BEIJING, Aug. 17 (Xinhua) -- The following are the highlights of China's science news from the past week:

QINGHAI-TIBET PLATEAU

The hinterland of southwest China's Qinghai-Tibet Plateau was a warm and humid lowland nourished by warm air from the Indian Ocean 26 million years ago, according to a recently published study in the journal Chinese Science Bulletin.

The joint research of the Institute of Vertebrate Paleontology and Paleoanthropology and Xishuangbanna Tropical Botanical Garden of the Chinese Academy of Sciences found the diversified fossils of animals and plants in southwest China's Tibet Autonomous Region and recognized the transitions of the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau's ecosystem in the early Miocene, about 23 million years ago.

JOURNALS GUIDELINE

Chinese authorities have issued a guideline on promoting reform and development of the country's sci-tech journals.

The guideline proposes approaches to achieve a goal of establishing world-leading sci-tech journals, stressing that sci-tech journals reflect a country's competitiveness and cultural soft power.

SCIENCE PROJECTS FUND

China will allocate 21.03 billion yuan (about 2.99 billion U.S. dollars) to finance 41,752 science projects, the National Natural Science Foundation of China (NSFC) announced Friday.

The funds will go to 10 types of science projects including national key projects, key international cooperative research projects, projects conducted by distinguished young scholars, as well as major projects on scientific instruments and equipment.

PLANT DIVERSIFICATION

Researchers from the Chinese Academy of Sciences and the Leipzig University have disclosed that polyploidy, or genome duplication, promotes plant diversification through ecological changes, according to a recent study published in the journal New Phytologist.

SOIL RESPIRATION

Chinese researchers have disclosed the relationship between soil respiration and long-term rainfall reduction.

Soil respiration includes heterotrophic respiration (Rh) and autotrophic respiration (Ra). The researchers separated Rh and Ra and measured dissolved organic carbon in the soil and microbial biomass.

The results showed that the forest Ra decreased 35 percent with 36 percent root biomass reduction in the seventh and eighth year of rainfall reduction, while the Rh and active inorganic nitrogen increased by 29 percent and 31 percent respectively. Enditem