Office of Biological and Environmental Research Weekly Report

November 24, 2008

Extending Climate Data Records to the Qing Dynasty. Extending climate data beyond the instrumental record is important since it provides a context of recent changes within the back drop of long-term climate. The rainy season is an important climate feature over Eastern China where anomaly in either its timing or length can lead to adverse economic and social consequences. BER-sponsored researcher W.-C. Wang has examined records of daily precipitation description at Beijing and Shanghai contained in Memos-to-Emperor during the Qing Dynasty. They provide a unique source to extend the rainy season information to 1736. The information together with the instrument measurements since 1875 in both cities reveals significant inter-annual and decadal variations of the beginning and ending dates, and length of the rainy season. The analysis further reveals that, on the decadal time scale, the length of the rainy season increased in Shanghai since 1961 with more frequent extreme rainfall events, but decreased in Beijing since 1975 with persistent dry conditions. This pattern of changes was not seen in any other periods of the data, in particular during 1736-1820 when both cities showed an increase in the length of the rainy season.

Reference: Wang W.-C., Ge Q., Hao Z and Zheng J., Zhang P., and Sung S., 2008: Rainy Season at Beijing and Shanghai since 1736. J. Meteor. Soc. Japan, 86, 827-834.

Media Interest: No

Contact: Anjuli Bamzai, SC-23.1, (301) 903-0294

Two New Data Analysis Tools Developed for Proteomics Researchers. Proteomics researchers from the Pacific Northwest National Laboratory (PNNL), the University of Texas, and the University of Wisconsin-Madison have collaborated to develop and deploy new data analysis tools to further the field of proteomics research. Better tools for protein identification are vital to solving intractable problems such as converting agricultural waste into fuels, detecting bio-based threats and quickly detecting and treating disease. These tools are available free of charge through a publicly available website (http://ncrr.pnl.gov/software/). Making new proteomics tools available at no cost to the scientific community allows more researchers to enter the proteomics field without investing in expensive tools or needing to develop their own. DAnTE (Data Analysis Tool Extension) was developed as a statistical and visualization software tool that scientists can use to perform data analysis steps on large-scale proteomics data, but it also performs well on genomics microarray data. The second tool, a “bottom-up” data analysis strategy that can detect thousands of peptides over time, has been demonstrated on data from a time-course study of Rhodobacter sphaeroides, an environmentally important photosynthetic microorganism under study in DOE’s Genomics: GTL program. These tools were funded by several of the National Institutes of Health as well as DOE’s Office of Science. Portions of the research for both tools were performed in the Environmental Molecular Sciences Laboratory, a DOE scientific user facility located at PNNL. Additional details are available at: http://www.pnl.gov/science/highlights/highlight.asp?id=480.

References: Du X, SJ Callister, NP Manes, JN Adkins, RA Alexandridis, X Zeng, JH Roh, WE Smith, TJ Donohue, S Kaplan, RD Smith, and MS Lipton. 2008. "A Computational Strategy to Analyze Label-Free Temporal Bottom-Up Proteomics Data." Journal of Proteome Research 7(7):2595-604.

Polpitiya AD, WJ Qian, N Jaitly, VA Petyuk, JN Adkins, DG Camp II, GA Anderson, and RD Smith. 2008. "DAnTE: A Statistical Tool for Quantitative Analysis of -omics Data." Bioinformatics 24(13):1556-8.

Media Interest: No

Contact: Paul Bayer, SC-23.1, (301) 903-5324

Improved Approach to Calculating Soil Respiration. Soil respiration is increasingly  recognized as a critical factor in the global carbon cycle.  The temperature sensitivity of soil respiration is one of the most important processes in the terrestrial carbon cycling and carbon – climate interactions. To date, it has been difficult to estimate sensitivity parameters from measurements, leading to uncertainties in coupled carbon-climate simulations.  In the November 14 edition of the journal Global Biogeochemical Cycles, scientists from ORNL report a new approach called the ‘localized ratio fitting’ (LRF) which is shown to isolate and remove confounding effects and thus accurately estimate the ‘true’ temperature sensitivity of soil respiration.  This improved calculation method suggests that a long-held assumption of seasonal variation in temperature sensitivity may be an artifact of earlier calculation methods. 

Reference:  Gu L, Hanson PJ, Post WM, Liu Q (2008) A novel approach for identifying the true temperature sensitivity from soil respiration measurements. Global Biogeochemical Cycles 22, GB4009, doi:10.1029/2007GB003164 

Media Interest:  No

Contact: Mike Kuperberg, SC-23.1, (301) 903-3281

DOE Climate Scientist Appointed as New Interagency Coordinating Committee Lead. Jason Tomlinson, Pacific Northwest National Laboratory (PNNL), has been appointed the new lead for the Interagency Coordinating Committee for Airborne Geosciences Research and Applications (ICCAGRA). The role of ICCAGRA is to improve cooperation, foster awareness, facilitate communication among sponsoring agencies having airborne platforms and instruments for research and applications, and serve as a resource to senior level management on airborne geosciences issues. The focus is to increase the effective utilization of the Federal airborne fleet in support of airborne geoscience research programs conducted by the individual agencies. Tomlinson is the operation lead of DOE’s Atmospheric Radiation Measurement (ARM) Climate Research Facility’s (ACRF)’s Aerial Vehicles Program and serves in a number of research and science support capacities. This appointment represents other Federal agency’s recognition of DOE capabilities in conducting suborbital or aerial platform (both piloted and unpiloted) measurements of atmospheric properties related to climate science and improving remote sensing retrievals of climate-related parameters. Additionally, it builds on the Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) between the National Aeronautics and Space Administration, National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, and the Department of Energy, addressing Unmanned Aircraft Systems for Global Observing System Science Research, signed October 2007. Mr. Tomlinson’s first role will be to coordinate and plan a joint meeting with European equivalent of ICCAGRA, the European Fleet for Airborne Research (EUFAR), at the 33^rd International Symposium Remote Sensing of Environment meeting in Lago Maggiore, Italy, May 4-8, 2009.

Media Interest: Probably None.

Contact: Rickey Petty, SC-23.1, (301) 903-5548

DOE Researchers Contribute to New NRC Report on Potential Impact of High-End Computing. The National Academy recently completed a report at the request of the Networking and Information Technology Research and Development (NITRD) program within the Office of Science and Technology of the President. NITRD coordinates federal investments in networking and information technology. DOE-sponsored researchers Phil Colella and David Erickson III were part of the 16-member Committee tasked to review important scientific questions and technological problems identified for four illustrative fields: Astrophysics, Atmospheric Sciences, Evolutionary Biology, and Chemical Separations. The Committee identified a subset of those important questions and problems for which an extraordinary advancement in understanding is difficult or impossible without high-end capability computing. The impacts on progress, ramification of postponing the use of high-end computing power in order to capitalize on the decreasing cost of computing over time, identification of numerical and algorithmic characteristics of the high-end capability computing requirements, are also addressed.

Reference: The Potential Impact of High-End Capability Computing on four illustrative fields of Science and Engineering. Committee on the Potential Impact of High-End Computing on Illustrative Fields of Science and Engineering. Division on Engineering and Physical Sciences and Division on Earth and Life Sciences. National Research Council of the National Academies. The National Academies Press (2008). http://www.nap.edu/catalog.php?record_id=12451

Media Interest: No

Contact: Anjuli Bamzai, SC-23.1, (301) 903-0294