【推荐1】More than 2,600 enterprises gathered and presented their advanced products at the China International Import Expo (CIIE). And many innovative products have made their world premiere. Let’s have a look at three of them.

Quick corona-virus test machine

Nucleic acid testing could be faster in the future. King Fisher Apex, made by the Finnish tech company Thermo Fisher Scientific,can complete the extraction of 96 nucleic acid samples in just 15 minutes. The tester can purify nucleic acid and protein automatically to save researchers’ time spent on additional steps, significantly improving nucleic acid test efficiency. Also, the system eliminates manual intervention. The risk of exposure to harmful re-agents or biological samples, such as blood,is greatly reduced for medical staff.

Myopic (近视) prevention glasses

Here comes a lifesaver for teenagers with poor eyesight — a myopic control lens. Whether it’s a classroom blackboard or a tablet,an outdoor activity or a mobile phone game, the Stellest lens from Essilor, a French company, keeps the same control effect, with changeable viewing angles and constant visual clarity. The lens can create a beam in front of the retina that will slow down the increase of the eye axis. Therefore, the development of myopia can be contained.

Portable kayak

A folding,portable,18-kilogram“backpack”can be inflated into a kayak. The safe, lightweight ITIWIT X500 Kayak,made by Decathlon,a French sports goods group, makes kayak racing accessible to the majority. It consists of five“air chambers”, so even if two of them don’t work, the inflatable kayak will help passengers safely return to land.To solve long-standing problems in the kayak industry — from lack of durability to overall insufficient performance — the company applied a special metal processing technology to its product. The ITIWITX500 Kayak’s V-shaped bottom makes this product long-lasting and tough.

【推荐2】A rare genetic skin condition has been corrected for the first time using a gene therapy that is applied to the skin.

About 1 in 800,000 children in the US are born with a severe condition called recessive dystrophic epidermolysis bullosa (不良性大疱性表皮松解症 RDEB) that makes their skin extremely weak and likely to be torn and blister (长水疱).

“It is very painful,” says Vincenzo Mascoli, 22, who travelled from Italy to the US to have the gene therapy. He had open wounds all over his body, including one covering his entire back that had been there since he was 2 years old. “Sometimes I also get blisters in my eyes and have to keep my eyes closed, and sometimes I get blisters in my throat that make it difficult to eat,” he says. Mascoli and other people with the condition have weak skin because they have an improper version of a collagen (胶原) gene called COL7A1. That means their skin can’t produce the collagen proteins needed to give it structure and strength.

Peter Marinkovich at Stanford University in California and his colleagues developed a way to insert normal COL7A1 genes into the skin of such individuals so they can start producing collagen properly. “All it does is go into the cell and deliver the gene,” says Marinkovich.

The gene therapy was then incorporated into a gel (凝胶) so it could be applied to the skin. It was tested in a late-stage clinical experiment in the US involving 31 children and adults with RDEB, including Mascoli.

The treatment was repeated weekly until the wounds closed. After three months, 71% of the wounds treated with the gene therapy had completely healed, compared with 20% of those who had the ineffective gel applied, and there were no serious side effects.

A US company called Krystal Biotech has partnered with Marinkovich and his colleagues to develop the gene therapy and will apply in the next few months for approval to make it available to more patients in the US.

【推荐2】Scientists have mapped out oceanic “dead zones” from the Pliocene, about 5. 3 to 2. 6 million years ago, when Earth’s temperature was two to three degrees higher than today. This could offer insight into the future locations and effects of low oxygen areas in a warmer Earth’s oceans.

Oxygen minimum zones, or OMZs, are regions in the ocean with lower oxygen levels in the mid-waters to support marine (海洋的) life. These dead zones play an important role in the ocean’s overall health. “Their locations show where carbon and nitrogen (氮) are available in the ocean —so they’re important drivers of nutrient cycles,” says Catherine Davis, assistant professor at North Carolina State University.

Being able to predict the location of OMZs is important not only for understanding nutrient cycling but also because of their effects on marine life. Oceanic dead zones restrict the range of animals to the shallow surface ocean where oxygen is more plentiful. Davis and her colleagues wanted to figure out how a warmer climate might impact future OMZs. So they looked to the Pliocene, when the Earth’s atmospheric CO₂ levels were close to what they are now.

“This is the first global spatial reconstruction of oxygen minimum zones in the past,” Davis says. “And it’s in line with what we’re already seeing in the Atlantic in terms of lower oxygen levels. Warmer water holds less oxygen. This dead zone map from the Pliocene could give us insight into what the Atlantic might look like 100 years from now.”

What would a future with much less oxygen in the Atlantic mean? According to Davis, it could have a big impact on everything from carbon storage and nutrient cycling in the ocean to how fisheries and marine species are managed. “OMZs act as a ‘floor’ for marine —animals they are pushed to the surface,” Davis says. “So fishermen may suddenly see a lot of fish, but it doesn’t mean that there are actually more than normal —they’re just being forced into a smaller space.” Fisheries will need to take the effects of OMZs into account when managing populations.

【推荐1】Scientists have assessed 78 mountain glacier-based water systems around the world and ranked the Asian water towers as the most threatened, according to a recently published study in the journal Nature.

Scientists ranked the importance of the water systems to neighbouring lowland communities while assessing the vulnerability (脆弱性) to future environmental and socioeconomic changes. These water systems, known as mountain water towers, store and transport water via glaciers, snowpacks, lakes and streams, therefore supplying invaluable water resources to 1.9 billion people globally.

The scientists analyzed the various factors that influenced how independent downstream communities were upon the supplies of water from these systems. They also assessed each water tower to determine the vulnerability of the water resources, as well as the people and ecosystems that depended on them, based on predictions of future climate and socio-economic changes. The paper said that global water towers are at risk due to the threats of climate change, growing populations and mismanagement of water resources.

Among the 78 global water towers identified, Asian water towers that rely on river systems in the Third Pole region were ranked as the most threatened water towers.

“If temperatures increase two degrees Celsius globally, the Asian water towers could see a temperature hike as high as four degrees Celsius,” said Prof. Yao Tandong, a scientist from the Chinese Academy of Sciences and also a co-author of the research, adding that by 2060 to 2070, rising temperatures due to climate change could lead to ever-stronger glacier reduction in the region.

Since 2014, a network of 11 monitoring stations has been set up across the Third Pole region to track meteorological (气象的) variables, such as air temperature, humidity, air pressure, precipitation (降水量) and winds, according to a comment published in Nature earlier this year. Data needs to be expanded on the water cycle by measuring the stable isotopes (同位素) of hydrogen and oxygen in water vapor.

【推荐2】By March 2018, Cape Town’s biggest reservoir (储水库) had dropped to just 11 percent of its capacity. The city was close to turning off the taps. “I’ve never experienced anything like it,” said Samantha Reinders. Like everyone else here, Reinders learned to wash, cook and drink using just the official daily limit—50 liters. Posters were put up everywhere, telling 400,000 people in Cape Town how far the reservoirs had dropped. They also showed the countdown until “Day Zero”. Finally, in June, the rains returned. People ran outside to feel the water flow on their faces. Cape Town’s water shortage was over, at least temporarily. “Day Zero” had never quite arrived.

Afterward, an international group of scientists analyzed Cape Town’s drought and water shortage. They studied computer models and rainfall records. Finally, they came to a conclusion: Climate change wasn’t the culprit (罪魁祸首) of the drought. It hadn’t begotten the drought. But it had tripled (使成三倍) the chance that a drought would occur.

Friederike Otto is a climate scientist at Oxford University in England and lead author of that study. The risk of drought could triple again by the end of the 21st century, she said. That’s when global temperatures are predicted to rise another 1 degree Celsius.

Co-author Piotr Wolski said that better planning could help in the future. The area could manage its water reservoirs more carefully. People could fix leaky dams and make use of a variety of water sources instead of only reservoirs. “Drought may or may not translate into a crisis (危机),” he pointed out.

In many ways, said Reinders, the water crisis made a change to the city. Most people, across race, gender, religion and class, did their best to save water and help their neighbors out. And most were sticking to the water-saving habits they had learned. “I think this is the new normal. And that is pretty much the word on the street,” said Reinders.