空间生物技术研究与应用动态

由于空间生物技术潜在重大社会和经济效益。加强探索空间生物技术的发展。目前已经成为空间科学技术发展的重点之一。我国的空间技术在系列应用卫星成功发展的基础上,已将进入到更先进的载人飞船阶段。我国的科技人员将会有更多的机会,更好的条件在空间开展生物技术的研究。以促进其发展和应用,造福于人类,本文简要地介绍了空间发展生物技术的优越性。空间生物技术发展的热点和趋势,以及空间生物技术硬件发展的动态。     

Seasonal butterfly design: morphological plasticity among three developmental pathways relative to sex,flight and thermoregulation

The temperate‐zone butterfly Pararge aegeria can use three developmental pathways corresponding to different seasonal cohorts: (1) development with a pupal winter diapause resulting in early spring adults; (2) development with a larval winter diapause resulting in late‐spring adults and (3) direct development resulting in summer or second generation adults. In order to test adaptive predictions, we compared variation in flight‐ and thermoregulation‐related morphology among adult males and females from the three pathways using both field data (i.e. wild‐caught butterflies) and experimental breeding data (i.e. reared under different photoperiod regimes). Morphological patterns among the pathways were largely similar in the field and rearing data. Seasonal patterns differed between the sexes for most traits, including (relative) size measures and wing colour. Our results suggest sex‐related, adaptive seasonal plasticity for morphological traits related to flight behaviour in a multivoltine insect.     

Thermal comfort in naturally ventilated and air-conditioned buildings in humid subtropical climate zone in China

A thermal comfort field study has been carried out in five cities in the humid subtropical climate zone in China. The survey was performed in naturally ventilated and air-conditioned buildings during the summer season in 2006. There were 229 occupants from 111 buildings who participated in this study and 229 questionnaire responses were collected. Thermal acceptability assessment reveals that the indoor environment in naturally ventilated buildings could not meet the 80% acceptability criteria prescribed by ASHRAE Standard 55, and people tended to feel more comfortable in air-conditioned buildings with the air-conditioned occupants voting with higher acceptability (89%) than the naturally ventilated occupants (58%). The neutral temperatures in naturally ventilated and air-conditioned buildings were 28.3°C and 27.7°C, respectively. The range of accepted temperature in naturally ventilated buildings (25.0∼31.6°C) was wider than that in air-conditioned buildings (25.1∼30.3°C), which suggests that occupants in naturally ventilated buildings seemed to be more tolerant of higher temperatures. Preferred temperatures were 27.9°C and 27.3°C in naturally ventilated and air-conditioned buildings, respectively, both of which were 0.4°C cooler than neutral temperatures. This result suggests that people of hot climates may use words like “slightly cool” to describe their preferred thermal state. The relationship between draught sensation and indoor air velocity at different temperature ranges indicates that indoor air velocity had a significant influence over the occupants’ comfort sensation, and air velocities required by occupants increased with the increasing of operative temperatures. Thus, an effective way of natural ventilation which can create the preferred higher air movement is called for. Finally, the indoor set-point temperature of 26°C or even higher in air-conditioned buildings was confirmed as making people comfortable, which supports the regulation in China that in public and office buildings the set-point temperature of air-conditioning system should not be lower than 26°C.     

Diversity and stability study on rice mutants induced in space environment

To further study the characteristics of changes on the molecular level of rice mutants induced in space environment, we analyzed proteins in leaves and seeds of four rice mutants （two high-tillering and two low-tillering） in the 8th and 9th generations after a 15-day spaceflight, and compared with their ground controls by two-dimentional polyacrylamide gel electrophoresis and reverse phase liquid chromatography （RPLC）. In addition, the albumin, globulin, prolamine, glutelin, and amylose of the mutant seeds were analyzed by RPLC and ultra-violet spectrometry. The results showed that the low-abundance proteins of leaves in the peak tillering stage are more likely to he induced compared with their corresponding controls. The albumin, globulin, and prolamine of the mutant seeds revealed changes when compared with their controls, and the characteristics of changes in different mu- tants were stably inherited in the 8th and 9th generations, suggesting that they can be used as biomarkers to identity the mutants induced by spaceflight. Moreover, two proteins （SSP9111 and SSP6302） were found to be expressed with high intensity （two-fold change） in different mutants, which were both correlated with photosystem according to mass spectrometry and database searching.