A study of the problems associated with Dalangdian reservoir, China

There are over 2,300 lakes over 1 km2 in China (total area 80 000 km2). In addition there are approximately 87 000 reservoirs with a storage capacity of 413 billion m3. These form the main supply of drinking water as well as water for industrial and agricultural production and aquaculture. Because of a lack of understanding of the frailty of lake ecosystems and poor environmental awareness, human activities have greatly affected freshwater systems. This article focuses on the problems of one water supply reservoir, Dalangdian Reservoir, and considers options for improving its management. Dalangdian Reservoir is described and occurrence of algal genera given. The authors conclude with remarks on the future of the Dalangdian Reservoir

Highlights of the special issue Carbon neutrality and a low carbon economy for agriculture

Editoria

Exosomes released by granulocytic myeloid-derived suppressor cells attenuate DSS-induced colitis in mice

published_or_final_versio

Partially linear censored quantile regression

Censored regression quantile (CRQ) methods provide a powerful and flexible approach to the analysis of censored survival data when standard linear models are felt to be appropriate. In many cases however, greater flexibility is desired to go beyond the usual multiple regression paradigm. One area of common interest is that of partially linear models: one (or more) of the explanatory covariates are assumed to act on the response through a non-linear function. Here the CRQ approach of Portnoy (J Am Stat Assoc 98:1001–1012, 2003) is extended to this partially linear setting. Basic consistency results are presented. A simulation experiment and unemployment example justify the value of the partially linear approach over methods based on the Cox proportional hazards model and on methods not permitting nonlinearity

The Long Noncoding RNA IFNG-AS1 Promotes T Helper Type 1 Cells Response in Patients with Hashimoto’s Thyroiditis

published_or_final_versio

Ages and Masses of 0.64 million Red Giant Branch stars from the LAMOST Galactic Spectroscopic Survey

We present a catalog of stellar age and mass estimates for a sample of 640\,986 red giant branch (RGB) stars of the Galactic disk from the LAMOST Galactic Spectroscopic Survey (DR4). The RGB stars are distinguished from the red clump stars utilizing period spacing derived from the spectra with a machine learning method based on kernel principal component analysis (KPCA). Cross-validation suggests our method is capable of distinguishing RC from RGB stars with only 2 per cent contamination rate for stars with signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) higher than 50. The age and mass of these RGB stars are determined from their LAMOST spectra with KPCA method by taking the LAMOST - $Kepler$ giant stars having asteroseismic parameters and the LAMOST-TGAS sub-giant stars based on isochrones as training sets. Examinations suggest that the age and mass estimates of our RGB sample stars with SNR $>$ 30 have a median error of 30 per cent and 10 per cent, respectively. Stellar ages are found to exhibit positive vertical and negative radial gradients across the disk, and the age structure of the disk is strongly flared across the whole disk of $6<R<13$\,kpc. The data set demonstrates good correlations among stellar age, [Fe/H] and [$\alpha$/Fe]. There are two separate sequences in the [Fe/H] -- [$\alpha$/Fe] plane: a high--$\alpha$ sequence with stars older than $\sim$\,8\,Gyr and a low--$\alpha$ sequence composed of stars with ages covering the whole range of possible ages of stars. We also examine relations between age and kinematic parameters derived from the Gaia DR2 parallax and proper motions. Both the median value and dispersion of the orbital eccentricity are found to increase with age. The vertical angular momentum is found to fairly smoothly decrease with age from 2 to 12\,Gyr, with a rate of about $-$50\,kpc\,km\,s$^{-1}$\,Gyr$^{-1}$. A full table of the catalog is public available online.Comment: 16 pages, 22 figures,accepted by MNRA

Atmospheric reactive nitrogen concentrations at ten sites with contrasting land use in an arid region of central Asia

Atmospheric concentrations of reactive nitrogen (N&lt;sub&gt;r&lt;/sub&gt;) species from 2009 to 2011 are reported for ten sites in Xinjiang, China, an arid region of central Asia. Concentrations of NH&lt;sub&gt;3&lt;/sub&gt;, NO&lt;sub&gt;2&lt;/sub&gt;, particulate ammonium and nitrate (&lt;i&gt;p&lt;/i&gt;NH&lt;sub&gt;4&lt;/sub&gt;&lt;sup&gt;+&lt;/sup&gt; and &lt;i&gt;p&lt;/i&gt;NO&lt;sub&gt;3&lt;/sub&gt;&lt;sup&gt;&amp;minus;&lt;/sup&gt;) showed large spatial and seasonal variation and averaged 7.71, 9.68, 1.81 and 1.13 μg N m&lt;sup&gt;−3&lt;/sup&gt;, and PM&lt;sub&gt;10&lt;/sub&gt; concentrations averaged 249.2 μg m&lt;sup&gt;−3&lt;/sup&gt; across all sites. Lower NH&lt;sub&gt;3&lt;/sub&gt; concentrations and higher NO&lt;sub&gt;2&lt;/sub&gt;, &lt;i&gt;p&lt;/i&gt;NH&lt;sub&gt;4&lt;/sub&gt;&lt;sup&gt;+&lt;/sup&gt; and &lt;i&gt;p&lt;/i&gt;NO&lt;sub&gt;3&lt;/sub&gt;&lt;sup&gt;&amp;minus;&lt;/sup&gt; concentrations were found in winter, reflecting serious air pollution due to domestic heating in winter and other anthropogenic sources such as increased emissions from motor traffic and industry. The increasing order of total concentrations of N&lt;sub&gt;r&lt;/sub&gt; species was alpine grassland; desert, desert-oasis ecotone; desert in an oasis; farmland; suburban and urban ecosystems. Lower ratios of secondary particles (NH&lt;sub&gt;4&lt;/sub&gt;&lt;sup&gt;+&lt;/sup&gt; and NO&lt;sub&gt;3&lt;/sub&gt;&lt;sup&gt;&amp;minus;&lt;/sup&gt;) were found in the desert and desert-oasis ecotone, while urban and suburban areas had higher ratios, which implied that anthropogenic activities have greatly influenced local air quality and must be controlled