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No.351

 
 
 


CHINA  SCIENCE  AND  TECHNOLOGY
NEWSLETTER
The Ministry of Science and Technology
People's Republic of China


N0.351 December 10,2003
 
IN THIS ISSUE

* China Builds Small S&T Towns

* Three Major Marine Fields to Pursue

* Long Term S&T Priorities Defined

* S&T Findings for Quality Control

* China is Ready for IPv6

* Ancient Silk Protected

* ScienceWord for Linux Launched

 
 SPECIAL ISSUES
 

China Builds Small S&T Towns

Recently the Chinese Ministry of Science and Technology has taken the lead in launching a major project to accelerate the S&T development in small towns in collaboration with the Ministry of Construction, Ministry of Land and Resources, Ministry of Labor and Social Security, Ministry of Agriculture, Ministry of Civil Affairs and China Agriculture Bank.

The small township S&T development project mainly works on the S&T development strategies, relevant policies and planning criteria, establishing the industries of local advantages, infrastructures construction, environmental protection and rational resources utilization tailored to the major development needs of small towns. The project also encourages small towns to develop and possess its proprietary technologies, products and equipment. The project will, through the process of policy making, planning and technical integration, turn out a group of small towns for S&T development demonstration, providing the powerful S&T support for the healthy development of small towns.

The project has so far selected 21 institutions who have the proven advantages in R&D and associated industrialization to be the leaders. In the meanwhile, a number of experts panels made of renowned scholars were established to provide consultations for the decision makers. Under the principle of mobilizing all the initiatives and giving each advantage a full play, the project will focus on mechanism innovation, resources integration and human resources development for research, results conversion and diffusion.

The official of the Ministry of Science and Technology expressed that the demonstration of small S&T towns will stimulate the S&T advancement in other small towns, realize the transfer of rural surplus labor, coordinate the development between urban and rural areas, and raise the overall level and S&T innovation capacity of small towns.

Three Major Marine Fields to Pursue

The China Academic Committee for Ocean Drilling proposed that China's deep ocean study will in the future decade focus on three major fields: ancient marine environment study, lithosphere evolution of the west Pacific continental rim and seismological origin belt.

Since becoming part of the International Ocean Drilling Program (ODP) on April 1998, China has seen the fast development of its deep ocean related basic researches. Up to date, there have been a dozen key labs under the Ministry of Education, the Chinese Academy of Sciences, State Oceanic Administration and Ministry of Land and Resources working on the deep ocean study. In the past five years, a dozen Chinese scientists attended the international meetings on the ocean drilling and eight Chinese scientists became part of the ship based scientific expedition with numerous labs working on the ocean drilling analysis and study.

October 2003 witnessed the completion of 18-year long international ocean drilling program and the beginning of the comprehensive ocean drilling program. It is reported that China will continuously be part of the new comprehensive ocean drilling program. With the earth system and science as the core, the new program is planning to drill through the crust of oceans so as to unveil the earthquake mechanism, and understand the biosphere and natural hydrates in deep oceans and the evolution of extreme climate changes. The new program will create a platform to establish the earth system and science for the new century and provide services for deep ocean resources prospecting and development, environmental prediction, earthquake prevention and disasters alleviation. 

Long Term S&T Priorities Defined China's national long and medium term S&T planning has recently disclosed its future focuses on 20 major strategic issues as follows: the overall S&T development strategies, S&T system reform and national innovation system, S&T issues concerning the development of the manufacturing industry, agriculture, energy, resources and marine development, traffic, modern service industry, population and health, public security, ecological construction, environmental protection and cyclic economy, urban development, strategic high tech development and the associated industrialization, basic research, S&T infrastructures, S&T human resources, S&T input and management, S&T legislation and policies, innovation culture and popular science and regional S&T development.

National Conference on S&T Legislation

The National Conference on S&T Legislation and Intellectual Property was held November 3-4, 2003 in Beijing.  Mr. LI Xueyong, Chinese Vice Minister of Science and Technology delivered his work report at the Conference. Attending the Conference were 120 and more representatives from the National People's Congress, governmental agencies under the State Council, provincial departments of science and technology, high tech parks, research institutions and legal departments. 13 speakers addressed at the Conference varieties of topics including the construction of S&T legal system, the dedicated S&T legislation study, the strategic analysis of patents in the selected fields, the IP management for major projects and the IP system in research institutes.

Mr. LI reviewed and summarized the accomplishments achieved in the development of S&T legal system and S&T related IP protection since the 10th five-year plan period. He also gave an analysis of the major existing problems and the new situation facing the development of S&T legal system and S&T innovation related IP protection, and laid out the detailed deployment for the future development and protection activities.

IGCP Harvested

Since its participation in the International Geological Comparison Program (IGCP), China has harvested rich results in paleontology, global changes, environmental geology and geological disasters and is thought of highly by the international geological community. So far Chinese scientists have become part of 98 projects under IGCP, and sponsored or co-sponsored 29 of them. IGCP is an influential international endeavor that has enjoyed the most and longest participation of Chinese earth scientists. Chinese scientists have through the program played an active or leading role in the geological applications, earth chemical mapping, very low metamorphism, meteorite attacking and special grains, ecological and eventful stratigraphy and others.

S&T Findings for Quality Control

The China General Administration of Quality Supervision, Inspection and Quarantine has long paid great attention to enhance the input in R&D activities and the associated conversion of S&T findings. As a result, a number of related major projects listed under the national S&T programs have harvested fruitful results. During the period of 2001-2003, China's quality supervision system had enjoyed a dedicated investment of RMB 350 million, which greatly enhanced China's S&T capacity in the field. Major special projects such as the study of major technical standards and the food security study have seen major progresses.

In the first half of 2003, researchers of China Institute of Import & Export Commodity Examination Technology had worked out in a short period of 18 days the technique to detect SARS viruses. In addition, Beijing Quarantine Bureau, the Animal and Plant Lab under the General Administration of Quality Supervision, Inspection and Quarantine and a Japanese company had jointly developed the full genome based SARS virus detecting technique, the first of its kind in the world.

The General Administration has also kicked off the full fledged implementation of three major programs, namely S&T program, technical updating program and young scientist foundation. In the past two years, the Administration had approved on a combined basis the establishment of 787 projects, obtained 376 S&T findings and registered 356 S&T results at the national level.

RESEARCH AND DEVELOPMENT
 

China is Ready for IPv6

The Institute of Computation Science under the Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS) announced on November 27, 2003 that China has landed major breakthroughs in the development of key technologies for the next generation networking. In the meanwhile, China has established the IPv6 based demonstration network for pure city-wide applications in the Chongqing Municipality, the first of its kind in the country.

The Chinese Academy of Sciences launched the project in 2001 with an impressive budget of RMB 20 million. The project has achieved series breakthroughs in practical applications such as IPv6 testing, conversion and interfacing between Ipv4 and IPv6, IPv6 monitoring and management, mobile IPv6 with authorization based identification and fee calculating functions, information filtration and many others. CAS created the demonstration network in collaboration with the local network operator in Chongqing. Of the key technologies, IPv6 testing system has found the proprietary applications in the special testing equipment, which made it the IPv6 testing equipment of the most functions and fullest coverage in the world.

It is reported that the Chinese made IPv6 testing system has not only been adopted by France Telecom, Korea Telecom and numerous other network equipment manufacturers, but also passed the verification check of the US Department of Defense.

China's Proprietary EVD Player

China Joint Entity for Digital Disk Technology has recently worked out its proprietary EVD player and announced that it will put the product into the mass production possibly at the end of the year.

Under the joint initiatives of the former State Economy and Trade Commission and the Ministry of Information Industry, the EVD project was launched in 1999 to invite major domestic video disc player manufacturers to work on the related core and common technologies in a concerted manner.

The Entity has up to date applied for 25 EVD patents and won 7 grants with 40 and more new technologies to be patented. The manufacturers entity has also worked out the technical standards for the new generation of high density digital laser video disks and asked the International Electrotechnical Commission and the International Organization for Standardization to make EVD an international standard.

SARS Vaccine Progressed

On the basis of 6-month tireless efforts, China has seen a major breakthrough in SARS vaccine development. The animal tests have shown that the vaccine is able to resist the attack of SARS viruses without producing toxicant side effects. So far the pre-clinic study has been completed. The experiments have shown that the injection of the vaccine into animals' body in different dosages can make the animals in a full position to resist the attack of SARS viruses without causing the abnormality of other organs. This implies that the vaccine is not only effective in SARS resistance but also safe for use.

The official of the State Food and Drug Administration expressed that the World Health Organization has thought positively of the vaccine and regarded the development an encouraging research finding.

Up to date, China has worked out 1,400 SARS vaccines with 20,000 more to be verified. In the meanwhile, the quality control criteria for SARS vaccine products and associated quality control procedure has been completed. This December will see the state approval of the vaccine for clinic testing on volunteers in both Beijing and Guangzhou.

Ancient Silk Protected

It is reported that the Jingzhou Municipal Cultural Relics Protection Center has through more than a decade painstaking exploration found the solutions to a number of technical difficulties in extracting, shaping, repairing and preserving the unearthed ancient silk goods. Enlightened by the technologies used in protecting the ancient lacquerware, researchers have worked out the key techniques for the critical dehydration process in handling the unearthed ancient silk fabrics. The new technique is able to peel off the silks that had already lost the mechanic intensity layer by layer. Researchers also successfully employed bioenzyme to reshape and repair the damaged silk goods.  The oxygen free nitrogen case dedicated to the ancient silk display has applied for the national patent.

The silk goods unearthed from the No. 1 Chu Tomb at the Jianglingmashan present their splendid color patterns before visitors at the Jingzhou Municipal Museum, though they were buried underground 2300 years ago. The Cultural Relics Protection Center has provided the full solution package for the protection of these precious ancient silks.

 
 NEWS BRIEFS

ScienceWord for Linux Launched

A major special project named ScienceWord was recently kicked off under the National 863 Program. Mr. LIAO Zhaocun, a young scientist who heads the development of the ScienceWord for Linux has made the project an important component of China's strategy to promote Linux operational system. The software ScienceWord that made its debut last October is the first of its kind in the world dedicated to scientific literature oriented word processing. Before the new launch, the software can only find its applications in the environment of Microsoft windows. To take full advantage of its unique applications, the study team has been approved by the Chinese Ministry of Science and Technology to work on a Linux application.

ScienceWord is not only able to process regular office files, but also facilitates the handling of sophisticated S&T literatures, delivering a practical software for teaching, compiling S&T papers, publishing S&T books, constructing the digital library and realizing visual network based teaching. The new system can also work on the online S&T literatures and files transmission and retrieval.

China's Environment Satellite Network

China National Space Administration recently disclosed that China will in collaboration with other countries launch 8 satellites in the future 8 years so as to establish a global satellite network for disasters alleviation and environmental protection.

To establish the satellite network, China will work together with other countries to launch 3 or 4 satellite within next 2 or 3 years and further deploy the rest satellites in 5 or 8 years. These satellites will be positioned at an altitude of 700 km to work for the natural disasters prevention and environmental protection in Asian and Pacific regions, though may possibly providing services for other countries or regions as well. It is reported that some of the countries in Asia and Pacific regions have showed their interest in the project.


       Comments or inquiries on editorial matters or Newsletter content should be directed to:Mr. Mao Zhongying, Department of International Cooperation, MOST 15B, Fuxing Road Beijing 100862, PR China  Tel: (8610)68512650 Fax: (8610) 68512594

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