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Before completion of the Three Gorges Reservoir (TGR), China, there was growing apprehension that it would become a major emitter of greenhouse gases (GHG): Carbon Dioxide (CO2), Methane (CH4) and Nitrous Oxide (N2O). We report monthly measurements for one year of the fluxes of these gases at multiple sites within the TGR, Yangtze River, China, and from several major tributaries, and immediately downstream of the dam. The tributary areas have lower CO2 fluxes than the main storage; CH4 fluxes to the atmosphere after passage through the turbines are negligible. Overall, TGR showed significantly lower CH4 emission rates than most new reservoirs in temperate and tropical regions. We attribute this to the well-oxygenated deep water and high water velocities which produce oxic mainstem conditions inimical to CH4 emission. TGR's CO2 fluxes were lower than most tropical reservoirs and higher than most temperate systems. This is due to the high load of metabolizable soil carbon delivered through erosion to the Yangtze River. Compared to fossil fuelled power plants of equivalent power output TGR is a very small GHG emitter, annual CO2-equivalent emissions are approximately 1.7% of a coal-fired generating plant of comparable power output. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Two sediment cores from the Changjiang (Yangtze) River estuary and its adjacent East China Sea were collected and studied for eutrophication history using paleoecological records of environmental changes over the last century. A multiproxy approach by using biological and geochemical analyses revealed changes in diatom assemblages, total organic carbon (TOC), total nitrogen (TN) and biogenic silica (BSi) and give an indication of nutrient in status and trends in Changjiang River estuary and its adjacent East China Sea. The diatom assemblages in the two cores generally increased gradually from the 1970s, and accelerated from the 1990s until now, reflecting the increased eutrophication and causing large algae blooms/red tides. The TOC, TN and BSi showing the similar trends, supported the interpretation of the eutrophication process indicated by diatom analyses. The two cores were located in different sea areas of the East China Sea, and we discuss their relative changes based on their environment characteristics. We also discuss the potential effect of anthropogenic influences and ongoing projects on eutrophication in the Changjiang River and its adjacent East China Sea. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Model studies suggested that human-induced increase in nutrient load may have stimulated primary production and thus has enhanced the CO2 uptake capacity in the coastal ocean. In this study, we investigated the seasonal variations of the surface water's partial pressure of CO2 (pCO2sw) in the highly human-impacted Changjiang-East China Sea system between 2008 and 2011. The seasonality of pCO2sw has large spatial variations, with the largest extreme of 170±75 µatm on the inner shelf near the Changjiang Estuary (from 271±55 µatm in summer to 441±51 µatm in autumn) and the weakest extreme of 53±20 µatm on the outer shelf (from 328±9 µatm in winter to 381±18 µatm in summer). During the summer period, stronger stratification and bio-logical production driven by the eutrophic Changjiang plume results in a very low CO2 in surface waters and a very high CO2 in bottom waters on the inner shelf, with the latter returning high CO2 to the surface water during the mixed period. Interestingly, a comparison with historical data shows that the average pCO2sw on the inner shelf near the Changjiang Estuary has decreased notably during summer, but it has increased during autumn and winter from the 1990s to the 2000s. We suggest that this decadal change is associated with recently increased eutrophication. This would increase both the photosynthetic removal of CO2 in surface waters and the respiratory release of CO2 in bottom waters during summertime, thereby returning more CO2 to the surface during the subsequent mixing seasons and/or episodic extreme weather events (e.g. typhoons). Our finding demonstrates that increasing anthropogenic nutrient delivery from a large river may enhance the sequestration capacity of CO2 in summer but may reduce it in autumn and winter. Consequently, the coastal ocean may not necessarily take up more atmospheric CO2 in response to increasing eutrophication, and the net effect largely depends on the relative time scale of air-sea gas exchange and offshore transport of the shelf water. Finally, the case we reported for the Changjiang system may have general ramifications for other eutrophic coastal oceans. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Green port construction has a profound impact on China's international climate commitment to carbon neutrality by 2050. To examine the carbon emission reduction potential of 20 major ports in the Yangtze River Delta port cluster of China, this study takes the perspective of environmental efficiency and employs dynamic exogenous variable DEA in efficiency evaluation. The results show the increasing environmental efficiency of the ports in the Yangtze River Delta, rising from 0.5116 in 2013 to 0.7276 in 2019. Also, there are significant spatial differences in efficiency. After considering exogenous variable, the average efficiency has increased from 0.5537 to 0.6276, indicating that regional green development is a critical factor in port environmental efficiency evaluation. Finally, the overall efficiency of input and output have risen, the slackness of carbon emission shows a trend of decreasing, and there is great potential for reducing carbon emissions from the perspective of port environmental efficiency. The previous studies paid less attention to dynamic efficiency, exogenous variables, and carbon emission. Therefore, this paper is the first comprehensive examination on the carbon emission reduction potential of China's Yangtze River Delta port cluster from the perspective of dynamic environmental efficiency. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper presents an empirical analysis of regional disparities from 2000 to 2012 based on a time series of data involving 74 cities within three mega-urban regions along Yangtze River in China. Differing from previous researches on inter-provincial and coastal/interior data, this paper provides a new perspective of mega-urban regions and their cities in China. By Coefficient of Variation and Analysis of Variance the selection of three mega-urban regions along Yangtze River reveals how the mega-urban regional disparities evolve among the east, middle and west up to date in China. In terms of general trend the mega-urban regional inequalities have been decreasing ever since the year around 2005. By traditional regression modeling this paper relates the mega-urban regional inequality and the alleviation to the urbanization and its focus on mega-urban regional development. The regression shows that the evolution of intra mega-urban regions disparities is negatively influenced by the urbanization with meaningful statistical significance from 2000 to 2012. The multilevel regression is further applied based on the nested hierarchical data structure. The results indicate a complicated relationship of the urban population density of the city level, the urbanization ratio of the mega-urban region level and the urban disparities in 2012. Finally limitations and further research advice are provided. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Rivers have been under sampled to establish them as sinks or sources of the atmospheric carbon oxide (CO2). Such poor coverage is well known for tropical and sub-tropical, particularly monsoon driven rivers. An unprecedented high-temporal-resolution (daily) sampling during July 2008-August 2009 were conducted from the Longchuanjiang River of the upper Yangtze basin, a subtropical monsoon river in China to reveal the daily-to-seasonal dynamics of the partial pressure of CO2 (pCO2) and CO2 degassing flux from the river. The pCO2 levels were supersaturated in CO2 with respect to atmospheric equilibrium (380 µatm) during the entire survey period with obvious daily and seasonal variations, ranging from 450 to 63000 µatm with an average of 3900 µatm. pCO2 values in the surface water in the wet season were relatively low, except flooding period in November, due to a dilution effect by heavy rainfall. However, both daily and monthly minimal and maximal pCO2 also occurred in this period. In contrast, the pCO2 levels in the dry season were much higher, mainly resulted from lower pH by anthropogenic activities. Net CO2 flux and pCO2 were strongly correlated with pH, but weakly with water temperature, dissolved inorganic carbon and water discharge, and uncorrelated with particulate nutrients and biogenic elements. The estimated water-to-air CO2 degassing flux in the Longchuanjiang River was about 110 mol m-2 yr-1, with the upper limit of 460 mol m-2 yr-1. Our study also indicated that among the total organic carbon remobilized through soil erosion, around 17% (11 400tC yr-1) of was emitted to the atmosphere, 52% (35 000tC yr-1) deposited in the river-reservoirs system and 31 % (21 000tC yr-1) exported further downstream. High spatial and temporal resolution of estimates of CO2 emission from the world large rivers is required due to that catchment characteristics and anthropogenic activities are extremely heterogeneous in space and time. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Dissolved nitrous oxide (N2O) was measured in the waters of the Changjiang (Yangtze River) Estuary and its adjacent marine area during five surveys covering the period of 2002-2006. Dissolved N2O concentrations ranged from 6.04 to 21.3 nM, and indicate seasonal variations with high values occurring in summer and spring. Dissolved riverine N2O was observed monthly at station Xuliujing of the Changjiang, and ranged from 12.4 to 33.3nM with an average of 20.8±7.8 nM. The average annual input of N2O from the Changjiang to the estuary and its adjacent area was estimated to be 15.8×106 mol/yr. N2O emission rates from the sediments of the Changjiang Estuary in spring ranged from -1.88 to 2.02 μmolm-2 d-1, which suggest that sediment can act as either a source or a sink of N2O in the Changjiang Estuary. The annual sea to air N2O fluxes from the Changjiang Estuary were estimated to be 6.8±3.7, 13.3±7.2 and 14.9±8.3 μmolm-2 d-1 using LM86, W92 and RC01 relationships, respectively. The annual sea to air N2O fluxes from the adjacent marine area were estimated to be 8.5±7.8, 15.3±13.5 and 17.4±15.7 μmolm-2 d-1 using LM86, W92 and RC01 relationship, respectively. Hence the Changjiang Estuary and its adjacent marine area is a net source of atmospheric N2O. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

During the flood season of 2016, the middle and lower reaches of the Yangtze River suffered the worst flooding since 1999, involving Hunan, Hubei, Anhui, Jiangxi and Jiangsu provinces and the Taihu Basin. Based on the field survey at eight counties on both sides along the Yangtze River in Anhui Province, this paper analyses the features of rainstorm, flood and the resulting disaster in 2016 over there, and identifies problems and difficulties existing in flood prevention and disaster reduction under the new situation of social and economic development. Furthermore, this paper discusses the coping strategies and measures on advancing the comprehensive flood management mode of human-water harmony, managing middle and small rivers and strengthening the key basic research on flood control and disaster reduction under the new situation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

With the rapid development of China's economy, air pollution is becoming extremely serious. The spatial-temporal evolution of air pollution is conducive to the management of air pollution. The paper is proceeded into three steps. Firstly, based on the generalization principal component analysis method, the comprehensive air pollution evaluation index is established. Then, the gravity center model is utilized to explore the spatial-temporal evolution of air pollution in Yangtze River Delta from January 2014 to December 2016. Finally, the contribution decomposition method is utilized to explore the contribution to gravity center evolution. The main results are as follows: (1) The air pollution have obvious seasonal and regional differences in Yangtze River Delta. (2) The gravity center of air pollution continues to westward after 2014 with the characteristic of the north-south circular movement. (3) Hefei City and Yangzhou City have huge impact on the gravity center evolution of air pollution. The conclusions could be helpful for Chinese government to control the air pollution in Yangtze River Delta. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Investigating the characteristics of urban expansion is helpful in managing the relationship between urbanization and the ecological and environmental issues related to sustainable development. The Defense Meteorological Satellite Program/Operational Line-scan System (DMSP/OLS) collects visible and near-infrared light fromthe Earth's surface at nightwithoutmoonlight. It generates effective time series data for mapping the dynamics of urban expansion. As a major urban agglomeration in the world, the Yangtze River Delta Urban Agglomeration (YRDUA) is an important intersection zone of both the "Belt and Road Initiative" and the "Yangtze River Economic Belt" in China. Therefore, this paper analyses urban expansion characteristics of the YRDUA for 1993-2012 from urban extents extracted from the DMSP/OLS for 1993, 1997, 2002, 2007, and 2012. First, calibration procedures are applied to DMSP/OLS data, including intercalibration, intra-annual composition, and inter-annual series correction procedures. Spatial extents are then extracted from the corrected DMSP/OLS data, and a threshold is determined via the spatial comparison method. Finally, three models are used to explore urban expansion characteristics of the YRDUA from expansion rates, expansion spatial patterns, and expansion evaluations. The results show that the urban expansion of the YRDUA occurred at an increasing rate from 1993-2007 and then declined after 2007 with the onset of the global financial crisis. The Suxichang and Ningbo metropolitan circles were seriously affected by the financial crisis, while the Hefei metropolitan circle was not. The urban expansion of the YRDUA moved from the northeast to the southwest over the 20-year period. Urban expansion involved internal infilling over the first 15 years and then evolved into external sprawl and suburbanization after 2007. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper characterizes the land-use changes of Wuhan in Yangtze River Basin between 1954 and 2020, and its impact on flood exposure. Using Landsat TM images, the study draws four land-use maps which refer to the years 1954, 1982, 2000 and 2020, to explore the spatial and temporal distribution of land-use changes, particularly concerning the distribution of urban areas near the Yangtze River Basin. This was followed by an analysis of the land-use changes during the 4 study periods, and a set of four levels of flood exposure are used to analyze the flood exposure of urban areas of Wuhan. The result shows that the extensive land-use changes have a negative impact on the flood exposure of Wuhan during the last two decades. Finally, this paper provides a quantitative analysis of the correlation between flood exposure and flood damage (using Spearman's rank correlation coefficient). The analysis indicates that there is an significant positive correlation between flood exposure and flood damage (or economic losses caused by floods), but the correlations between flood exposure and the number of people affected is different with previous assumptions. This paper is an initial effort to quantitatively analyze the impact of land-use changes on flood exposure of Wuhan in Yangtze River Basin, which can be used by stakeholders of the developing countries to develop contingency land-use plans to reduce the urban flood exposure and to address and prevent the damage and casualties caused by flood disasters. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Gezhouba Reservoir (GR) and Three Gorges Reservoir (TGR) are the two largest water-storage projects in the middle reach of the Yangtze River. The impoundments of the reservoirs have changed natural flow-regimes in the river. This paper uses the Yichang Hydrological Station as a proxy for water-storage projects along the Yangtze River to assess alterations in river-flow conditions in three separate periods. The periods coincide with the start of water storage in the GR and TGR. The ecohydrological conditions in the river system are assessed based on annual discharge, water level, water temperature, and suspended-sediment concentration. More importantly, the entire analysis is done in relation to the Chinese sturgeon species, which face the danger of extinction in the Yangtze River. Based on the research reported in this paper, the impoundment of the GR and TGR increases downstream average annual water-temperature. In contrast, it decreases downstream average annual runoff, water level, and suspended-sediment concentration. The change of hydrological conditions negatively influences the spawning and hatching conditions of Chinese sturgeon. This change is the key reason that causes the fertilized rate of Chinese sturgeon eggs to decline. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the past decades, a multilayer transshipment network of bulk shipping has been formed along the Yangtze River so as to support the fast development of Chinese iron and steel industry. Yet with the decrease of iron ore trade in China since 2014, the bulk port system on Yangtze River probably will be subject to change in the future. Under this background, this paper aims to analyze the development potential of Yangtze River bulk ports system with a focus on iron ore transshipment. To realize this objective, we firstly sort out the main transshipment patterns of bulk shipping, and optimize the bulk-shipping network with an optimization model. Several scenarios are then proposed and examined in the model by changing corresponding parameters. Cooperation among ports as one scenario is analyzed by applying core theory in cooperative game. Based on the changes of transshipment plans observed under the various scenarios, we finally ascertain the different development potentials of the system, and provide suggestions to the port operators and local maritime authorities. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

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In this paper, we explored the trends of the atmospheric moisture budget, precipitation, and streamflow in summer during 1961 to 2005 and possible correlations between them by using the linear regression method in the Yangtze River basin, China. The results indicate that: (1) increasing tendencies can be detected in the atmospheric moisture budget, precipitation and streamflow in the Yangtze River basin; however, the significant increasing trends occur only in the atmospheric moisture budget and precipitation in the middle and lower Yangtze River basin; (2) both the ratio of summer moisture budget to annual moisture budget and the ratio of summer precipitation to annual precipitation exhibit a significant increasing trend in the Yangtze River basin. The ratio of summer streamflow to annual streamflow is in a significant increasing trend in Hankou station. Significant increasing summer precipitation can be taken as the major controlling factor responsible for the higher probability of flood hazard occurrences in the Yangtze River basin. The consecutively increasing summer precipitation is largely due to the consistently increasing moisture budget; (3) the zonal geopotential height anomaly between 1991 and 2005 and 1961 and 1990 is higher from the south to the north, which to a large degree, limits the northward propagation of the summer monsoon to north China. As a result, the summer moisture budget increases in the middle and lower Yangtze River basin, which leads to more summer precipitation. This paper sheds light on the changing properties of precipitation and streamflow and possible underlying causes, which will be greatly helpful for better understanding of the changes of precipitation and streamflow in the Yangtze River basin. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This review paper provides a brief review on the development of ideas in the fields of the sea level change of the ECS (East China Sea), the history of the Yangtze River entering the sea and paleochannels in the shelf of the ECS since the Last Glacial Maximum (LGM). The paper summarizes two opposite theories about the Yangtze River entering the sea during the LGM. One theory is that the Yangtze River input a lacustrine in the north of Jiangsu province which was defunct in middle Holocene, and the river was once dry. The other was that the Yangtze River still existed and entered into the Okinawa Trough during the LGM, but scholars share different opinions on which course the river ran across and which place the river input the trough. This paper concludes future work is to study the evolution of the Yangtze River and the paleoclimate and the corresponding events as a whole from the view of regional and even global change, and more attention should be paid to the study on mud sediment, the Yangtze River's response to the changes in climate and sea-level, and the channel metamorphosis. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The left branch of the Bagua reach of the Yangtze River in China is vital for the regional economy and shipping. This paper describes a numerical modelling study, based on an extensively verified shallow-water solver, to simulate the effects of a diversion dyke on the flow around Bagua Island. A boundary-fitted curvilinear mesh of high resolution was generated, covering the model domain which stretched from Sihao Wharf to Gangchi. The simulation was calibrated against the field observations and physical model tests for the dry season at some velocity measurement cross-sections and water level gauging stations. The results showed that a diversion dyke can modify the water levels, flow fields and the flow rates to the left branch of the river. The water levels on the left side of the upstream channel and in the left branch were mainly affected. The left branch's diversion ratio also varied greatly when the length and the angle of the diversion dyke changed. However, when the angle of the diversion dyke was about 70°, the diversion ratio barely changed with the length of the dyke. The results are useful for channel management and regulation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

China is predicted to have higher drought risk with global warming, and for better preparedness and mitigation, it is necessary to find out the risky areas and reveal the essential causes. This paper develops an integrated index of drought risk following the pressure-state-impact process in which drought hazard and vulnerability are reflected by two stages of pressure-state and state-impact, respectively. Accordingly, the network structure data envelopment analysis model is employed to calculate the degree of drought risk, hazard and vulnerability. Then, this study evaluates 31 provinces, municipalities and autonomous regions of China, and the tempospatial patterns of regional drought hazard, vulnerability and risk during 2006-2011 are presented. Moreover, the determinants of risk in different parts of China are also investigated. The results suggest that the northeast and southwest of China are more potential to be affected by drought due to the high degree of hazard and vulnerability. The dominant factor affecting drought risk in the northwest is vulnerability, because the hazard in this part is comparatively low. However, although the drought situation is severe in the middle and lower reaches of the Yangtze River and the southeastern coastal areas, the strong resilience to drought makes the risk remain low. It is concluded that the effective way to decrease drought risk is to promote the level of water efficiency and agricultural irrigation, so that low sensitivity and high adaptive capacity would contribute to vulnerability reduction. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper investigates the long-run development of China's treaty ports from the mid-eighteenth century until today. Focusing on a sample of prefectures on the coast or on the Yangtze River, I document the dynamic development paths of treaty ports and their neighbors in alternate phases of closedness and openness. I also provide suggestive evidence on migration and sector-wise growth to understand the advantage of treaty ports in the long run. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the late 1990s, China’s Yangtze and Yellow River Basins suffered devastating natural disasters widely attributed to the degradation of soil and water resources. The Government of China responded with a number of major environmental programs, the most expensive and influential of which, the Grain for Green (GfG) Program, was implemented widely from 1999. Under the GfG Program—also known as the Sloping Land Conversion or Conversion of Cropland to Forest Program—the central government compensates farmers to convert cropland on steep slopes or otherwise ecologically sensitive areas to forest or grassland. Its long-term success depends on households’ ability to make sustainable changes to their household income streams and income diversification strategies. In this paper, we use a difference-in-difference estimation approach to examine the role of migration as a household-level response to the GfG Program, testing the extent to which individuals migrate following a reduction in land available for farming. Importantly, we exploit 15 years of data on migration decisions and establish that participating and non-participating households were on parallel migration paths before the program, thus refuting a key threat to causality in a difference-in-difference model. We find that participating families do, in fact, choose migration as an income diversification strategy more frequently than non-participants. The program effects varied over time but peaked post-Great Recession in 2011 when migration rates in GfG households exceeded those of non-GfG households by 5.9% points (p = 0.003) or about 26%. Our findings should encourage policymakers that families are making long-term adjustments to their livelihood strategies to avoid poverty in anticipation of the eventual withdrawal of government supports. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A better understanding of the runoff variations contributes to a better utilization of water resources and water conservancy planning. In this paper, we analyzed the runoff changes in the Yangtze River Basin (YRB) including the spatiotemporal characteristics of intra-annual variation, the trend, the mutation point, and the period of annual runoff using various statistical methods. We also investigated how changes in the precipitation and temperature could impact on runoff. We found that the intra-annual runoff shows a decreasing trend from 1954 to 2008 and from upper stream to lower stream. On the annual runoff sequence, the upstream runoff has a high consistency and shows an increasing diversity from upper stream to lower stream. The mutation points of the annual runoff in the YRB are years 1961 and 2004. Annual runoff presents multitime scales for dry and abundance changes. Hurst values show that the runoffs at the main control stations all have Hurst phenomenon (the persistence of annual runoff). The sensitivity analyses of runoff variation to precipitation and temperature were also conducted. Our results show that the response of runoff to precipitation is more sensitive than that to temperature. The response of runoff to temperature is only one-third of the response to precipitation. A decrease in temperature may offset the impact of decreasing rainfall on runoff, while an increase in both rainfall and temperature leads to strongest runoff variations in the YRB. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

During the past few decades, the ecosystems of lakes have been reshaped greatly by global climate change and expanding human activities. As the second largest freshwater lake in China, Dongting Lake is the most important regulating lake in the Yangtze River Basin because it has extensive flood storage capacity. The dynamic characteristics of its circulation and sediment transport are significantly affected by the scheduling and interception of control reservoirs at the upper reaches of the Yangtze River. In this paper, a central lake reservoir is proposed to improve the flood and drought resistance of Dongting Lake. The efficiency of the central lake reservoir is investigated numerically by developing a two-dimensional shallow water model. We demonstrate that current velocity and water elevation during flood and drought events can be influenced significantly by the construction of the central lake reservoir. The flood storage capacity of the central lake reservoir can reduce the peak flood elevation significantly in West Dongting Lake, which would enhance its flood resistance. The water replenishment of the central lake reservoir in the dry season can also efficiently increase the lake water elevation to enhance the drought resistance in the area surrounding the lake. Our findings have important implications for policy makers and their management of Dongting Lake. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Recent interpretations of the archaeology of domesticated rice evolution and the development of agriculture in the Lower Yangzi Valley are being informed by new genetic, palaeoenvironmental, archaeological and archaeobotanical data. This paper explores current views on early rice production in the region and attempts to expand the discourse to provoke exploration of new and modified questions. Rice-specific botanical through large-scale ecological issues and causality are examined. This paper argues that understanding rice domestication and production, although important, should not be the exclusive goal of research on early agriculture in the Yangzi Valley. Despite the preliminary nature of the investigations at Kuahuqiao (c. 8000–7000 cal. BP), evidence of resource management, and potential domesticated resources or their ancestors that includes pig (Sus scrofa), peach (Prunus persica), apricot (P. armeniaca), Japanese apricot (P. mume), foxnut (Euryale ferox) and water chestnut (Trapa spp.) underscore the need to broaden the scope of inquiry on early food/resource production. The complexities of the archaeological and environmental record in the Yangzi valley indicate that nuanced, complex explanations for rice domestication and agricultural origins rather than deterministic, single cause explanations are necessary in order to move forward. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Middle and eastern routes of the South-North Water Diversion Project (SNWDP) of China, which are approximately located within the area 28°-42°N and 110°-122°E, are being constructed. This paper investigates the past climatic variations on various time scales using instrumental and proxy data. It is found that annual mean surface air temperature has increased significantly during the past 50-100 years, and winter and spring temperatures in the northern part of the region have undergone the most significant changes. A much more significant increase occurs for annual mean minimum temperature and extreme low temperature than for annual mean maximum temperature and extreme high temperature. No significant trend in annual precipitation is found for the region as a whole for the last 50 and 100 years, although obvious decadal and spatial variation is detectable. A seesaw pattern of annual and summer precipitation variability between the north and the south of the region is evident. Over the last 100 years, the Haihe River basin has witnessed a significant negative trend of annual precipitation, but no similar trend is detected for the Yangtze and Huaihe River basins. Pan evaporation has significantly decreased since the mid-1960s in the region in spite of the fact that the trend appears to have ended in the early 1990s. The negative trend of pan evaporation is very significant in the plain area between the Yangtze and Yellow Rivers. There was a notable series of dry intervals lasting decades in the north of the region. The northern drought of the past 30 years is not the most severe in view of the past 500 years; however, the southern drought during the period from the 1960s to the 1980s may have been unprecedented. The dryness-wetness index (DWI) shows significant oscillations with periodicities of 9.5 and 20 years in the south and 10.5 and 25 years in the north. Longer periodicities in the DWI series include 160-170- and 70-80-yr oscillations in the north, and 100-150-yr oscillations in the south. The observed climate change could have implications for the construction and management of the SNWDP. The official approval and start of the hydro project was catalyzed by the severe multiyear drought of 1997-2003 in the north, and the operation and management of the project in the future will also be influenced by climate change-in particular by precipitation variability. This paper provides a preliminary discussion of the potential implications of observed climate change for the SNWDP. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article discusses the scroll titled "Three Gorges Dam Migration" by artist Yun-Fei Ji, which depicts the Three Gorges Dam on the Yangzi River in China. Aspects of the artwork are explored including the use of calligraphic colophon, interpersonal contact among the piece's subjects, and the depiction of families moving away from the Badong area of China. Materials used in the creation of the scroll are presented including ink, bamboo, and silk. The article also presents a translation of the colophon text of the work, originally written in Chinese.

The present paper provides a scientific assessment of the inter-decadal variability of the Asian summer monsoon and its significant effect on precipitation patterns in China. The paper consists of four parts. The first part shows the observed inter-decadal weakening of the Asian summer monsoon since the end of 1970s. The second part describes the impact of the weakening Asian summer monsoon on precipitation in China, which caused the major monsoon rainbelt to shift southward from North China to South China over about 30 years, with a 60-80 oscillation dominating. The third part projects the future change of the Asian summer monsoon in the warmer climate by using IPCC AR4 climate models. It has been found that major monsoon rainfall belts in East Asia will move northward in the 2040s, with summer precipitation in North China increasing considerably and stably. Finally, in the fourth part, the implication of the adaptation to the above climate change and related water management will be discussed including the water transport engineering project from the Yangtze River to the Yellow River and North China. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Recently, increasing nutrient (i.e., nitrogen and phosphorus) concentrations have been observed in the surface water of many countries and this nonpoint source (NPS) pollution has become an important factor in the deterioration of water quality in the upper reach of the Yangtze River Basin. In this paper, the NPS pollution loads in the upper reach of Yangtze River Basin in the year 2000 were estimated using export coefficient model and remote sensing techniques. The spatial distributions of the NPS loads within the watershed were then displayed using geographical information system. Results indicated that the total nitrogen load was 1.947×106 t and the total phosphorus load was 8.364×104 t. Important source areas for the nutrients were croplands in the Jinsha R. and Jialing R. watershed, as well as the Chongqing municipality. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Hedgerow intercropping systems were introduced in China in early 1990s. Achievements in research and extension of contour hedgerow intercropping in China during the past 15 years are reviewed here. Results reported in over 70 published papers have shown that hedgerow intercropping contributes to soil and water conservation, soil fertility amelioration, land productivity improvement, bioterrace formation, and gives more options for income generation based on local resources in mountain areas. Research and demonstration works on contour hedgerow systems have achieved success by integrating local resources and needs into the system, especially in the dry valleys of the upper reaches of the Yangtze River, and the Three Gorges region. Contour hedgerow intercropping has attracted the attention of researchers, policy-makers, and farmers, and has been taken as an alternative to implementation of the Grain for Green policy, and ecological reconstruction and restoration today. To date, hedgerow intercropping has been demonstrated and applied practically on sloping land in more than six provinces of China, particularly Sichuan, Guizhou, Shanxi, Shaanxi, as well as in the Three Gorges region of Chongqing and Hubei Province. The intercropping system has also been practiced as an optimized technology for conserving farming on sloping lands, improving cash income, and reducing agricultural risks in depressed mountainous regions in southwest and northern China over recent years. Some misunderstandings and problems in studies and extension of the system in China are summarized and clarified, and some recommendations for further research and expansion of the system are also presented in this paper. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Groundings are frequently occurring accidents that pose a serious risk in inland waterways. This paper proposes a flexible decision-support solution for grounded ships in the Yangtze River. The basis of the proposed method is to develop an influence diagram based on a three-layer decision-making framework, to consider the effectiveness of the intervention measures by adding two nodes and establishing the associated conditional probability tables, and to merge the influence diagram and the intervention measures as a flexible decision-support solution. The merits of the proposed method include the intuitive representation of how the influencing factors affect the alternatives using a graphical structure, the flexibility to implement and to consider the intervention measures for grounded ships, and the ability to deal with uncertainty in both numerical data and qualitative information. The results of the case study showed that it is unanimous with the real situations and the intervention measures should be considered to make effective and accurate decision-making for grounding ships. Consequently, the method presented in this paper provides a practical and flexible decision-support solution for grounded ships. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study examines the making of local climate governance in the Chinese setting where central-local inter-governmental relations continue to play critical part in almost every policy domain. Through analysing the climate responses of the three provincial-level governments at the Yangtze River Delta (YRD), the paper argues that the process of “experimentation under hierarchy” is relevant to understanding the evolving of the subnational climate regime in the YRD region. We find the preponderance of the central authorities in initiating national climate strategies and galvanising responses at the local level. Meanwhile, provincial governments have been able to leverage climate plans and actions to achieve their own gains. These findings suggest that any optimism about subnational climate activism in a Chinese setting has to be mixed with caution. In fact, the shadow of hierarchical authority structure lingers and plays important part in the initiation of subnational response and spurring climate responses and innovations from below. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Water footprint of production can be used to identify pressure on national or regional water resources generated by production activities. Water stress is defined as the ratio of water use (the difference between a regional water footprint of production and a green water footprint) to renewable water resources available in a country or region. Water stress can be used to identify pressure on national or regional water resources generated by production activities. This paper estimates the water footprint of production and the water stress in China during the years 1985-2009. The result shows that China's water footprint of production increased from 781.58 × 109 m3 in 1985 to 1109.76 × 109 m3 in 2009. Mega-cities and regions with less agriculture production due to local climatic conditions (Tibet and Qinghai) had lower water footprint of production, while the provinces (Henan, Shandong) with higher agriculture production had higher footprint. Provinces with severe water stress increased from 6 in 1985 to 9 in 2009. High to severe water stress exists mainly in mega-cities and agricultural areas located in the downstream areas of the Yellow River and the Yangtze River in North and Central China. The outlook for water resources pressure in China is not optimistic, with areas of stress expanding from northern to southern of China. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Recently some generalized autoregressive conditional heteroskedasticity (GARCH) models are proposed and applied to various hydrologic variables to capture and remove the ARCH effect, which has been observed frequently in the residuals from linear autoregressive moving average (ARMA) models fitted to hydrologic time series. As a nonlinear phenomenon of variance behavior, the ARCH effect reveals partially nonstationarity and nonlinearity of hydrological processes. This paper deals with the variation of a river basin using the ARMA-GARCH error model, which combines an ARMA model for modelling the mean behavior and a GARCH model for modelling the variance behavior of the residuals from the ARMA model. Based on the heteroscedasticity of hydrological variable series, the time-varying regional variance is proposed to check the variation of a river basin for the first time. As a study case, the method is applied to four deseasonalized daily discharge series from the middle reach of Yangtze River, China. Through the analyses of the conditional variance in different streamflow series, it is concluded that: (1) The ARCH effect exists in all the studied series which means the stream processes is nonstationary in terms of the variance; (2) The variations of time-varying variances are similar for the series from adjacent hydrological stations, and the similarity degree increases from upstream to downstream; (3) The regional variance is time-varying and can be used for further regional research. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Baligang is a Neolithic site on a northern tributary of the middle Yangtze and provides a long archaeobotanical sequence from the Seventh Millennium BC upto the First Millennium BC. It provides evidence for developments in rice and millet agriculture influenced by shifting cultural affiliation with the north (Yangshao and Longshan) and south (Qujialing and Shijiahe) between 4300 and 1800 BC. This paper reports on plant macro-remains (seeds), from systematic flotation of 123 samples (1700 litres), producing more than 10,000 identifiable remains. The earliest Pre-Yangshao occupation of the sites provide evidence for cultivation of rice (Oryza sativa) between 6300–6700 BC. This rice appears already domesticated in on the basis of a dominance of non-shattering spikelet bases. However, in terms of grain size changes has not yet finished, as grains are still thinner than more recent domesaticated rice and are closer in grain shape to wild rices. This early rice was cultivated alongside collection of wild staple foods, especially acorns (Quercus/Lithicarpus sensu lato). In later periods the sites has evidence for mixed farming of both rice and millets (Setaria italica and Panicum miliaceum). Soybean appears on the site in the Shijiahe period (ca.2500 BC) and wheat (Triticum cf. aestivum) in the Late Longshan levels (2200–1800 BC). Weed flora suggests an intensification of rice agriculture over time with increasing evidence of wetland weeds. We interpret these data as indicating early opportunistic cultivation of alluvial floodplains and some rainfed rice, developing into more systematic and probably irrigated cultivation starting in the Yangshao period, which intensified in the Qujialing and Shijiahe period, before a shift back to an emphasis on millets with the Late Longshan cultural influence from the north. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Under the background of vigorously promoting the construction of ecological civilization, the importance of constructing the "non-waste cities" becomes increasingly prominent. Taking 39 cities in the Yangtze River Economic Zone as the research objects, this paper establishes a new evaluation index system for "non-waste cities," and proposes a multi-source, heterogeneous and multi-attribute decision-making method for the comprehensive evaluation of "non-waste cities." Specifically, the evaluation index system of "non-waste cities" is constructed from four aspects: economic level, environmental pollution, resource consumption, and waste utilization. Considering that there is the characteristic of multi-source heterogeneity for the attribute values (that is, real numbers, interval numbers, and fuzzy linguistic variables coexist), the multi-source heterogeneous data are uniformly converted into two-tuples, and then a new two-tuple entropy weight method is proposed to determine the weights of evaluation attributes. Moreover, combining the traditional grey relational analysis method with TOPSIS, a multi-source, heterogeneous and multi-attribute decision-making method based on two-tuple mixed correlation degree (TTMCD-MSHMADM) is proposed to evaluate the "non-waste cities," and an empirical analysis is made for the 39 cities in the Yangtze River Economic Zone. The result gives a theoretical basis for the formulation of sustainable economic development policies in the Yangtze River Economic Zone, and provides a decision reference for selecting the demonstration cities of "non-waste cities." [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

As the large-scale cascaded reservoirs have been developed rapidly in recent years, river basin flood control (RBFC) has become a complex, multi-objective and multi-reservoir problem. In order to realize the optimal operation and management of reservoirs in mainstreams and branches, this paper presents a generalized multi-objective flood control model (MOFCM) for joint optimal dispatching of cascade reservoirs, which is applied to cascade reservoirs in lower reaches of Jinsha River and Three Gorges Reservoir in Yangtze River (JFCR-TGR). Meanwhile, a multi-objective cultural self-adaptive electromagnetism-like mechanism (MOSEM) algorithm is introduced to solve RBFC problem. In the case study, comparing with the natural runoff of the Chuan River, the maximum release of optimal schemes is lesser, its reduced range is from 1727 to 12,887 m/s and the flood peak deduction rate is from 6.4 to 48 %. Results of case studies demonstrate that MOFCM is practicable and efficient for multipurpose multi-reservoir flood control. The optimal operation schemes obtained by MOSEM in JFCR-TGR system can be used to assist the decision makers in choosing the most efficient scheme. Furthermore, MOFCM can accomplish multiple-object optimization effectively under various scheduling situations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Guanyinyan Yangtze River Bridge is the key structure on the second ring highway of Chongqing City, southwest of China. The bridge is a cable-stayed bridge with a main span of 436 m. The main girder is a steel-concrete composite girder with a total width of 36ṡ2 m. The final design solution was based on an extensive comparison of proposals. The main bridge was constructed using the balanced cantilever method. This paper presents the challenges in design and static analysis of the bridge, including the detailed design, global static analysis, local finite element model analysis, the determination of the allowable maximum thickness of steel plate against fatigue and brittle fracture induced by low temperature. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The normalized difference water indices (NDWIs) were successfully used in map land surface water mapping (LSWM) from Landsat series multispectral images. This paper evaluates the potential of the recent Landsat satellite (Landsat-8) Operational Land Imager (OLI) multispectral images for LSWM using three NDWI models. We tested the accuracy and robustness of the three OLI NDWI models in the Yangtze River Basin and the Huaihe River Basin in China. The results demonstrate that the three OLI NDWI models achieve an overall accuracy of more than 95%, a kappa coefficient of 0.89 and a producer’s accuracy of 95% for LSWM. The results also demonstrate that the NDWI model using the green band (Band 3) and the SWIR1 band (Band 6) (referred to as NDWIO6,3) of the OLI sensor has a higher LSWM accuracy than the other two NDWI models. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

By Hirschman-Herfindahl Index, the paper measures the spatial structure transformation of the Chinese container port system from the perspective of cargo flow in recent 13 years. It indicates that the spatial structure of container port system enters into 'the challenge of the periphery' phase as a whole, the decentralization of container flow become the mainstream tendency of the spatial variation of China's container port system; on the other hand, the spatial structure of container port system shows different characteristic in seven port regions, such as low-level equilibrium, single-gateway, multi-gateway and so on. It is a fact that multi-gateway port region of container port system has formed in Yangtze River Delta and Pearl River Delta region. Economic and foreign trade development, government macro-control and policy guidance, challenge of the periphery, network expansion of the terminal operators and shipping liners are the main driving forces for these new phenomena. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Environmental protection could promote ecological environment into a virtuous circle. The following measures had being taken recently to improve ecological environment in Three Gorges Reservoir Area: Yangtze River shelterbelt was being built, small watershed soil erosion was being controlled, the farmland was being returned to forest and grassland, agro-ecological engineering was being carrying out. Besides the State Council has formally given an official to the Follow-up planning of the Three Gorges Reservoir Area on June 15th, 2011, which has required to enhance ecological environment construction and protection of Three Gorges Reservoir Area, and focused to solve three issues which are improving the social economical development of Three Gorges Reservoir Area, reducing the frequency that geological disasters happened, and protecting ecological environment. This paper took Yunyang county of Chongqing, where was located at the hinterland of the Three Reservoir Area, as a case study and constructed correction coefficients of ecosystem service value in view of multi-functionality in land use among different land-use types based on the basis of Costanza' theories and ecosystem service value coefficient set by Xie Gaodi. And then quantitative analysis was being used to evaluate ecological effect of ecological barrier zone in land use planning from the perspective of ecosystem service value and landscape pattern. The results could be shown in the following aspects: 1) Ecosystem service pattern, forest is of primary importance while cultivated land, garden, grassland are supplementary, of Yunyang county' ecological barrier zone would be initially established in 2020. 2) Ecosystem service value in ecological barrier zone could be raised rapidly by land use planning guided by ecological functional construction, which also could strengthen the ability of ecological barrier zone to adjust the climate, conserve water and soil, and maintain biological diversity. The total ecosystem service value of ecological barrier zone in Yunyang county would be rising from 1.552 billons in 2010 to 1.998 billons in 2020, and average annual change rate would reach to 2.87%. 3) The ecosystem service value, especially its regulation service value and supporting service value, of ecological barrier zone in Yunyang county has shown an obvious spatial diversity. The ecosystem service value of Modao River Basin has been rising largest, and followed by Pengxi River Basin, and the ecosystem service value of Yangtze River has been maintained in a steadily increased, while little change has happened in Changtan River Basin. 4) According to the ecological effects analysis, practical guidance was designed to promote policy makers to evaluate and optimize land use pattern and spatial structure for land use planning. It should clarify the adjusting direction of land use structure through the evaluation of land-use structure adjustment among different land-use types and analysis of ecological effect produced by land structure adjustment, and then would achieve the goal of improving the scientific decision-making level in land use planning and ecological protection. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The structure and temporal variations of the fish community in the intertidal estuarine zone of shallow mud areas have been poorly studied in China. This paper analyses the diel, semi-lunar and seasonal patterns of fish assemblages in the Yangtze estuary in 2006. Fish were collected by consecutive day and night samplings using tide-stow-nets deployed parallel to each other in three stations. A total of 56 fish species belonging to 21 families was caught during the study period. The family Cyprinidae dominated with 25 species. Freshwater fish species were the important dominant commercial fishery species and well represented with five species (sharpbelly Hemiculter bleekeri, goldfish Carassius auratus, bream Parabramis pekinensis, likely-bream Pseudobrama simony, and glossy yellow catfish Pelteobagrus nitidus) in the three stations. Juvenile fishes dominated the fish community, comprising 93.9% in station 1 and 96.6% in station 2 of the total abundance. The number of fish species in day tides was slightly lower than those in night tides in spring and summer, but the opposite in other seasons. In neap tides, the numbers and abundance of fish species were both lower than those in the spring tides. Fish abundance was lowest in winter, increasing during spring and summer (March-September) in both stations 1 and 2, with obviously large fluctuations in each season. The pattern of habitat selection of fishes could effectively decrease the food competition of intraspecies or interspecies and favour the growth and nursing of young fishes. These findings indicate that the intertidal zones in the estuary may serve as important nursery areas for fish communities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The flow regime of the Yangtze River (Changjiang) has been altered to some extent by intensified human activities over the past decades, particularly dam construction. To assess the impacts of dam building on the flow regime in the Yangtze River, two of the largest reservoirs on the upper reach, i.e., the Gezhouba and Three Gorges reservoirs, have been selected as case study sites. To analyze the changes in flow regime between predam and postdam periods, the whole study period was divided into three subperiods according to the years when these two reservoirs started to store water. On the basis of the time series of daily flow discharge from four key hydrological stations, i.e., Cuntan, Yichang, Hankou, and Datong, the alterations in annual, seasonal, monthly, and daily flow regimes and water rising or falling regime in different subperiods were investigated and the driving forces were explored. The results revealed the impacts of the two reservoirs on their downstream flow regime varied with reservoir storage capacity and the distance between the target reservoir and the case study site, the Gezhouba and Three Gorges reservoirs imposed various impacts on different time scales of downstream runoff regime, and the operation of these two reservoirs altered the water rising and falling regime to some degree, which is particularly critical for the spawning of Chinese sturgeon and the four major domestic carp. The output of the paper could provide references for the assessment of impacts of dam construction on the health and stability of the Yangtze River ecosystem. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Heavy rainfall hit the Yangtze-Huai Rivers basin (YHRB) of east China several times during the pro-longed 2007 mei-yu season, causing the worst flood since 1954. There has been an urgent need for attaining and processing high-quality, kilometer-scale, hourly rainfall data in order to understand the mei-yu pre-cipitation processes, especially at the mesoß and smaller scales. In this paper, the authors describe the construction of the 0.07°-resolution gridded hourly rainfall analysis over the YHRB region during the 2007 mei-yu season that is based on surface reports at 555 national and 6572 regional automated weather sta-tions with an average resolution of about 7 km. The gridded hourly analysis is obtained using a modified Cressman-type objective analysis after applying strict quality control, including not only the commonly used internal temporal and spatial consistency and extreme value checks, but also verifications against mosaic radar reflectivity data. This analysis reveals many convectively generated finescale precipitation structures that could not be seen from the national station reports. A comprehensive quantitative as-sessment ensures the quality of the gridded hourly precipitation data. A comparison of this dataset with the U.S. Climate Prediction Center morphing technique (CMORPH) dataset on the same resolution suggests the dependence of the latter's performance on different rainfall intensity categories, with sub-stantial underestimation of the magnitude and width of the mei-yu rainband as well as the nocturnal and morning peak rainfall amounts, due mainly to its underestimating the occurrences of heavy rainfall (i.e., >10mmh-1). [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The eastern route of the South-to-North Water Diversion (SNWD-ER) project is a massive-scale interbasin system to transfer water from the Yangtze River to North China. With the infrastructure construction close to completion, the project is now faced with many complicated operations management problem at different levels. The problems are unique in that, on the one hand, the project is expected to be financially self-sustainable by charging water usages, and on the other hand, the water price is regulated for its nature as a social product. One such problem is to achieve a rational water allocation among different users by appropriate pricing schemes. In this paper, we study how to use a two-tier pricing scheme to balance the water allocation by using a Stackelberg game model. From the study, we find that (1) the Stackelberg game always has equilibrium solutions to balance the benefit of every party in the system, which implies that the two-tier pricing scheme can effectively coordinate the water allocation; (2) the two-tier pricing scheme can also result in multiple desirable by-products such as encouraging the implementation of water saving mechanism and giving the local water users certain priority; and (3) the government can adjust the pricing parameters to control and balance the profit of every party. As such we conclude that the two-tier pricing scheme is an effective way that integrates both the government control and market powers to ensure the public interest and the economic benefit, which is suitable for SNWD-ER project. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Poyang Lake in Jiangxi Province is the largest freshwater lake in China and is historically a region of significant floods. Maximum annual lake stage and the number of severe flood events have increased during the past few decades because of levee construction that reduced the area available for floodwater storage. The most severe floods since 1950 occurred during 1954, 1973, 1983, 1995, and 1998. Each of these floods followed El Niño events that influence the Asian monsoon and that are directly linked to rainfall in the Changjiang (Yangtze River) basin. The 1954 flood was the largest ever recorded until the 1990s. That year the peak Changjiang stage at Hukou was 21.6 m, which was 1.6 m above the previous record high. The last major flood on the Changjiang was during 1998, when the peak Changjiang stage reached 22.5 m, higher than during 1954, even though peak discharge was lower. The most severe floods, including those in 1954 and 1998, require both 1) high rainfall and tributary discharge into Poyang Lake and 2) high Changjiang discharge and stage at Hukou that backflows into the lake or slows Poyang Lake drainage. Since gauging stations were established on the Changjiang, these conditions always occurred following an El Niño. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Temporal and spatial evolution characteristics of the 30-60 day oscillation (intraseasonal oscillation, ISO) of summer rainfall in China and the effects of East Asian monsoon on the rainfall ISO are analyzed in this paper. Results show that the annual and decadal variations of the oscillation exist between 1960 and 2008, and the intensity is weakest in the late 1970s and early 1980s. In the typical strong years of the rainfall ISO obtained from empirical orthogonal functions (EOF mode 1), an anticyclone is in northwestern Pacific and a cyclone is in the east of China. In the typical weak years, the wind ISO is much weaker. The low-frequency zonal wind and water vapor transport from the low latitudes to mid-latitudes in the typical strong years, and the oscillation strength of diabatic heating is much stronger than that in the weak years of the rainfall ISO. The anomaly characteristics of the rainfall ISO show anti-phases between the Yangtze River basin and south of China. As for the typical strong years of the rainfall ISO in the Yangtze River basin (EOF mode 2), the main oscillation center of water vapor is in the east of China (20-30°N, 110-130°E). In the peak (break) phase of the rainfall oscillation, a low-frequency cyclone (anticyclone) is in the Yangtze River basin and an anticyclone (cyclone) is near Taiwan Island. In addition, the peak rainfall corresponds to the heat source in the Yangtze River basin and the heat sink in the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau. As for the typical strong years of the rainfall ISO in the south of China, the main oscillation center of water vapor is south of 20°N. In the peak (break) phase of the rainfall ISO, a low-frequency cyclone (anticyclone) is in the south of China and an anticyclone (cyclone) is in the Philippines. The peak rainfall corresponds to the heat source in the south of China and the South China Sea, and the heat sink in the west of Indochina. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Family-based interventions have been dramatically advocated in early childhood educational field, especially for those young children who have special needs. The application of family-based interventions has had a profound influence in the western societies over many years. However, due to a lack of theory basis, the knowledge of how to apply it to help many children with special needs in China, particularly, in Yangtze River Delta Region, is slim. This paper is to explore how family-based early interventions will support the children who have exhibited social-emotional problems and their families in the social context of the Yangtze River Delta Region, China. Thus, the author will address the question by looking into (1) the social context in the Yangtze River Delta Region, China; (2) factors contribute to children's social and emotional problems from the family systems perspective; (3) two families as case studies, and (4) the family-based early interventions designed for the two families. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose: The objective of this paper is to assess the regulation of the accumulation of heavy metals in the aquatic environment and different fish species. Methods: Water and fish samples were collected from upper to lower reaches of the Yangtze River. The heavy metal (Cd, Cr, Cu, Hg, Pb, Zn) concentrations in the muscle tissue of seven fishes were measured. Additionally, the relationships between heavy metal concentrations in fish tissue and fish size (length and weight), condition factor, water layer distribution, and trophic level were investigated. Results: Metal concentrations (milligrams per kilogram wet weight) were found to be distributed differently among different fish species. The highest concentrations of Cu (1.22 mg/kg) and Zn (7.55 mg/kg) were measured in Pelteobagrus fulvidraco, the highest concentrations of Cd (0.115 mg/kg) and Hg (0.0304 mg/kg) were measured in Silurus asotus, and the highest concentrations of Pb (0.811 mg/kg) and Cr (0.239 mg/kg) were measured in Carassius auratus and Cyprinus carpio. A positive relationship was found between fish size and metal level in most cases. The variance of the relationships may be the result of differences in habitat, swimming behavior, and metabolic activity. In this study, fishes living in the lower water layer and river bottom had higher metals concentrations than in upper and middle layers. Benthic carnivorous and euryphagous fish had higher metals concentrations than phytoplankton and herbivorous fish. Generally, fish caught from the lower reach had higher metals concentrations than those from the upper reach. Conclusions: Cadmium and lead concentrations in several fishes exceeded the permissible food consumption limits, this should be considered to be an important warning signal. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

China is entering a critical and accelerating phase of urbanization. As one of the most urbanized regions in China, the Changjiang (Yangtze) River Delta has experienced dramatic urbanization and urban transformation. However, in the recent years, many changes have taken place in this region and there is limited attention to the regional urbanization path evolution, its problems and the way to solve these problems. Therefore, we should revisit the urbanization process in the Changjiang River Delta again. In this paper, we revisited urbanization paths of the Changjiang River Delta by data analysis, influence factors of urbanization by the Gray Relational Analysis, and major challenges to urbanization of the Changjiang River Delta by theoretical considerations. We found that the urbanization of the Changjiang River Delta had experienced several stages of large-scale spatial and urban system restructuring. Within the Changjiang River Delta, Shanghai, Zhejiang and Jiangshu had experienced different urbanization path with local characteristics. But with their development model gradually converging, their urbanization model is also converging. We also found that the major influence factors affecting the Changjiang River Delta urbanization were dynamic change and urbanization was driven by different key factors in different socio-economic development stages. Meanwhile, the Changjiang River Delta urbanization is facing many problems such as existing institutional arrangements, including the hukou (household registration) system and others which can not meet the needs of current socio-economic development and urbanization. Therefore, it is imperative to promote institutional innovation and adopt a new urbanization development strategy for the sake of the orderly and sustainable urbanization development in the Changjiang River Delta. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The impoundment of the Three Gorges Dam (TGD) has disturbed the hydrological regime downstream and has directly affected the relationship between the Yangtze River and Dongting Lake. To trace the realistic and potential impacts, this paper examined the changes of the channel morphology and sedimentology caused by the TGD through a field survey on the channel cross-sections and then analyzed the impact on lake water level through BP neural networks. The possible impacts on inundation patterns in lake wetlands were studied based on the lake basin DEM. The results indicate that drastic sediment decline and severe channel erosion are putting considerable pressure on the river and lake. Changing river channels are evident in some monitoring cross-sections. Dongting Lake, for the first time, changed from trapping to supplying net sediment to the Yangtze River. During the water storage periods of the TGD, the water level decreased 2.03 m in 2006 and 2.11 m in 2009 at the outlet of the lake, with extreme decreases up to 3.30 m and 3.02 m, respectively. These changes have inevitably induced alterations in the inundation patterns of the lake wetlands, which in turn have disturbed the ecological function of lake wetlands as habitats for both migratory birds and aquatic fish. The serious droughts in Dongting Lake recent years were largely connected with the above changes. Therefore, proper attention should be paid to this occurrence. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The present paper focuses on the variation of the annual streamflow and sediment fluxes in the Yangtze River basin from 1956 to 2009 using annual observations at 10 hydrological gauging stations. Both simple linear regression analysis and the Mann-Kendall test are applied to the time series for trend detection, and the relations between streamflow and precipitation and between sediment flux and precipitation are analyzed with the help of a double mass curve function. The results present differing trends of changes in streamflow and sediment. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]