Field margins as rapidly evolving local diversity hotspots for ground beetles (Coleoptera : Carabidae) in northern China

The diversity of carabid assemblages at newly established field margins was compared to the diversity in surrounding fields and woodland habitats at Dongbeiwang village, Beijing. Carabids were sampled using 6 pitfalls per plot at a total of 12 plots in the year 2000. Although sampled only a year after their establishment, field margins harbored the most abundant and diverse carabids assemblages of all sites. More than a quarter of carabid species encountered were furthermore restricted to catches from field margins. Also woodland and fields under rotational wheat/maize cultivation harbored some unique species. Therefore, a short term establishment of field margins is effective in enhancing diversity and abundance of carabids, an important predator group in the agricultural landscape, while only the preservation of a heterogeneous landscape will enable the conservation of the overall species diversity

In-plane dielectric properties of epitaxial 0.65Pb(Mg[sub ⅓]Nb[sub ⅔])O₃-0.35 PbTiO₃ thin films in a very wide frequency range

Author name used in this publication: Y. WangAuthor name used in this publication: H. L. W. ChanAuthor name used in this publication: C. L. ChoyAuthor name used in this publication: K. C. Cheng2004-2005 > Academic research: refereed > Publication in refereed journalVersion of RecordPublishe

Progress in solid-state NMR studies of electrode materials for lithium ion batteries

Solid-state NMR is the effective technique for the study of local structural changes and chemical environment around the atoms which monitor atomic environments by varying adjacent metal or carbon content. Based on the changes of the Li-6,Li-7 NMR spectrum, the coordinating condition of lithium with the neighbor metal atoms and the structural changes of the materials during the charge/discharge cycle can be clearly identified. The developments in the micro-structural analysis of the electrode materials and mechanistic study of Li+ intercalation into a various of materials by using solid NMR techniques were reviewed

Improved prediction of RNA secondary structure by integrating the free energy model with restraints derived from experimental probing data.

PublishedEvaluation StudiesJournal ArticleResearch Support, Non-U.S. Gov'tRecently, several experimental techniques have emerged for probing RNA structures based on high-throughput sequencing. However, most secondary structure prediction tools that incorporate probing data are designed and optimized for particular types of experiments. For example, RNAstructure-Fold is optimized for SHAPE data, while SeqFold is optimized for PARS data. Here, we report a new RNA secondary structure prediction method, restrained MaxExpect (RME), which can incorporate multiple types of experimental probing data and is based on a free energy model and an MEA (maximizing expected accuracy) algorithm. We first demonstrated that RME substantially improved secondary structure prediction with perfect restraints (base pair information of known structures). Next, we collected structure-probing data from diverse experiments (e.g. SHAPE, PARS and DMS-seq) and transformed them into a unified set of pairing probabilities with a posterior probabilistic model. By using the probability scores as restraints in RME, we compared its secondary structure prediction performance with two other well-known tools, RNAstructure-Fold (based on a free energy minimization algorithm) and SeqFold (based on a sampling algorithm). For SHAPE data, RME and RNAstructure-Fold performed better than SeqFold, because they markedly altered the energy model with the experimental restraints. For high-throughput data (e.g. PARS and DMS-seq) with lower probing efficiency, the secondary structure prediction performances of the tested tools were comparable, with performance improvements for only a portion of the tested RNAs. However, when the effects of tertiary structure and protein interactions were removed, RME showed the highest prediction accuracy in the DMS-accessible regions by incorporating in vivo DMS-seq data.National Key Basic Research Program of China [2012CB316503]; National High-Tech Research and Development Program of China [2014AA021103]; National Natural Science Foundation of China [31271402]; Tsinghua University Initiative Scientific Research Program [2014z21045]; Hong Kong Research Grants Council Early Career Scheme [419612 to K.Y.]; National Science Foundation [1339282 to D.H.M.]; Computing Platform of the National Protein Facilities (Tsinghua University). Funding for open access charge: National Natural Science Foundation of China [31271402]

Human health outcomes of a restored ecological balance in African agro-landscapes

Biodiversity loss and invasive species are exacting negative economic, environmental and societal impacts. While the monetary aspects of species invasion have been well-assessed, their impacts on human and social livelihood outcomes routinely remain obscure. Here, we empirically demonstrate several important human health and demographic consequences of a 1970s invasive pest species of cassava across sub-Saharan Africa. Pest-induced crop loss in 18 African countries relying heavily on cassava as a staple inflicted cascading effects on human birth rate (−6%) and adult mortality (+4%) over the span of a decade. The 1981 scientifically-guided release of the specialist parasitic wasp Anagyrus lopezi restored cassava yields, thus reconstituting food security in these agricultural systems and enabling parallel improvements in human health indices. Our analysis shows how agricultural performance can influence health and demographic outcomes, and accentuates how deliberate efforts to safeguard agro-ecological functions and resilience could be important during times of global environmental change

SnO2Nanowire Arrays and Electrical Properties Synthesized by Fast Heating a Mixture of SnO2and CNTs Waste Soot

SnO2nanowire arrays were synthesized by fast heating a mixture of SnO2and the carbon nanotubes waste soot by high-frequency induction heating. The resultant SnO2nanowires possess diameters from 50 to 100 nm and lengths up to tens of mircrometers. The field-effect transistors based on single SnO2nanowire exhibit that as-synthesized nanowires have better transistor performance in terms of transconductance and on/off ratio. This work demonstrates a simple technique to the growth of nanomaterials for application in future nanoelectronic devices