High-resolution speleothem records from China have provided insights into the factors that control the strength of the East Asian monsoon [1][2][3][4] . Our understanding of these factors remains incomplete, however, owing to gaps in the record of monsoon history over the past two interglacial-glacial cycles. In particular, missing sections have hampered our ability to test ideas about orbital-scale controls on the monsoon [5][6][7] , the causes of millennial-scale events 8,9 and relationships between changes in the monsoon and climate in other regions. Here we present an absolute-dated oxygen isotope record from Sanbao cave, central China, that completes a Chinesecave-based record of the strength of the East Asian monsoon that covers the past 224,000 years. The record is dominated by 23,000-year-long cycles that are synchronous within dating errors with summer insolation at 656 N (ref. 10), supporting the idea that tropical/subtropical monsoons respond dominantly and directly to changes in Northern Hemisphere summer insolation on orbital timescales 5 . The cycles are punctuated by millennial-scale strongsummer-monsoon events (Chinese interstadials 1 ), and the new record allows us to identify the complete series of these events over the past two interglacial-glacial cycles. Their duration decreases and their frequency increases during glacial build-up in both the last and penultimate glacial periods, indicating that ice sheet size affects their character and pacing. The ages of the events are exceptionally well constrained and may thus serve as benchmarks for correlating and calibrating climate records.The last glacial period is characterized by millennial-scale events, first identified in Greenland, including 25 Greenland interstadials (GIS) during the last interglacial-glacial period [11][12][13] . We previously identified a number of Chinese interstadial (CIS) events 2,4 (relatively strong summer millennial-scale East Asian monsoon, EAM, events) and correlated them with analogous GIS events. We also identified CIS events from portions of the penultimate glacial period, and established a nomenclature with last glacial period CIS denoted CIS A1, A2, and so on, from youngest to oldest, and those of the penultimate glacial period denoted CIS B1, B2, and so on 1 . Here we present an EAM record from Sanbao cave, together with our previous Hulu records 1,2 , and characterize the complete CIS series for the last and penultimate interglacial-glacial cycles, including events not previously identified.Sanbao cave is in Hubei province, central China, on the northern slope of Mt Shennongjia, near the southern edge of the Chinese loess plateau (110u 269 E, 31u 409 N, 1,900 m above sea level). Regional climate is dominated by the EAM, a sub-system of the Asian monsoon (AM) (Supplementary Fig. 1), with a mean annual rainfall of 1,900-2,000 mm and a mean temperature of 8-9 uC. During boreal summer (June to September), warm/humid air from the equatorial Pacific penetrates to the northern slope of Mt Shennongjia, delivering mo...

Each year the Mythimna separate (Walker), undertakes a seasonal, long-distance, multigeneration roundtrip migration between southern and northern China. Despite its regularity, the decision to migrate is facultative, and is controlled by environmental, physiological, hormonal, genetic, and molecular factors. Migrants take off on days 1 or 2 after eclosion, although the preoviposition period lasts ≈7 d. The trade-offs among the competing physiological demands of migration and reproduction are coordinated in M. separata by the "oogenesis-flight syndrome." Larvae that experience temperatures above or below certain thresholds accompanied by appropriate humidity, short photoperiod, poor nutrition, and moderate density tend to develop into migrants. However, there is a short window of sensitivity within 24 h after adult eclosion when migrants can be induced to switch to reproductive residents if they encounter extreme environmental factors including starvation, low temperature and long photoperiod. Juvenile hormone (JH) titer is low before migration but high titers are associated with termination of migratory behavior and the switch to reproduction. Early release of JH by the corpora allata in environmentally stressed 1-d old adults, otherwise destined by larval conditions to be migrants, switches them to residents. Offspring inherit parental additive genetic effects governing migratory behavior. However, they also retain flexibility in expression of both flight and reproductive life history traits. The insect neuropeptide, allatotropin, which activates corpora allata to synthesize JH, controls adult flight and reproduction. Future research directions to better understand regulation of migration in this species are discussed.

We report partial melting of an ultrahigh pressure eclogite in the Mesozoic Sulu orogen, China. Eclogitic migmatite shows successive stages of initial intragranular and grain boundary melt droplets, which grow into a three-dimensional interconnected intergranular network, then segregate and accumulate in pressure shadow areas and then merge to form melt channels and dikes that transport magma to higher in the lithosphere. Here we show, using zircon U–Pb dating and petrological analyses, that partial melting occurred at 228–219 Myr ago, shortly after peak metamorphism at 230 Myr ago. The melts and residues are complimentarily enriched and depleted in light rare earth element (LREE) compared with the original rock. Partial melting of deeply subducted eclogite is an important process in determining the rheological structure and mechanical behaviour of subducted lithosphere and its rapid exhumation, controlling the flow of deep lithospheric material, and for generation of melts from the upper mantle, potentially contributing to arc magmatism and growth of continental crust.

The beet armyworm, Spodoptera exigua, undertakes long-distance migration. We used flight mills to investigate the interaction between flight and reproduction in this species given the apparent absence of the oogenesis-flight syndrome. This syndrome, common in many migratory insects, is characterized by a suite of traits including migration during the pre-oviposition period followed by a switch to oogenesis. No negative effects of inter-ovipositional flight on lifetime fecundity were observed. Instead, adult reproductive output suffered when female flight was initiated the first day after eclosion and before oviposition, suggesting that migratory flight overlaps with the oviposition period rather than being confined to the pre-oviposition period. Mating status of both females and males had no negative influence on their flight performance except that flight distance and flight duration of 7-day-old mated females were significantly less than in unmated females. Furthermore, the number of eggs produced and mating frequency of females less than 7 days of age were not significantly correlated with flight performance, suggesting reproductive development paralleled and was independent of migratory behavior. This independent relationship between flight and reproduction of adults is consistent with the very short pre-oviposition period in this species, and suggests that resources are partitioned between these activities during pupal development. Together, our results uncovered neither obvious trade-offs nor mutual suppression between flight and reproduction in S. exigua, which indicates the lack of an oogenesis-flight syndrome for coordination of these two energy-intensive processes. We propose a conceptual model of migration for this species based on the current and previous studies.