Comment on "Revised paleoaltimetry data show low Tibetan Plateau elevation during the Eocene".

Botsyun et al (Research Articles, 1 March 2019, eaaq1436) have suggested that the Tibetan Plateau was low (substantially less than 3000 meters) during the Eocene, based on a comparison of oxygen isotope proxy data with isotope-enabled climate model simulations. However, we contend that their conclusions are flawed as the result of a number of failings of both the modeling and the data comparison.

Uplift, climate and biotic changes at the Eocene-Oligocene transition in south-eastern Tibet.

The uplift history of south-eastern Tibet is crucial to understanding processes driving the tectonic evolution of the Tibetan Plateau and surrounding areas. Underpinning existing palaeoaltimetric studies has been regional mapping based in large part on biostratigraphy that assumes a Neogene modernization of the highly diverse, but threatened, Asian biota. Here, with new radiometric dating and newly collected plant-fossil archives, we quantify the surface height of part of the south-eastern margin of Tibet in the latest Eocene (∼34 Ma) to be ∼3 km and rising, possibly attaining its present elevation (3.9 km) in the early Oligocene. We also find that the Eocene-Oligocene transition in south-eastern Tibet witnessed leaf-size diminution and a floral composition change from sub-tropical/warm temperate to cool temperate, likely reflective of both uplift and secular climate change, and that, by the latest Eocene, floral modernization on Tibet had already taken place, implying modernization was deeply rooted in the Palaeogene.

[Isolation and identification of Marinobacter adhaerens HY-3 and its allelopathy on Skeletonema costatum].

UNLABELLED: The allelopathy between bacteria and algae is a very complicated physical and ecological phenomenon. A marine bacterium was isolated from the water of a shrimp and crab mix-culturing pond. By 16S rRNA analysis, it was identified as Marinobacter adhaerens HY-3. Skeletonema costatum, a common dominant species of red-tide microorganism in China, was chosen as the other research object. The allelopathic effect of Marinobacter adhaerens HY- 3 on S. costatum was studied. Using the growth mass of Skeletonema costatum and the content of chlorophyll a as the parameters, the effects of HY-3 on the growth and photosynthesis of Skeletonema costatum were studied after co-cultivation and addition of extracellular metabolites of HY-3. The results showed that the growth of S. costatum was inhibited when the concentration of the strain HY-3 was above 10(4), and the growth mass of the 10(4), 10(6) and 10(8) HY-3 group was 70%, 23% and 22% of the control group respectively on the 10th day, with the content of chlorophyll being 88%, 62% and 60% of the control group, respectively. Therefore, the suppression increased with increasing concentration of HY-3. However, addition of extracellular metabolites of HY-3 had no effect on the growth of S. costatum. CONCLUSIONS: M. adhaerens HY-3 had certain allelopathy on S. costatum and affected its growth and photosynthesis. Moreover, interaction between M. adhaerens HY-3 and S. costatum was achieved by their direct contact and the extracellular metabolites did not contain allelopathy factors.