparison of eolian flux variation between the Lingtai profile and the ODP sites 885/886 in the North Pacific shows a significant wet-dry variability in addition to a gradual drying trend in the dust source regions in interior Asia. Especially, the increase of eolian fluxes from both continental and pelagic eolian sediments indicates a sharp drying of the dust source regions between 3.6 and 2.6 MaBP, which might be attributed to the tectonic uplift of the Tibetan Plateau, which cut down the moisture input to the interior Asia. The average value and variability of eolian flux are higher after 2.6 MaBP than before, which may be related to the Quaternary climatic fluctuations on the glacial-interglacial timescale after the commencement of major Northern Hemisphere Glaciations. The eolian fluxes of the Lingtai profile and Core V21-146 in northwest Pacific show a synchronous variation on the 10(4)-10(5) a timescale, indicating that the flux variations from both continental and marine records are closely correlated to the Quaternary climatic fluctuation forced by the ice volume changes on a global scale.