Safeguarding China′s Botanical HeritageFoundation item: BGCI′S Program in China——BGCI′s integrated conservation programme in China

China′s rich floral diversity includes more than 33000 vascular plant species, representing approximately 10 percent of all known plant species. Over half of these species are endemic to China. However, China′s rapid economic development in the last 30 years and continuous population growth have seriously damaged plant resources in the wild and the ecological environment, resulting in a dramatic increase in the number of endangered species. There are nearly 4000 to 5000 higher plants that are now threatened or on the verge of extinction. To help halt the loss of Chinese plant diversity, Botanic Gardens Conservation International (BGCI) has developed a China programme and opened its first office based in Guangzhou in 2008. This office works along with Chinese partners aiming to secure Chinese plant diversity through integrated conservation approaches with reintroduction/population reinforcement, engagement of local communities in conservation activities, capacity building in horticulture and environmental education and public outreach.     

Estimating the household costs of human–wildlife conflict in China’s giant panda national park

Human–wildlife conflict is a major cause of losses resulting from the establishment of protected areas, most of which are borne by the communities within these areas. It is therefore important to establish a compensation system for such losses. This study measures the total costs of human-wildlife conflict by surveying communities within and surrounding China's Giant Panda National Park. The results show that the primary visible costs from human–wildlife conflict, which include crop loss, livestock depredation, property damage, and human fatalities and injury, were 2185.6 Yuan ($316.9) per household. Approximately 64.9% of households were affected by this conflict in 2020. For each affected household, the average visible costs per capita was 952.6 Yuan ($138.1) or 7.2% of per capita net income. When converting well-being losses caused by human-wildlife conflict into economic costs, we consider visible costs and hidden costs (e.g., transaction, opportunity, and health costs). This study shows that human–wildlife conflict reduced per capita net income by 15.3% and significantly affected household well-being. The average cost of the well-being loss caused by human-wildlife conflict was 38.5 % of per capita net income.     

Advancing sex and gender competency in medicine: sex & gender women’s health collaborative

Research conducted to date has deepened our understanding of sex and gender differences in the etiology, diagnosis, treatment, and outcomes for many conditions that affect both women and men. The Sex and Gender Women’s Health Collaborative (SGWHC) is supported by the coordinated efforts of our founding partners: the American Medical Women’s Association, the American College of Women’s Health Physicians and Society for Women’s Health Research to address the gaps in medical education with regard to sex and gender competency in the care of women. The SGWHC initiated and continues to build a novel digital resource library of sex and gender specific materials to be adopted and adapted into medical education and clinical practice, residing @ http://www.sgwhc.org. This article presents a case for the inclusion of sex and gender focused content into medical curricula and describes a means for students, faculty, and practitioners to access a centralized, interactive repository for these resources.     

Ecological stoichiometry of N:P:Si in China’s grasslands

Aims

Understanding ecological stoichiometry of plant nutrients and its relationship with vegetation succession in terrestrial ecosystems is largely limited to nitrogen (N) and phosphorus (P). Despite it being an important element for most grasses, silicon (Si) is usually ignored. We examined ecological stoichiometry of N:P:Si in grasslands.

Methods

We used leaf N, P and Si concentration, climate variables and phylogenic development, life forms, ecotypes, photosynthetic pathway to determine the relationship of N:P:Si ratio distribution with environmental conditions and the succession of grassland communities.

Results

The distribution of N, P and Si varied greatly among the seven types of China’s grasslands as influenced by environmental conditions (e.g. mean annual temperature – MAT) and plant species groups (e.g. phylogeny). Leaf N showed a significant positive correlation with P across all species, while N and P showed significant negative correlations with Si.

Conclusions

Si was less affected by grassland types than N and P. Environmental conditions such as MAT and MAP had a significant influence on the stoichiometry of N, P and Si in grasslands and that temperature had a greater influence than precipitation. The succession of grassland communities may respond to or be influenced by stoichiometry of N, P and Si.     

Phytotaxonomy in the People’s Republic of China

As three of the members of the delegation of the Botanical Society of America, the authors participated in a 28-day tour of the People’s Republic of China in May and June, 1978. Botanical institutes and universities were visited in nine cities. A list of names and addresses of the collaborators and editors of family treatments for theFlora Reipublicae Popularis Sinicae is supplemented with a bibliography of published floras and significant taxonomic literature issued primarily since the end of the Cultural Revolution. A few observations on herbaria and herbarium practices are included.     

Estimating Long-Term Changes in China’s Village Landscapes

Over the past 50 years, China’s ancient agricultural village landscapes have been transformed by unprecedented social, technological, and ecological changes. Although these dense anthropogenic mosaics of croplands, settlements, and other used lands cover more than 2 million square kilometers across China, the nature of these changes and their environmental impacts remain poorly understood because their spatial scale is generally too small to measure accurately using conventional land-change methods. Here, we investigate the regional consequences of fine-scale landscape changes across China’s village regions from 1945 to 2002 using high-resolution, field-validated ecological mapping of a regionally stratified sample of village landscapes at five sites across China, with uncertainties estimated using model-based resampling and Monte Carlo methods. From 1945 to 2002, built surface areas increased by about 7% (90% credible interval = 2–17%) across China’s village regions, an increase equivalent to about three times the total urban area of China in 2000. Although this striking result is explained by a near doubling of already large village populations and by lower housing density per capita in rural areas, two unexpected changes were also observed: a 9% net increase (−4% to +21%) in regional cover by closed canopy trees and an 11% net decline (−30% to +3%) in annual crops. These major regional changes were driven primarily by intensive fine-scale land-transformation processes including tree planting and regrowth around new buildings, cropland abandonment, and by the adoption of perennial crops and improved forestry practices. Moreover, the fragmentation, heterogeneity, and complexity of village landscapes increased over time. By coupling regional sampling and upscaling with observations in the field, this study revealed that fine-scale land-change processes in anthropogenic landscapes have the potential for globally significant environmental consequences that are not anticipated, measured, or explained by conventional coarser resolution approaches to global and regional change measurement or modeling. Electronic supplementary material  The online version of this article (doi:) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users. E. C. Ellis conceived and managed research, and wrote the article; K. Peng, H. S. Xiao, H. Wang, S. C. Li, J. X. Wu, and J. G. Jiao conducted research; H. Ouyang, X. Cheng, and L. Z. Yang managed research; N. Neerchal and Y. Zhuang contributed methods and models.     

Prevalence of Kaposi’s sarcoma-associated herpesvirus in Uygur and Han populations from the Urumqi and Kashgar regions of Xinjiang,China

Kaposi’s sarcoma-associated herpesvirus (KSHV) is the infectious etiologic agent associated with Kaposi’s sarcoma (KS), primary effusion lymphoma, and multicentric Castleman disease. It has been shown that high KSHV prevalence and high incidence of both classic KS and AIDSassociated KS are found mostly among people of Uygur ethnicity in Xinjiang, while people of Han ethnicity in Xinjiang have a higher KSHV seroprevalence than those of other Han populations in mainland China. However, it is still unclear why there is such geographical and population variation in KSHV distribution in China. In this work, we focused on the populations in the Kashgar region and Urumqi area, where a total of 1294 research subjects were randomly selected to investigate the potential correlation between KSHV prevalence and different ethnicities in endemic areas of Xinjiang, and to determine risk factors that may affect KSHV infection rates or KS incidence. We identified a high seroprevalence of KSHV and high peripheral blood DNA infection in the general Uygur and Han populations in both Urumqi and Kashgar regions of Xinjiang, and determined that advancing age, low education level, and stationary population status affect KSHV infection rates. Further, KSHV-positive Uygur participants were shown to have higher prevalence of neutralizing antibodies and neutralizing antibody titers than KSHV-positive Han participants.

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Factors influencing soil enzyme activity in China’s forest ecosystems

Enzyme activity (EA) mediates soil organic matter (SOM) degradation, transformation, and mineralization, thereby maintaining the biogeochemical cycles and energy flow of ecosystems. To determine the main factors explaining EA variations in China’s forest ecosystems, we created a database of soil EAs and relevant variables using data from the literature and analysed relationships between EAs and both climatic and edaphic variables. Catalase, phenol oxidase, acid (alkaline) phosphatase, and protease activities differed significantly among different types of forests. Catalase and urease activities were generally higher in primosols, cambisols, and argosols than in ferrosols. EA largely decreased with soil depth and increased with SOM. Phenol oxidase and urease activities were negatively correlated with mean annual temperature (MAT); in contrast, catalase, invertase, and protease activities first decreased (< 2.5 °C), increased (2.5–17.5 °C), and then decreased (> 17.5 °C) with increasing MAT. Although protease activity was slightly positively correlated with mean annual precipitation (MAP), catalase, phenol oxidase, and urease activities were all negatively related to MAP. Catalase, invertase, acid (alkaline) phosphatase, urease, and protease activities first increased (< 2000 m.a.s.l.) and then decreased (2000–4100 m.a.s.l.) with increasing elevation. Principal component analysis revealed most EAs to be correlated with climate conditions and soil pH. These findings suggest that climatic and edaphic variables directly and indirectly correlate with forest type and greatly impact soil EA.     

The Plastic Cassowary: Problematic ‘Pets’ in West Papua

This article explores the ambivalent relations of indigenous Marind to domesticated animals in Merauke District, West Papua. Marind pity village animals because they lose their ‘wildness’ and behave like human settlers, whom Marind consider alien because of their ‘modern’ lifestyle and non-Papuan origins. These transformations evoke to Marind their own experiences of political oppression and ethnic domination as coerced subjects of the Indonesian state. However, domesticates also appear to enjoy living in the village and refuse to return to the wild. Similarly, many Marind are drawn by the promises of modernity and have given up hope for political freedom. Furthermore, Marind themselves replicate the oppressive role of the state over their lives by subjecting animals to human control. In this light, domesticates as ‘matter out of place’ in the village environment provoke pity and anxiety because they offer an all too faithful reflection of the ambiguous condition of their keepers.     

Ecosystem carbon stocks and their changes in China’s grasslands

The knowledge of carbon (C) stock and its dynamics is crucial for understanding the role of grassland ecosystems in China’s terrestrial C cycle. To date, a comprehensive assessment on C balance in China’s grasslands is still lacking. By reviewing published literature, this study aims to evaluate ecosystem C stocks (both vegetation biomass and soil organic C) and their changes in China’s grasslands. Our results are summarized as follows: (1) biomass C density (C stock per area) of China’s grasslands differed greatly among previous studies, ranging from 215.8 to 348.1 g C m⁻² with an average of 300.2 g C m⁻². Likewise, soil C density also varied greatly between 8.5 and 15.1 kg C m⁻². In total, ecosystem C stock in China’s grasslands was estimated at 29.1 Pg C. (2) Both the magnitude and direction of ecosystem C changes in China’s grasslands differed greatly among previous studies. According to recent reports, neither biomass nor soil C stock in China’s grasslands showed a significant change during the past 20 years, indicating that grassland ecosystems are C neutral. (3) Spatial patterns and temporal dynamics of grassland biomass were closely correlated with precipitation, while changes in soil C stocks exhibited close associations with soil moisture and soil texture. Human activities, such as livestock grazing and fencing could also affect ecosystem C dynamics in China’s grasslands.     

Quantifying the interannual litterfall variations in China’s forest ecosystems

凋落物是森林生物地化学循环和火险预测的关键参数。然而,森林凋落物如何随林龄变化仍不清楚。因此,量化森林生态系统凋落物年际变化对减少大尺度凋落物预测的不确定性至关重要。本论文基于中国人工林和次生林凋落物连续多年(≥2年)测定的数据集(N = 318),采用变异系数(CV)、变化百分比(V_P)和年际间比率量化凋落物的年际变化。研究结果表明,凋落物的年际变化随林龄增加(1–90年生)而呈下降趋势。其中,1–10年林龄的凋落物年际变化最大(平均CV = 23.51%,平均V_P= -28.59%~20.89%),其主要原因在于树木早期快速生长,即下一年与当年凋落物比率平均为1.20。11–40年林龄的凋落物年际变化逐渐减小,但CV平均值仍在18%左右,V_P平均值在-17.69%~21.19%之间。41–90年林龄的凋落物年际变化最小,CV平均值仅为8.98%,V_P平均值维持在8%左右。因此,大于40年林龄的凋落物量较低且稳定。这一结果与已有研究的认知不同：即当林龄大于30年、20年甚至15年时,森林凋落物量达到相对稳定。本研究结果将有助于我们深入理解森林凋落物生态学,并为大尺度碳收支和生物地化学循环模型提供基础。     

Dam-Induced Displacement and Agricultural Livelihoods in China’s Mekong Basin

Households in China’s Yunnan Province were surveyed to understand the impacts of hydropower development and resettlement on the agricultural livelihoods of rural villagers. Household-level data from this survey are analyzed to test whether income and landholdings vary by resettlement status. Independent sample t-tests and one-way ANOVAs are used to examine how resettlement status relates to income, land allotments, agricultural crops, and government subsides. Results showed that, contrary to predictions, resettlement corresponds to higher household incomes, while differences in landholdings were mixed. Results indicate that while productive landholdings are less for resettled households, new wage labor, government subsidies, and intensified agriculture may contribute to a higher annual mean income at the household level. However, the tradeoff of receiving wage income for reduced landholdings may be a significant vulnerability for the affected households of the Mekong River Basin, since this loss in productive land corresponds to a long-term loss in social security.     

Tetrahydrobiopterin Availability in Parkinson’s and Alzheimer’s Disease; Potential Pathogenic Mechanisms

Within the central nervous system, tetrahydrobiopterin (BH4) is an essential cofactor for dopamine and serotonin synthesis. In addition, BH4 is now established to be an essential cofactor for all isoforms of nitric oxide synthase (NOS). Inborn errors of metabolism affecting BH4 availability are well documented and the clinical presentation can be attributed to a paucity of dopamine, serotonin, and nitric oxide (NO) generation. In this article, we have focussed upon the sensitivity of BH4 to oxidative catabolism and the observation that when BH4 is limiting some cellular sources of NOS may generate superoxide whilst other BH4 saturated NOS enzymes may be generating NO. Such a scenario could favor peroxynitrite generation. If peroxynitrite is not scavenged, e.g., by antioxidants such as reduced glutathione, irreversible damage to critical cellular enzymes could ensue. Such targets include components of the mitochondrial electron transport chain, alpha ketoglutarate dehydrogenase and possibly pyruvate dehydrogenase. Such a cascade of events is hypothesized, in this article, to occur in neurodegerative conditions such as Parkinson’s and Alzheimer’s disease.