Glucosinolates are a group of sulfur and nitrogencontaining secondary metabolites that occur in crops belonging to the family of Brassicaceae. Glucosinolates are chemically stable until they become in contact with the enzyme myrosinase. Upon tissue damage, glucosinolates are released from plant vacuoles and rapidly hydrolyzed by myrosinase to glucose and other unstable thiohydroximate-O-sulfonate intermediates, which, as dictated by chemical conditions, spontaneously rearrange to isothiocyanates, thiocyanates, or nitriles. The chemical nature of the hydrolysis products from the glucosinolatemyrosinase system depends on the presence or absence of supplementary proteins, such as epithiospecifier proteins (ESPs). ESPs are specifically involved in the glucosinolate degradation catalyzed by myrosinase. ESPs have been purified and identified in Crambe abyssinica, Arabidopsis thaliana, Brassica napus and Brassica oleracea that appear responsible for the formation of epithionitriles. However, the function of ESP in the regulation of glucosinolate hydrolysis and its physiological role in Brassica vegetables remain unclear.
The objective of the present study was to analyze the function of BoESP and investigate the regulation mechanism of ESP in glucosinolate hydrolysis of Brassica vegetables.
Total RNA was extracted from broccoli (Brassica oleracea L. ssp. italica) used as the template to amplify the full length of cDNA of broccoli ESP gene (BoESP) by RT-PCR, and the gene fragment
was subsequently cloned into pMDTM20-T vector．BoESP gene was digested completely from pMDTM20-T-BoESP vector by KpnⅠ and BamHⅠ, and the gene fragment was cloned into plant expression vector pCambia2301．The overexpression construct of BoESP was then introduced into the model plant A. thaliana by Agrobacterium tumefaciens-mediated genetic transformation. The seeds of T0 plants were sown on medium containing 50 mg/L kanamycin and the resistant plants were verified by PCR amplification to be transgenic A. thaliana. The transgenic T₁ seeds were sown and seedlings were harvested after 3 weeks. The hydrolysis products of glucosinolate in transgenic T₁ seedlings were analyzed by gas chromatograph with flame ionization detector and the compositions of hydrolysis products in vivo in the transgenic plants were evaluated.
The results from the electrophoresis of PCR-amplified products confirmed that the cDNA of BoESP was successfully cloned. The results of double restriction enzyme digestion of BoESP CaMV35S by KpnⅠand BamHⅠ and PCR detection of BoESP CaMV35S in A. tumefaciens EHA105 showed the successful construction of plant overexpression vector BoESP CaMV35S. The transformation with the BoESP CaMV35S construct altered the constituents of glucosinolate hydrolysis products in A. thaliana. The content of 4-methoxy-indole-3-acetonitrile in A. thaliana with BoESP overexpression was significantly increased by 3.49%, whereas that of 1-isothiocyanato-4-methanesulfinyl-butane in A. thaliana with BoESP overexpression was significantly decreased by 17.63%, compared with the wild-type plants.
As a result, it is provided the direct evidence for the regulatory role of BoESP in glucosinolate metabolism. The research on the function of ESP in the regulation of glucosinolates hydrolysis can provide unique tools in agricultural crops as a strategy to improve their insect and pathogen resistance as well as nutrition value. Our findings are of great theoretical significance and potential in crop improvement.

Glucosinolatemyrosinase system is one of the most important defense systems in plants, which is essential for plants to defense against herbivores and pathogens. Glucosinolates are a group of sulfur and nitrogencontaining secondary metabolites that mainly occur in crops belonging to the family of Brassicaceae. They can be hydrolyzed by myrosinases into different degradation products, which have a variety of biological activities. The chemical nature of the hydrolysis products from the glucosinolatemyrosinase system depends on the presence or absence of supplementary proteins, such as epithiospecifier proteins (ESPs). ESPs are specifically involved in glucosinolate degradation catalyzed by myrosinase. ESPs have been purified and identified in Crambe abyssinica, Arabidopsis thaliana, Brassica napus and Brassica oleracea. However, the gene of Chinese cabbage (Brassica campestris ssp. chinensis) ESP (BcESP) has not been cloned yet and the function of BcESP in the regulation of glucosinolate hydrolysis and its physiological role in Chinese cabbage remain unclear. To investigate the physiological roles of ESPs in Brassica vegetables, the gene of BcESP was coloned and its function was preliminarily verified. Total RNA was extracted from Chinese cabbage used as the template to amplify 3′ sequence and 5′ sequence of cDNA of BcESP by RTPCR using degenerate primers, and then the full cDNA of BcESP was obtained. The full cDNA fragment of BcESP was subsequently cloned into pMDTM20T vector. BcESP gene was then digested completely from pMDTM20-T-BcESP by BamHⅠ and SalⅠ,
and the gene fragment was cloned into plant expression vector pCambia2301．The overexpression construct of BcESP CaMV35S was introduced into the model plant A. thaliana by Agrobacterium tumefaciens-mediated genetic transformation. The seeds of T0 plants were sown on medium containing 50 mg/L kanamycin and resistant plants were verified by PCR amplification to be transgenic A. thaliana. The transgenic T1 seeds were sown and the seedlings were harvested after 4 weeks. The hydrolysis products of glucosinolate in transgenic T1 seedlings were analyzed by gas chromatograph with flame ionization detector and the constitue of hydrolysis products in vivo in the transgenic plants were evaluated.
A full-length cDNA encoding BcESP of 343 amino acids was isolated, which showed high similarity to ESP of A. thaliana and Brassica oleracea with identity of 94.7% and 95.6%, respectively. The results of double restriction enzyme digestion of BcESP CaMV35S by BamH1 and SalⅠ showed the successful construction of plant overexpression vector BcESP CaMV35S. The transformation with the BcESP CaMV35S construct altered the hydrolysis of glucosinolates. The hydrolysis of allyl glucosinolate was redirected towards epithionitrile and nitrile formation in the BcESP-overexpressing lines. The content of simple nitrile in A. thaliana with BcESP overexpression was significantly increased, whereas that of isothiocyanates in A. thaliana with BcESP overexpression was significantly decreased, compared with the wild-type plants.
The study will provide unique tools for modulating glucosinolates metabolism in agricultural plants as a means to improve their insect and pathogen resistance and a good experimental system to study glucosinolates and their derived products.

Stubby root nematodes (Trichodorus spp.) are a group of ectoparasitic nematodes that not only affect root growth but also lead to root stagnation of an extensive range of crops by their feeding on plant root cells, and the importance is that some of which are virus vectors and can transmit viruses to many economically important crops such as flowers, vegetables, crops, fruit trees, etc. Until now, more than 50 species have been described in this genus all over the world, by using traditional diagnosis of nematode species based on examination of morphology and morphometrics, which need special taxonomists, is timeconsuming and laborious. Recent years, comparative analysis of rDNA genes and their associated spacer regions is becoming a popular tool for species and subspecies identification and construction of phylogenetic trees of many nematode groups, including stubby root nematodes.
Among 1546 soil samples collected from 13 provinces of China, including Beijing, Shandong, Shanxi, Henan, Jiangsu, Anhui, Hunan, Chongqing, Zhejiang, Fujian, Yunnan, Hainan, and Guangdong, 23 populations of Trichodorus nanjingensis were identified from the rhizosphere of Chinese mulberry, ornamental flowers in Zhejiang Province, and orchards in Beijing, by systematical study based on the morphological and rDNA characters.
The results showed that the detection rate of T. nanjingensis populations from Beijing accounted for 39.1% of the total samples collected in Beijing, which indicated T. nanjingensis as the dominant nematode species in perennial plants of Beijing. Through the morphological and morphometrical comparisons, slight variation between intraspecies was revealed by the populations of T. nanjingensis from Beijing and Zhejiang Province, but two males of population 129 isolated from Prunus blireana and one male of population 088 isolated from Cotoneaster multiflorus from Beijing had one cervical papillae instead of two. The sequence similarity of 18S rDNA between T. nanjingensis populations from Beijing and Zhejiang Province and those submitted in GenBank (AJ439579 and AJ439580) ranged in 99.2%-100.0%. The sequence alignments of ITS1, ITS2 region of rDNA and D2D3 region of 28S RNA gene revealed the consistency between these populations. These results indicate that rDNA sequences can provide useful information for identifying T. nanjingensis from the others.

In nature, plants are often exposed to everchanging external stimuli during their growth and development, including pathogen infection, drought, salinity and various other biotic and abiotic stresses. These extracellular stimuli are perceived by the plant through a highly elaborate signaling network, which leads to an adaptive stress response at cellular and organismal levels. A specific class of serine/threonine

protein kinases, mitogenactivated protein kinases (MAPKs) play an important role in the transduction of various extra and intracellular signals and are conserved throughout eukaryotes. Recently, increasing evidences
indicate that MAPK (mitogenactivated protein kinase) has very important effects on plant growth and development, as well as stress resistance. As we know, current research on tomato (Solanum lycopersicum L.) MAPK gene is relatively limited. While the recently completed Genome Sequencing Project for tomato genome provides an opportunity to deduce the tomato MAPK genes and infer its evolutionary history. So more detailed biochemical and functional characterization is likely to be carried out to understand the function of tomato MAPKs. The cDNA sequence of novel SlMAPK12 (GenBank No. JF795447) was amplified by PCR using primers designed based on the predicted sequences of tomato unigene.Then many bioinformatics tools were used to analyze and predict SlMAPK12, such as ProtParam. To analyze the expression pattern of SlMAPK12 in various tissues and during flower developmental stages, the leaves, stems, petals, stamens, pistils, fruits and 5 stages of floral development from flowering tomato plants were characterized by RT-PCR and furthermore proved by qRT-PCR. For high temperature treatment, the stamen were collected at 0 h, 12 h, 24 h, 48 h and 72 h after (38±1) ℃ heat stress treatment. Then the qRT-PCR experiments were employed to characterize gene expression profiles. SlMAPK12 encoding a protein of 621 amino acids contained 11 subdomains of the MAPK. Subdomain Ⅷ contained the threonine and tyrosine residues, named T-D-Y (Thr-Asp-Tyr) motif, that was phosphorylated for the activation of SlMAPK12. SlMAPK12 protein sequences were found to contain four types of special domains: active site, ATP binding site, substrate binding site, and activation loop (A-loop) and KIM docking site. Amino acid sequence alignment revealed that SlMAPK12 shared high identity with groupD MAPKs from Arabidopsis, Populus, and Ricinus, which indicated that the groupD MAPKs was conserved in different plant species. The temporal and spatial expression patterns of SlMAPK12 analysed by RT-PCR and qRT-PCR in different tomato tissue indicated that the relative gene expression level of SlMARK12 in stamen was much higher than other organs. Also, the levels of SlMAPK12 expressed in different developmental stages of tomato flower were almost the same. These results indicated that SlMAPK12 might have very important effects on flower development. The expression pattern of SlMAPK12 gene under hightemperature (38±1) ℃ was analysed by qRTPCR. We found that the transcripts of SlMAPK12 in stamen accumulated markedly when the tomato seedlings were subjected to heat stress. These results above indicated that SlMAPK12 probably involved in the adaptive responses to heat stress during tomato pollen development. The preferential expression of SlMAPK12 gene provides a new avenue for functional analyses in tomato. The major challenge for future research is to focus on identifying more MAPKs and understanding the specific role of MAPK genes during tomato growth and development.

Aeschynanthus radicans is one of the most popular hanging plants. Now, for its high visual value of leaves and flowers, A. radicans has been often used as indoor ornamental and also plays an important role in landscaping. In Zhejiang Province, A. radicans has been widely cultivated; however, it often suffers from cold in winter. In the recent years, some researches on plant naturalization and tissue culture of A. radicans have been reported, whereas little information is available regarding cold resistance of A. radicans thus far. Therefore, it is necessary to characterize the physiological effects of low temperature on A. radicans. These studies might make technological assistance for plant growth and development under low temperature, and provide a basis for new variety selection with improvements on cold resistance. The purpose of the present study is to investigate the cold tolerance characteristics of A. radicans leaves, to show the physiological responses of A. radicans to low temperature stress, and to choose some physiological indicators for evaluating the cold tolerance of A. radicans. In this study, some physiological traits, that is, relative electric conductivity (REC), water content, chlorophyll content, malondialdehyde (MDA) content, activities of superoxide dismutase (SOD) and catalase (CAT), were studied for biennial cutting plants of A. radicans variety ‘Round leaf and red flower’ under different day/night low temperature stress (16℃/12℃, 12℃/8℃, 8℃/4℃, 4℃/0℃), different stress time and recovery growth time. The results indicated that: 1) The REC values of A. radicans leaves increased gradually with the decrease of temperature and the elongation of treatment time. Also, the REC values showed significant difference among treatments under four kinds of temperatures. The tendency of chlorophyll content and water content declined with the elongation of treatment time under low temperatures. The content of MDA under cold stress descended at first and then ascended gradually, and received a peak at 10 h. The SOD activity increased slowly under low temperature, rose to the maximum at 4 d, and then decreased gradually, with a minimum at 10 d. Among the treatments with different low temperatures, the SOD activity showed a decline tendency with lower temperatures. 2) The results showed that all determined traits had no obvious distinctness when day/night temperatures exceeded 12℃/8℃, and leaves death would take place below 4℃/0℃. Therefore, 8℃/4℃ group was considered to be a suitable day/night temperature for cold tolerance evaluation. 3) The REC and water content were significantly correlated with the other investigated traits. Besides, a significant positive correlation was detected between chlorophyll content and SOD activity, whereas a significant negative correlation between MDA content and CAT activity was discovered. In a word, the proper day/night temperature for cold tolerance evaluation of A. radicans was 8℃/4℃. REC, MDA content, water content, chlorophyll content, SOD and CAT activity could be used as physiological indicators in cold tolerance evaluation of A. radicans. The findings of this study would be useful for selecting new varieties with improved cold resistance.

Cyst-forming nematode parasitizing on wheat is a serious problem in the world. The first report of cyst nematode infecting wheat in China was in 1989，and since then the nematodes were reported in 13 provinces of China. In Shanxi Province no systematic survey were made for the distribution and species identification of the cystforming nematodes parasitizing in wheat.
During 2010 to 2011, an extensive survey and investigation on cystforming nematodes parasitizing wheat in Shanxi Province was carried out. Key morphological characteristics and morphometrics of cysts and secondstage juveniles of major populations were systematically observed and measured, and molecular data of rDNA-ITS region of the populations were analyzed.
The cysts were characterized by lemon-shaped, with posterior protuberance, vulval silt short, bifenestrate, bullae present and under bridge absent. Morphometric comparison of cysts and second stage juveniles showed that all the cystforming nematode populations from Shanxi were Heterodera avenae. The phylogenic analysis of the rDNA-ITS sequences based on nine cereal cyst nematode (CCN) populations from Shanxi Province showed a close genetic relationship with the H. avenae populations from China including Anhui, Jiangsu, Henan, Beijing, Hebei and Qinghai, and India, and H. australis population from Australia, however, the CCN populations from China had a distant genetic relationship with H. avenae from European countries including Germany, Morocco, Spain, United Kingdom and France. Amplification of rDNA-ITS region of H. avenae populations collected from Shanxi yielded a fragment with the length of 1045 bp.
Both morphological and molecular identification of cyst-forming nematode populations parasitizing on wheat in Shanxi confirm that all the populations collected in this study are H. avenae, and no other species are detected.

Although ten years have passed since the draft sequence of the human genome was reported in 2001, the accurate number of human proteinencoding genes is still uncertain. According to the latest release of HInvDB (release 6.2), 34511 proteinencoding genes were annotated and most of them were functionunknown. There is still a long road ahead to identify the whole human genes and their functions. During our previous genome-wide analysis of single-block EST sequences with polyadenylation sites, we found a lot of ESTs that represented potentially novel un-identified genes or splice variants. In the present study, we focused on the cloning and identification of a novel cDNA sequence represented by the EST AV653338 with the encoding product containing two incomplete colipaselike domains, when the electronic prolongation by EST contig was performed.
By using mixed cDNAs from human cell lines as templates, we successfully cloned the novel encoding gene sequence, and revealed a novel human colipase-like proteinencoding gene named hCLPSL3 (human colipase-like 3) for there have been two other genes with protein products also containing colipase-like domains registered in the international nucleotide databases, C6ORF126 (namely CLPSL1 here) and C6ORF127 (namely CLPSL2 here). Totally, two transcript variants were obtained, i.e. hCLPSL3-v1 and -v2. Only hCLPSL3-v1 contained a complete open reading frame (ORF), encoding 159 amino acids, whereas the ORF of hCLPSL3-v2 was interrupted by PTC (premature stop codon) and it possibly was a substrate of nonsensemediated mRNA decay. Human CLPSL3-v1 contained a typical signal peptide (aa. 1-22) predicted by SignalP 4.0 Server, two internal sequence repeat regions (aa. 46-84 and aa. 88-125) with high homology, and two incomplete colipase-like domains (aa. 25-68 and aa. 113-159) predicted by InterProScan and Motif Scan program, respectively. Using nested RT-PCR method for expression analysis in several cell lines (293T, HeLa, U2OS, HepG2, HCT116, A549, H1299, Jurkat, H520 and THP-1), we found that hCLPSL3 was mainly expressed in 293T, U2OS, HCT116 and THP-1 cells. For lack of cDNAs, we did not perform the detection in human tissues. The typical signal peptide in CLPSL3 suggests that it probably is a secreted protein. Therefore, the recombinant eukaryotic expression vector of hCLPSL3-v1 was constructed, and over-expressed in human 293T cells. As expected, human CLPSL3 was verified to be secreted when the supernatant was used for Western blot assay. By homology analysis, mouse and rat CLPSL3 homologous cDNAs were also predicted. Using RT-PCR method, three mouse CLPSL3 transcript variants (mCLPSL-v1, -v2 and -v3) were successfully cloned in the kidney (-v1), colon (-v2) and spleen (-v3) tissues, respectively. Only mCLPSL-v1 contained a complete ORF encoding 161 amino acids, whereas the ORFs of both mCLPSL-v2 and -v3 were interrupted by PTCs. Rat CLPSL3 (rCLPSL3) cDNAs, encoding a product of 162 amino acids, were successfully cloned in both colon and small intestine tissues. However, rCLPSL3 was undetectable in rat pancreas. CLPSL3 was widely expressed and highly conserved in mammalian animals, such as Pan troglodytes, Equus caballus, Cavia porcellus, Loxodonta africana, Mus musculus and Rattus norvegicus, and showed very similar gene structures. Moreover, the CLPSL3 contained 18 highly conserved cysteines in all species, suggesting that it might relate to the disulfide bond formation.
Colipase is a co-factor needed by pancreatic lipase for efficient dietary lipid hydrolysis. Because both mCLPSL and rCLPSL3 were detectable for expression in digestive tract, whether they play important roles in dietary lipid hydrolysis still needs further investigation. Our studies lay a foundation for future functional study of CLPSL3. In addition, all of the novel nucleotide sequences have been submitted to GenBank database with the accession numbers: JQ012741 (hCLPSL3-v1), JQ012742 (hCLPSL3-v2), JQ2589

Sweet cherry is a common economic fruit tree in China. The occasional and temporal drought, which is common in South China areas, has become a main environmental factor that decreases vegetative growth and yield, and reduces fruit size, and sometimes quality, causing important economic losses in orchards. Grafting elite and commercial cultivars onto rootstocks capable of reducing the effect of drought stress on shoot is a promising tool for enhancing drought resistance. It was reported that certain traits of rootstocks had a marked influence on droughtstress response, including differences in root distribution, water uptake efficiency and root hydraulic conductivity, as well as crop load and fruit characteristics. However, little information was available about the rootstock germplasm screening for drought tolerance in sweet cherry. The objective of the present study was to screen the potential cherry rootstock germplasm to make sweet cherry adapt to the drought stress. The sweet cherry ‘Zaodaguo’ (Prunus avium L.) were grated on four rootstocks, Prunus avium ‘Zaodaguo’, P. pseudocerasus ‘Daqingye’, Cerasus sachalinensis ‘Benxishanying’ P. avium × P. pseudocerasus ‘Colt’ and P. pseudocerasus ‘Laiyangaiying’. After an initial period of growth under wellirrigated conditions the amount of irrigation was gradually reduced to 40% of field moisture capacity as the drought stress, to simulate natural drying in the soil. Then, the responses of photosynthesis and chloroplast ultrastructure alternations of ‘Zaodaguo’ sweet cherry to drought stress were analyzed. The results showed that the leaf relative water content (RWC), total chlorophyll contents (TChl), photosynthetic rate (Pn), stomatal conductance (Gs), and maximum quantum yield of PSⅡ (Fv/Fm) of all seedlings grafted on four rootstocks were significantly altered by the drought stress (P < 0.05). With aggravated drought stress, the Pn, Gs, Tr (transpiration rate) and Fv/Fm decreased gradually. After subjected to drought stress for 16 d, the decreases with 10.7%, 28.4%, 37.8%, 51.5% and 20.5% were observed in RWC, TChl, Pn, Gs and Fv/Fm of ‘Benxishanying’. Correspondingly, the decreases were generally above 2fold higher in other three rootstocks than the decreases in ‘Benxishanying’, and the greatest decrease generally occurred in seedlings grafted on ‘Colt’. Under drought stress, the chloroplast lamellar structures were disordered in the leaves of ‘Laiyangaiying’, ‘Daqingye’ and ‘Colt’, in which the chloroplast was swollen and the fine structure was deformed, and the chloroplast matrix zone expanded and the lamellae structure became loose; however, the chloroplast ultrastructures were relatively intact in leaves of ‘Benxishanying’. Through membership function analysis based on the 10 photosynthetic parameters, the drought resistance capacity of the four cherry rootstocks was in descending order as follows: ‘Benxishanying’, ‘Laiyangaiying’, ‘Daqingye’ and ‘Colt’. These results above indicate that ‘Benxishanying’, as a relatively drought tolerant rootstock, is a promising choice for sweet cherry cultivated in arid and semiarid areas.

Although the harvesting of fresh, high quality tea leaves has traditionally relied on handplucking, labor shortages and the rise in the cost of handplucking have restricted the growth of quality tea production and the development of the tea industry.This problem would be effectively resolved if the fresh tea leaves harvested through machineplucking could be used for the production of high quality tea. However, few studies to date have been reported in this respect. Based on current machineplucking technology, fresh tea leaves are difficult to harvest, as the raw material, consisting of mixed shoots and leaves, varies in size and tenderness. In order to meet the production standards of high quality tea, machineplucking technology must be improved. This study aims to explore the technological development of the machineplucking classification method of fresh tea leaves. Three methods of classification of fresh, machineplucked tea leaves were compared in this study: 1) roll screen (6CXF70 bulk tea leaves classification machine, MCF selfmade high quality tea leaves classification machine); 2) flat circular screen (Zhechajing 766); and, 3) wind election (FX450 type). The raw material was classified by size and mass in varying sieve and wind condition. In addition, the mechanical compositions of classified fresh tea leaves were also analyzed to compare the classification effects. Among the fresh, machineplucked tea leaves, which were not suitable for the manufacture of high quality tea, the 23.54% were standard shoots, 43.33% were coarse old shoots and 33.13% were other debris. The results of the roll screen method showed that the proportion of standard shoots classified by MCF was 19% higher than those classified by 6CXF70 within the same classification range. The flat circular screen was unable to adequately separate shoots by size. The wind election method was more effective at removing debris, but it was not able to separate fresh, standard shoots from old, coarse shoots. The classification effect was vastly improved by combining the MCF and wind election methods. When the fresh, machineplucked tea leaves were first classified by MCF and then by wind election, the proportion of standard shoots to coarse shoots rose by 16%, and the debris decreased by 23%. This result indicates that the MCF in combination with the wind election method is effective in separating standard shoots from debris. The classification effect, however, was not observed if the order of methodology was reversed. These results clearly indicate that adjusting the structure of classification mechanisms can result in greater separation of standard shoots to a certain extent. Although the three classification methods of roll screen, flat circular screen, and wind election all have the ability to separate fresh tea leaves by size, each method varies in effect. In conclusion, the roll screen method of classification results in more precise and standardized shoots, and the classification effect is most pronounced by combining the methods of MCF and wind election.

Nitrogen (N) is an essential element for both crop development and yield, however, excessive application of N fertilizer not only increases the production cost but also causes environmental pollution. Therefore, there is an urgent need to improve nitrogen use efficiency (NUE) and
minimize N losses for the development of sustainable agricultural systems. Numerous studies showed that NUE may be improved by N management strategies but this approach needed a lot of input. It is therefore critical to select and cultivate crops with enhanced NUE. Previous studies on NUE were mainly focused on crops, such as rice, wheat, barley, canola, however researches on vegetables were rather limited, even though overfertilization was prevalent nowadays in vegetable production in China. The aim of this study was to investigate genotypic differences in growth traits and NUE in spinach (Spinach oleracea L.) grown under Ndeficient and Nsufficient conditions in hydroponic cultivation. Dry matter, N accumulation, N usage index, N uptake and utilization efficiency were measured and compared for 30 spinach genotypes grown under Ndeficient (2 mmol/L) and Nsufficient (10 mmol/L) conditions by hydroponic experiment. The results showed significant differences in all parameters of NUE among the spinach genotypes under N-deficient and N-sufficient conditions. At the higher N level, plants produced higher shoot dry masses, N concentrations, N accumulation and N uptake efficiency, but lower N utilization efficiency and N utilization ratios. The shoot dry mass may be used as a critical index for evaluating the difference in NUE in spinach genotypes at the same N level because of high co-efficiency of variation at low and high N levels. In addition, shoot N accumulation, N uptake efficiency and N utilization ratio also showed high coefficiency of variation, and exhibited a significant positive correlation with shoot dry mass. Efficient and inefficient genotypes were selected based on the criterion of producing more or less than 10% shoot dry mass, respectively, at low and high N levels. The typical efficient spinach genotypes exhibited larger shoot dry masses, and higher N uptake efficiency, N utilization efficiency and N utilization ratio than the inefficient genotypes under low and high N conditions. The path coefficient analysis revealed that NUE was dominated by N uptake efficiency, while N utilization efficiency also had some contribution to NUE at the two different N levels. In sum, significant differences in NUE are found among 30 spinach genotypes and it is feasible to select Nefficient spinach genotypes from the existing varieties. The shoot dry mass, which can be easily measured, can be used as a simple and effective parameter for NUE, whereas shoot N accumulation, N uptake efficiency and N utilization ratio can also be employed as secondary indices for selection and evaluation of NUE in spinach. N uptake efficiency and utilization efficiency both influence NUE of spinach. Thus, improvements in N uptake efficiency and N utilization efficiency may be valuable to breed N-efficient spinach genotypes under conditions of either low or high N availability.

Bamboo has very wide applications such as construction materials, fibre production, biological energy, food and traditional Chinese medicines, etc. Moreover, the area of bamboo forest will increase in future as a result of bamboo industry’s development into a pillar industry in rural areas of south China. The limitation of nitrogen supplements in plant growth and biomass is more sensitive than other nutrition elements. So addition of different nitrogen fertilizers will affect the growth procession. Although there are numerous studies focusing on monopodial bamboo species, these types of key researches are missing in sympodial bamboo research, which is negative to the bamboo industry. Investigating the plasticity and physioecology of sympodial bamboo is helpful to comprehend its adaptability under different cultivation and afforestation conditions. In order to understand the relationship between plasticity of sympodial bamboo and soil nitrogen input under the seminatural and afforestation condition, the morphological and physiological adaptability variations of two sympodial bamboo seedlings, namely, Oxytenanthera braunii (wine bamboo) and Dendrocalamopsis oldhami, were studied. We set up 5 nitrogen fertilization CO(NH₂)₂ levels, i.e. N0 (calculated by N content), N40, N80, N120, N160 kg/hm2 after 52.7 kg/hm2 Ca(H2PO4)2 and (K2SO4)K2O 56.3 kg/hm2 were applied into the soil. And 1 a later, we measured the morphological and photosynthesis characteristics. Results showed that wine bamboo had higher biomass and resource utilization efficiency compared with D. oldhami. And the optimal nitrogen fertilizer level for wine bamboo was about N120 while for D. oldhami was N80, so wine bamboo had higher utilization capacity. These two bamboos achieved their most optimized light utilization by elevating SLA, extending crown, increasing total leave areas and developing height. Meanwhile, the positive behavior was observed that the relative growth rate and root radius of wine bamboo and D. oldhami increased with the increase of nitrogen level. The nitrogen content of N160 was to high that it affected the optimal growth, but it was still better than N40 and the control treatment. Under the condition of medium nitrogen fertilizer supply (N80N120), the physiological traits such as Pmax, LSP, LCP, Rd and φAQY were improved. The data of lower nitrogen supply like N40 treatment implied that the plasticity responses were not significant except for the root and φAQY. The higher biomass and SLA of wine bamboo, representing the capacity of absorbing carbon dioxide, implied that it could possess better adaptation and stronger propagation ability in the midhigh mountains of Southwest China after being introduced and afforested. The result of this study indicated that sympodial bamboo such as wine bamboo and D. oldhami should be planted on fertile soils where its habitat is managed to decrease the weeds growth, increase the root radius, branch length and total leaves areas so as to extend the crown to elevate photosynthesis and propagation rate.　

In recent years, China’s market has an novel edible oil-fish oil supplemented blend oil (FO), however, there is no data on its ability to be used for deep frying, how safe it is, and if it will produce a large number of trans fatty acids, as well as how the dynamic changes of 20:5n-3 and 22:6n-3 during the frying process. The objective of the present study was to investigate the changes of fatty acids and other physical and chemical parameters in different doses of FO during deep frying. Two liters of soybean blend oil (SO), and 1.5%, 3.0%, 6.0% and 12.0% FO were used to fry fresh potato chips at the temperature of 180 ℃, respectively, for total 6 days, each day frying 10 times, each time frying 120 g potato chips for 3 minutes, and the interval of 5 minutes between each frying.
Oil was kept for 1.5 hours at 180 ℃ after daily deep frying. Gas liquid chromatography (GLC) was used to analyze the fatty acid composition (% of total fatty acid), and other physical and chemical parameters were determined according China National Standard (GB). The results showed that the main trans fatty acids (TFAs) produced during deep frying were t18:1, t18:2n-6, t18:3n-6 and t18:3n-3. The proportions of t18:1 and t18:2n6 were increased with frying time, which was significantly higher in FO than that in SO. The proportion of t18:3n-6 and t18:3n-3 in 3.0% and 6.0% FO were increased in the first stage (0-12 h), and then decreased. However, they were decreased in SO, 1.5% and 12.0% FO with frying time. With the prolonging of the deep frying time, the proportions of 20:5n-3 and 22:6n-3 decreased in different doses of FO, with 12.0% FO decreased most. After 4 h, the acid value had a significant increasing trend; during 4-24 h, acid value of SO was significantly lower than FO (P < 0.01). Anisidine value and polymer showed a similar trend with acid value. However, with the prolonging of the deep frying time, the peroxide value showed a rising trend, but overall peroxide value of SO was significantly higher than that of FO (P < 0.01), which may be associated with antioxidant activity of 20:5n-3 and 22:6n-3. In conclusion, FO and SO can be used for cooking safely, however, they are not suitable for long-term repeated deep frying.

Currently eutrophication has become a hot issue all over the world. The removal of phosphorus from wastewaters is regarded as an important approach to fight eutrophication since phosphorus is one of the main factors causing eutrophication. The chemical phosphorus removal technology with ferric salt as a precipitant is in widespread use to meet the wastewater discharge standard. The optimization of phosphorus removal technology helps to cut down the cost of wastewater treatment. Herein the response surface methodology (RSM) is introduced to investigate the individual and combined effects of operation parameters.
The performance of chemical phosphorus removal technology with ferric salt as a precipitant is dependant on a series of factors. Fe/P ratio, pH and flash mixing speed (FMS) were chosen as objects of study, and singlefactor experiment and multiple-actor experiment were carried out to optimize the phosphorus removal efficiency.
The results of single-actor experiment showed that both Fe/P ratio and pH had significant effects on phosphorus removal, but FMS did not. When the phosphorus concentration was 100 mg/L, the optimal operation parameters were Fe/P ratio 3.0, pH 8.0, FMS 175225 r/min. The results of multiplefactor experiment showed that the individual effects of operation parameters on phosphorus removal were in order as Fe/P＞pH＞FMS. The combined effects of operation parameters were in order as Fe/P-MS ＞ pH-MS ＞ Fe/P-H, among which the effects of Fe/P-MS and Fe/P-pH were positive and the effect of pHFMS was negative. Based on the experiment, “priority/combination” model was proposed to enhance the phosphorus removal with ferric salt as a precipitant. The optimal operation parameters were as follows: Fe/P=2.57, pH=6.31 and FMS=136 r/min， when the phosphorus concentration was 100 mg/L. Both synthetic and real wastewaters were used to verify the feasibility of “priority/combination” model. Operated according to the model, the phosphorus removal was larger than 97% and the fractional error was less than 3%.
It can be concluded that the response surface methodology is feasible for the optimization of operation parameters in wastewater treatment processes. The “priority/combination” model is effective for the improvement of phosphorus removal from wastewaters with ferric salt as a precipitant. During the wastewater treatment, the synergic action of operation parameters should be fully used, while the antagonistic action of operation parameters should be carefully avoided.

Heavy metal accumulation in the topsoil because traffic, industrial wastes and atmospheric deposition by sedimentation, impaction and interception is well documented. High concentrations of different heavy metals in soil may cause longterm risks to ecosystem and humans. Metals can be mobilized in soil and taken up by edible plants or transported through drainage waters. They can have a direct influence on human health, as they can be transferred into the human body by different pathways, e.g. inhalation of dust or contaminated suspended particles, soil ingestion, and dermal absorption by direct contact. Plant availability, bioaccessibility and solubility of metals in soil are related with these different pathways. Some techniques should be developed to achieve an enduring immobilization or insolubilization of metals in soil, especially when the pollution degree is not extremely high. Many researchers have reported a significant decrease of metal availability in plants when amendments are added to polluted soils. However, little effort has been reported in the literature to decrease metal bioaccessibility and solubility. Therefore, this study has the
objective to evaluate the effects of several inexpensive, common mineral amendments on the potential solubility, plant availability, and bioaccessibility of the most environmentally important metals in soils. Six mineral amendment effects as potential immobilizers of heavy metals in two soils (acidic soil and calcareous soil) were studied by monitoring metal availability. The EDTA extraction, simple bioaccessibility extraction test (SBET) and CaCl2 extraction were applied to measure the plant availability, bioaccessibility and solubility of heavy metals in the soils, respectively. The amendments were agricultural limestone, rock phosphate, palygorskite, calcium magnesium phosphate (Ca-Mg-P) fertilizer, zeolite, and Fe(OH)3, which were applied to the soils at rate of 50 g/kg, respectively. Adsorption/desorption experiments of metals by isolated amendments showed that all amendments caused a strong retention of metals from solutions, with negligible release by dilution. The proportions of heavy metals adsorbed in six mineral materials were higher than 97.2%, and the proportions of heavy metals remained in the mineral materials were higher than 96.8% after the first and second desorption steps of the experiments of adsorption/desorption of metals in solution. Chemical fractions of Cd, Cu, Pb, and Zn in the soils were affected by application of the mineral materials. Treatments of the mineral materials reduced exchangeable metals in the soils. There were chemical transformations of heavy metal fractions in the soils from exchangeable fractions to carbonatebound, oxidebound, and residual fractions when the mineral materials were applied, and the transformation varied with different types of amendments. The reduction effects of metal availability induced by amendment application decreased in the order of solubility > plant availability > bioaccessibility. The effects in acidic soil were greater than those in the calcareous soil. In general, Ca-Mg-P fertilizer, palygorskite or rock phosphate treatments were most suitable for decreasing water soluble heavy metals in the polluted soils. The most suitable mineral materials in decreasing plant availability were Ca-Mg-P fertilizer for Cd, palygorskite for Cu, Ca-Mg-P fertilizer or palygorskite for Zn, and agricultural limestone, rock phosphate or palygorskite for Pb. However, these amendments were scarcely efficient in reducing bioaccessibility of the metals, and the metals extracted by SBET in all six amendment treatments were very similar to the control treatment. Only Fe(OH)3, zeolite and Ca-Mg-P fertilizer had slight effects in reducing bioaccessibility of heavy metals of the soils. It is concluded t

Quercus forest is a zonal vegetation in east China. Due to the activity of local residents, the area of Quercus forest reduced gradually. As a temple forest, Q. variabilis forest in the Zipeng Mountain of Anhui Province survived from the human destruction. Investigation of the species composition, community structure and ecology function of the Q. variabilis forest is an essential work for forest conservation and vegetation restoration . The investigation was conducted in the Zipeng Mountain national forest park, which located in Feixi county of Anhui Province, China. A 1.5 hm2 fixed sample plot was established in natural Q. variabilis forest. The sample plot was divided into six 50 m × 50 m sized quadrats according to the contiguous grid quadrat method. All trees in the quadrats were investigated by measuring
their number, diameter at breast height (DBH), tree height and crown diameter, etc. Herbaceous plants were investigated in 5 m × 5 m quadrats set in the center of and all around each large quadrat. The extralayer plants were recorded by their category and growth status. Finally, the importance values of woody plants were calculated according to the data of investigation. The research results showed that the sample plot set in natural Quercus forest of Zipeng Mountain had a rich species composition with 81 species, belonging to 77 genera and 49 families in the forest. The community structure of the plot was simple. The statistics based on mean DBH, basal area, and importance value of species showed that Q. variabilis was an absolutely dominant species. The basal area of Q. variabilis over 17.938 1 m2/hm2 accounted for 85.73％ of total basal area of all woody plants. The dense shrublayer contained many species in which the abundant species was Symplocos paniculata. Herblayer was sparse but rich with 41 species, and liana was few. Arealtype analysis of species origination suggested that the species in the forest were highly related to temperate components, but tropical components also occupied fairly high percentage. The importance value of temperate and tropical genera reached 53.23％ and 41.94％, respectively. In addition, the Q. variabilis forest was of climax community, and the population was recessionary at present stage. The Q. variabilis of DBH＜10 cm was zero, and those of 10 cm＜DBH＜20 cm were 16 which accounted only 4.72％ of the total area, indicating that the regeneration of the species was very poor. The lifeform, stratification, structure of the community demonstrates that the Q. variabilis forest is a deciduous broadleaf forest in the north subtropical region of China. Further research is needed to elucidate how the main species in Quercus forest regenerate themselves, and which factors promote or inhibit pioneer species regeneration.