Southern East Asia Research Articles

Variability in zonal location of winter East Asian jet stream

ABSTRACTThis study reveals that the winter East Asian jet stream (EAJS) shows a strong variability in its zonal location; this topic has received less attention compared with the EAJS intensity and meridional location variability in previous studies. We show that the mid‐to‐high latitude climate system is mainly responsible for the EAJS eastward shift and the tropical system is closely related with the EAJS westward shift. In the EAJS east‐located years, North Pacific Oscillation undergoes a positive phase, which can enhance the eastern part of the EAJS over the North Pacific, favouring the eastward shift of the EAJS. In the west‐located years, the tropical convection over the Indian Ocean is strong, which can strengthen the zonal angular momentum transport from the Tropics to subtropical westerly belt. Consequently, the western part of the EAJS enhances and the EAJS shifts westward. In addition, the east‐located EAJS is related to the intensified Aleutian Low and East Asian trough, and thus, Northeast China, Korean Peninsula, and Japan experience low temperatures. On the other hand, the west‐located EAJS is associated with the weakened mid‐Asian ridge and cold‐temperature advection over southern East Asia, and thus, regions from mid‐Asia southeastward to southern China experience cold temperatures. Therefore, the zonal location of the EAJS is a potentially good index of the northern or southern East Asian anomalous temperature pattern.

Winter monsoon variability and its impact on aerosol concentrations in East Asia

We investigate the relationship between winter aerosol concentrations over East Asia and variability in the East Asian winter monsoon (EAWM) using GEOS-Chem 3-D global chemical transport model simulations and ground-based aerosol concentration data. We find that both observed and modeled surface aerosol concentrations have strong relationships with the intensity of the EAWM over northern (30–50°N, 100–140°E) and southern (20–30°N, 100–140°E) East Asia. In strong winter monsoon years, compared to weak winter monsoon years, lower and higher surface PM2.5 concentrations by up to 25% are shown over northern and southern East Asia, respectively. Analysis of the simulated results indicates that the southward transport of aerosols is a key process controlling changes in aerosol concentrations over East Asia associated with the EAWM. Variability in the EAWM is found to play a major role in interannual variations in aerosol concentrations; consequently, changes in the EAWM will be important for understanding future changes in wintertime air quality over East Asia.

Enteric fever in Barcelona: Changing patterns of importation and antibiotic resistance.

Enteric fever's incidence is decreasing among residents of high-income countries, although it's rising in travelers coming from low-resource endemic settings. The study's aim is to describe epidemiological, clinical and laboratory features of patients with enteric fever. Retrospective descriptive study of enteric fever cases diagnosed at a Tropical Medicine Unit in Barcelona, 1993-2012. Out of 40 patients, 31(77,5%) were returning travelers, and 70% of them had been in Southern Asia. In the rest of patients without an antecedent of a recent travel, the infection occurred mainly before year 2000. The more frequently reported symptoms were fever and diarrhea, lacking significant differences between S.typhi and S.paratyphi infections. Quinolones were used as empiric treatment in 47.2% of patients, 36.1% received 3rd generation cephalosporins, 2.78% azithromycin and 13.89% other combinations. Resistance to quinolones in the S.paratyphi group (66.7%) was significantly higher compared with the S.typhi group (20%) (p:0.02). 22.5% of patients had treatment failure and 23.6% patients presented complications, none of them had been previously vaccinated. The diagnosis of enteric fever was more frequent among travelers coming from Southern-East Asia. Quinolone resistance is widely spread, particularly in S.paratyphi serotypes and should not be considered as first choice treatment anymore.

Resemblances that matter: Lessons from the comparison between Southern Europe and East Asia

Southern Europe and East Asia are two distinct groups of nations which share a number of striking family resemblances warranting a close investigation. Such resemblances form a relatively coherent set best captured through the concepts of familialism and familial welfare state. A cross-regional comparison of Italy, Japan, Spain and Korea leads to interesting results in both descriptive and explanatory terms, highlighting the role played by culture and religion as well as by the compressed modernization which characterized the four countries during the 20th century. The comparative exercise of this Special Issue offers a significant contribution to the wider field of welfare research. It reshuffles the cards of the traditional ‘world of welfare capitalism’ debate, shows the significance of region-level (as opposed to nation-level) variables and invites a specification of temporal arguments in institutional transformations.

Beyond familialism: Recalibrating family, state and market in Southern Europe and East Asia

This Special Issue takes on a new cross-regional comparison between Southern Europe and East Asia in an attempt to identify ‘new politics’ of welfare state adjustments. Departing from the previous literature that overemphasized regional peculiarities of East Asian and Southern European welfare states, our Special Issue highlights family resemblances – among Italy, Japan, Korea and Spain. We argue that these four welfare states – often labelled as ‘familialist’ – share key common characteristics, which in turn experienced very similar policy problems in recent years. Interestingly, despite their initial similarities, these four countries have been trying to cope with new policy problems in different ways. In this process, some are clearly becoming less familialist. The main aim of this introductory article is to demonstrate the theoretical advantages based on the new cross-regional comparison. This article proceeds in three steps. First, it establishes the usefulness of the concept of family resemblances in our cross-regional comparison. Second, it presents a brief historical account of recent policy differences across the four countries going beyond familialism and shows that the existing theories fail to account for the new divergences. Third, it provides the overview of the Special Issue by explaining the research puzzles each paper tackles. We argue that these four welfare states, which are moving beyond familialism to varying degrees, represent heuristically helpful cases to explore the effects of both domestic and international political factors.

Varieties of familialism: Comparing four southern European and East Asian welfare regimes

The aim of this article is to articulate the concepts of familialism and defamilialization as well as their indicators to assess whether and how welfare states, or regimes, differ not only in the degree to which they are defamilialized but also in the specific familialism form. In other words, it assesses whether family responsibility in a given area (and its gender dimension) is only assumed without public policy support or, on the contrary, whether it is actively enforced by laws or supported by income transfers and time allocation. The same diversification also exists for the opposite concept, defamilialization, which may happen through positive, direct or indirect policy interventions or because of the lack of such interventions, encouraging recourse to the market. The article shows that when considering these distinctions in the analyses, the profiles of countries that are usually generically described as ‘familialistic welfare states’, such as Italy and Spain in Europe or Japan and Korea in East Asia, and their similarities and differences partly differ from those that emerge when considering only a simplified familialism – defamilialization dichotomy, in so far both familialism and defamilialization may occur, and be combined, through distinct means, offering, therefore, also different options.

Gastrodia cajanoae (Orchidaceae: Epidendroideae: Gastrodieae), a new species from the Philippines

Gastrodia Brown (1810: 330) is a holomycotrophic terrestrial orchid genus of c. 65 species with an Old World distribution and centre of diversity in Southeast Asia (Cribb et al. 2010, Huang et al. 2015, Ong 2015). In the Philippines, two species are thus far known: G. javanica (Blume, 1825: 421) Lindley (1840: 384) and G. verrucosa Blume (1856: 175). Both have a widespread distribution in northern Malesia and southern East Asia. During fieldwork for the Co’s Digital Flora of the Philippine project (Pelser et al. 2011 onwards) in early December 2012, Gastrodia plants were photographed that belong to a third Philippine species. These plants were observed in three areas on the island of Mindanao: Mt. Apo Natural Park (North Cotabato Prov.) and two sites in Mt. Kitanglad Range Natural Park (Lantapan and Baungon municipalities; Bukidnon Prov.). In December 2015, plants belonging to the same species were collected in Northern Negros Natural Park (Victorias City, Negros Occidental Prov., Negros) and in March 2016 plants were photographed in Barlig (Mountain Prov., Luzon). Morphological studies showed that this species is distinct from all Gastrodia species except G. spathulata (Carr, 1935: 180) Wood (in Wood et al. 2011: 355) in having petals that are considerably shorter than the calyx tube and separate from it about half way along the inner surface of the tube. It differs from G. spathulata in the longer adnation of the petals to the calyx tube, the shape of the petals and their lack of indumentum, and characters of the lip ridges. Assuming that these morphological differences are an indication of reproductive isolation, we name and describe these plants here as a new species under a biological species concept (Mayr 2000). This new addition brings the total number of Philippine Gastrodia species to three.

A new species of Habenaria (Orchidaceae) from Nepal

With about 800 species (Govaerts et al. 2010) Habenaria Willdenow (1805: 5) is one of the largest and most widespread genera in Orchidaceae. The highest diversity of the genus occurs in Brazil, southern and central Africa and East Asia (Kurzweil & Weber 1992). Species included in Habenaria are terrestrial herbs with fleshy tubers. Their leaves are arranged variously and basally contracted into amplexicaul sheaths. The flowers are usually resupinate, with dorsal sepal forming a hood with the petals (Xinqui & Cribb 2009). The gynostemium varies significantly between the species, especially in aspects of connective and rostellum form as well as length (Szlachetko & Rutkowski 2000).

Fast responses of climate system to carbon dioxide, aerosols and sulfate aerosols without the mediation of SST in the CMIP5

ABSTRACTIn this study, fast climate system responses to CO2, aerosols and sulfate aerosols are studied based on simulations of Coupled Model Inter‐comparison Project Phase 5 (CMIP5) atmospheric models. We demonstrate that the fast climate adjustments caused by CO2 forcing lead to decreases in global annual mean cloud fractions, evaporation and precipitation and to increases in the global annual mean net radiative forcing and atmospheric water vapour content. The inhibition of rainfall is primarily caused by the reduced oceanic precipitation. Regionally, Africa, South Asia, East Asia and Australia exhibit pronounced increases in rainfall, which are presumably attributed to the strengthened summer monsoon caused by the increased land–sea thermal contrast. Aerosols and sulfate aerosols exhibit only a slight effect on the global hydrological cycle before global surface temperature changes. However, by affecting the land–sea thermal contrast, they can have profound effects on regional‐scale hydrological cycles, such as those over southern Africa, South Asia and East Asia in the boreal summer. Moreover, the cloud fast feedback under the aerosol forcing is highly associated with the way of dealing with aerosols in the atmospheric model.

Intentions Into Actions

This article addresses the emergence of “lowest-low” fertility in some countries, primarily in Southern Europe and East Asia, and poses the question of why we find such large differences in birth rates across postindustrial societies. A set of macro–micro mechanisms are identified, which are examined empirically using comparative data for seven countries from the Gender and Generations Survey. Social norms, and in particular social norms related to gender roles, are at the center of the analysis as a mechanism that conditions the translation of intentions into behavior. Societies that discourage gender equity in the private sphere of the household tend to be characterized by a strong breadwinner ideology. In these societies, the valorization of women’s role as household manager and mother is mirrored by the valorization of men’s role as breadwinner for the household. In these societies, there is a strong norm that a young man should be able to support a family prior to getting married and becoming a parent, that is, that males should prove themselves to be adequate breadwinners. When combined with changing structural conditions, such as high unemployment rates, prolonged periods of education, and increasingly insecure terms of employment in flexible labor markets, this norm will lead to declining birth rates. Hence, norms work as a mechanism that filters the effect of structural conditions so that structural constraints on fertility, such as limited labor market opportunities for young men, will affect fertility outcomes via the mechanism of gender-role norms.

Global conservation priorities for crop wild relatives.

The wild relatives of domesticated crops possess genetic diversity useful for developing more productive, nutritious and resilient crop varieties. However, their conservation status and availability for utilization are a concern, and have not been quantified globally. Here, we model the global distribution of 1,076 taxa related to 81 crops, using occurrence information collected from biodiversity, herbarium and gene bank databases. We compare the potential geographic and ecological diversity encompassed in these distributions with that currently accessible in gene banks, as a means to estimate the comprehensiveness of the conservation of genetic diversity. Our results indicate that the diversity of crop wild relatives is poorly represented in gene banks. For 313 (29.1% of total) taxa associated with 63 crops, no germplasm accessions exist, and a further 257 (23.9%) are represented by fewer than ten accessions. Over 70% of taxa are identified as high priority for further collecting in order to improve their representation in gene banks, and over 95% are insufficiently represented in regard to the full range of geographic and ecological variation in their native distributions. The most critical collecting gaps occur in the Mediterranean and the Near East, western and southern Europe, Southeast and East Asia, and South America. We conclude that a systematic effort is needed to improve the conservation and availability of crop wild relatives for use in plant breeding.

Out of southern East Asia: the natural history of domestic dogs across the world.

The origin and evolution of the domestic dog remains a controversial question for the scientific community, with basic aspects such as the place and date of origin, and the number of times dogs were domesticated, open to dispute. Using whole genome sequences from a total of 58 canids (12 gray wolves, 27 primitive dogs from Asia and Africa, and a collection of 19 diverse breeds from across the world), we find that dogs from southern East Asia have significantly higher genetic diversity compared to other populations, and are the most basal group relating to gray wolves, indicating an ancient origin of domestic dogs in southern East Asia 33 000 years ago. Around 15 000 years ago, a subset of ancestral dogs started migrating to the Middle East, Africa and Europe, arriving in Europe at about 10 000 years ago. One of the out of Asia lineages also migrated back to the east, creating a series of admixed populations with the endemic Asian lineages in northern China before migrating to the New World. For the first time, our study unravels an extraordinary journey that the domestic dog has traveled on earth.

The Linkage between Upper-Level Jet Streams over East Asia and East Asian Winter Monsoon Variability

Abstract This study investigates the linkage between East Asian winter monsoon (EAWM) variability and upper-level jets, with particular focus on the East Asian polar front jet (PJ) and its concurrent variation with the subtropical jet located to the south of the Tibetan Plateau (TSJ). The winter upper-level zonal wind variations over the Asian landmass (70°–120°E) are dominated by two principal modes (i.e., meridional displacement of the PJ and out-of-phase variation in the intensity of the TSJ and PJ) and they are closely linked to the EAWM northern mode and southern mode, respectively. Southward shifting of the PJ concurs with northwestward displacement of the Siberian high (SH), an enhanced northern East Asian trough, leading to cold winter in northern East Asia. Meanwhile the simultaneous TSJ intensification and PJ weakening is linked to an amplified SH, a southward shift of the Aleutian low (AL), a strengthened southern East Asian trough, and a wavelike anomaly pattern extending from western Barents Sea downstream to East Asia at the 500-hPa level. Equatorward shift of the PJ is associated with La Niña conditions in the tropics and sea ice anomalies over the Arctic. An intensified TSJ and weakened PJ are preceded by autumn warming over the central and eastern Pacific Ocean and are linked to circulation anomalies induced by the extensions of stationary Rossby waves, as well as synoptic-scale transient eddy activity anomalies. Therefore, a combination of external forcing and internal atmospheric dynamics plays a role in driving the variations of two leading EOFs, and there is potential for seasonal forecasting of both modes.

Y-chromosome diversity suggests southern origin and Paleolithic backwave migration of Austro-Asiatic speakers from eastern Asia to the Indian subcontinent.

Analyses of an Asian-specific Y-chromosome lineage (O2a1-M95)—the dominant paternal lineage in Austro-Asiatic (AA) speaking populations, who are found on both sides of the Bay of Bengal—led to two competing hypothesis of this group’s geographic origin and migratory routes. One hypothesis posits the origin of the AA speakers in India and an eastward dispersal to Southeast Asia, while the other places an origin in Southeast Asia with westward dispersal to India. Here, we collected samples of AA-speaking populations from mainland Southeast Asia (MSEA) and southern China, and genotyped 16 Y-STRs of 343 males who belong to the O2a1-M95 lineage. Combining our samples with previous data, we analyzed both the Y-chromosome and mtDNA diversities. We generated a comprehensive picture of the O2a1-M95 lineage in Asia. We demonstrated that the O2a1-M95 lineage originated in the southern East Asia among the Daic-speaking populations ~20–40 thousand years ago and then dispersed southward to Southeast Asia after the Last Glacial Maximum before moving westward to the Indian subcontinent. This migration resulted in the current distribution of this Y-chromosome lineage in the AA-speaking populations. Further analysis of mtDNA diversity showed a different pattern, supporting a previously proposed sex-biased admixture of the AA-speaking populations in India.

Taxonomic revisions on nimravids and small feliforms (Mammalia, Carnivora) from the Upper Eocene of Mongolia

This study reports occurrences of feliform carnivorans from the Upper Eocene Ergilin Dzo Formation and Alag Tsav locality of southeastern Mongolia. Nimravus mongoliensis (Nimravidae) is distinguished from other species in having a deep mandible, a longer p/1–2 and m/2 relative to p/4, and relatively wider P3/. Eofelis sp. (Nimravidae), a genus previously known only from the Oligocene of France is found in the Ergilin Dzo Formation. Alagtsavbaatar indigenus comb. nov. (Alagtsavbaatar gen. nov.; Feliformia) is established for new specimens from the Ergilin Dzo Formation and the previously known Stenoplesictis specimen from the Alag Tsav locality based on its characteristics such as moderately developed buccal cingulid and cingular and accessory cuspids on p/3 − 4, wide m/1 trigonid and double-rooted m/2 with a trenchant talonid. Stenoplesictis simplex from the Ergilin Dzo Formation is revised to Asiavorator gracilis, extending its chronological range back to the Late Eocene. Geographical and chronological distributions and morphological comparisons suggest that the Nimravidae originated by the Middle Eocene in southern East Asia and migrated northward in the Late Eocene, whereas the early small feliforms immigrated to northern East Asia in the Late Eocene and stayed within the middle-to-high-latitude area.

Urbanization dramatically altered the water balances of a paddy field-dominated basin in southern China

Abstract. Rice paddy fields provide important ecosystem services (e.g., food production, water retention, carbon sequestration) to a large population globally. However, these benefits are diminishing as a result of rapid environmental and socioeconomic transformations, characterized by population growth, urbanization, and climate change in many Asian countries. This case study examined the responses of stream flow and watershed water balances to the decline of rice paddy fields due to urbanization in the Qinhuai River basin in southern China, where massive industrialization has occurred during the past 3 decades. We found that stream flow increased by 58 % and evapotranspiration (ET) decreased by 23 % during 1986–2013 as a result of a three-fold increase in urban areas and a reduction of rice paddy fields by 27 %. Both high flows and low flows increased significantly by about 28 % from 2002 to 2013. The increases in stream flow were consistent with the decreases in ET and leaf area index monitored by independent remote sensing MODIS (Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer) data. Attribution analysis, based on two empirical models, indicated that land-use/land-cover change contributed about 82–108 % of the observed increase in stream flow from 353 ± 287 mm yr−1 during 1986–2002 to 556 ± 145 during 2003–2013. We concluded that the reduction in ET was largely attributed to the conversion of cropland to urban use. The effects of land-use change overwhelmed the effects of regional climate warming and climate variability. Converting traditional rice paddy fields to urban use dramatically altered land surface conditions from an artificial wetland-dominated landscape to an urban land-use- dominated one, and thus was considered an extreme type of contemporary hydrologic disturbance. The ongoing large-scale urbanization of the rice paddy-dominated regions, in humid southern China and East Asia, will likely elevate storm-flow volume, aggravate flood risks, and intensify urban heat island effects. Understanding the connection between land-use/land-cover change and changes in hydrological processes is essential for better management of urbanizing watersheds in the rice paddy-dominated landscape.

Change in Sea Ice Cover is Responsible for Non-Uniform Variation in Winter Temperature over East Asia

AbstractObserved winter (December—February) surface air temperature over East Asia (0°–60°N, 100–140°E) (TEA) shows non-uniform variation during 1979–2013, with cooling and weak warming north and south of 40°N. To understand this, the authors perform statistical analysis (linear regression and composite) on the observed data. The results suggest that reduced (increased) autumn sea ice cover in the Barents-Kara Sea (BK-ASIC) lowers (warms) TEA over northern East Asia, which is consistent with previous studies. In comparison, increased (decreased) winter sea ice cover in the Sea of Okhotsk (O-WSIC), warms (cools) the air over southern East Asia. The mechanism can be described as follows: When the BK-ASIC decreases, the East Asian winter monsoon tends to be stronger with an intensified Siberian high, leading to cooling over northern East Asia. An O-WSIC increase is associated with cold anomalies north of 50°N, altering the meridional temperature gradient between the midlatitudes and tropics, and leading to a...

Stationary Wave Activity Associated with the East Asian Winter Monsoon Pathway

The pathway of the East Asian winter mon- soon (EAWM) that usually leads to the out-of-phase pat- tern of surface air temperature between northern and southern East Asia is an important feature in the variabil- ity of the EAWM besides its strength. Using the European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts 40-year (ERA40) reanalysis dataset, this study investigates the pathway-related stationary wave activity to explore the mechanism of the interannual variations in the EAWM pathway. It reveals that when the southern pathway of the EAWM is strong, the phase of the climatological station- ary wave tends to be shifted westward significantly in both the horizontal and vertical directions by an anoma- lous wavenumber 2 pattern at mid-latitudes, whereas the changes are relatively small in the subtropics. The hori- zontal changes in the stationary wave phase facilitate a north-south-oriented East Asian trough in the middle tro- posphere that eventually produces the strong southern pathway of the EAWM. The vertical changes in the sta- tionary wave, in contrast, feature a westward-tilted phase line with height over the North Pacific, indicating en- hanced upward propagation of waves into the strato- sphere. This result suggests that the phase of stationary waves at mid-latitudes dominate the interannual variations in the EAWM pathway. Moreover, it supports our previ- ous interpretation of the possible role of the North Pacific sea surface temperature (SST) in the EAWM pathway variability. It also implies that the excitation of anomalous mid-latitude stationary waves may be the key in the re- sponse of the EAWM pathway to the North Pacific SST.  Keywords: East Asian winter monsoon, pathway, sta- tionary wave, phase Citation: Wang, L., 2014: Stationary wave activity asso- ciated with the East Asian winter monsoon pathway, At- mos. Oceanic Sci. Lett., 7, 7-10, doi:10.3878/j.issn.1674- 2834.13.0043.

Southern East Asian origin and coexpansion of Mycobacterium tuberculosis Beijing family with Han Chinese

The Beijing family is the most successful genotype of Mycobacterium tuberculosis and responsible for more than a quarter of the global tuberculosis epidemic. As the predominant genotype in East Asia, the Beijing family has been emerging in various areas of the world and is often associated with disease outbreaks and antibiotic resistance. Revealing the origin and historical dissemination of this strain family is important for understanding its current global success. Here we characterized the global diversity of this family based on whole-genome sequences of 358 Beijing strains. We show that the Beijing strains endemic in East Asia are genetically diverse, whereas the globally emerging strains mostly belong to a more homogenous subtype known as "modern" Beijing. Phylogeographic and coalescent analyses indicate that the Beijing family most likely emerged around 30,000 y ago in southern East Asia, and accompanied the early colonization by modern humans in this area. By combining the genomic data and genotyping result of 1,793 strains from across China, we found the "modern" Beijing sublineage experienced massive expansions in northern China during the Neolithic era and subsequently spread to other regions following the migration of Han Chinese. Our results support a parallel evolution of the Beijing family and modern humans in East Asia. The dominance of the "modern" Beijing sublineage in East Asia and its recent global emergence are most likely driven by its hypervirulence, which might reflect adaption to increased human population densities linked to the agricultural transition in northern China.

The Influence of ENSO on Northern Midlatitude Ozone during the Winter to Spring Transition

Abstract The influence of El Niño–Southern Oscillation (ENSO) on northern midlatitude ozone during the period January–March (JFM) is investigated using various observations and a chemistry–climate model. The analysis reveals that, during El Niño events, there are noticeable anomalously high total ozone column (TOC) values over the North Pacific, the southern United States, northeastern Africa, and East Asia but anomalously low values in central Europe and over the North Atlantic. La Niña events have almost the opposite effects on TOC anomalies. The longitudinal dependence of midlatitude ozone anomalies associated with ENSO events during the period JFM is found to be related to planetary waves. Planetary waves excited by tropical convection propagate into the middle latitudes and give rise to longwave trains (Pacific–North American pattern) and shortwave trains along the North African–Asian jet. These wave trains affect ozone in the upper troposphere and lower stratosphere (UTLS) by modulating the midlatitude tropopause height and cause TOC anomalies by changing the vertical distributions of ozone. In addition, synoptic-scale Rossby wave breaking increases on the poleward flanks of the enhanced westerly jet during El Niño events, leading to a stronger eddy-driven meridional circulation in the UTLS and hence causing TOC increases over the North Pacific, the southern United States, northeastern Africa, and East Asia and vice versa for La Niña events. It is also found that the contribution of changes in Brewer–Dobson circulation due to anomalous planetary wave dissipation in the stratosphere during ENSO events to TOC changes in the middle latitudes for the period JFM is small, not more than 1 Dobson unit (DU) per month.