Professor Gulnara Sitpaeva, the Director of Kazakhstan Institute of Botany, and another expert visited out institute during the period from May 25 to June 1, 2009.

　　The “Carbon Process of Saline or Alkaline Soil in Arid Area and Global Change”, a research project from the National Key Fundamental Research Development Program (973 Program), is currently taken charge by out institute. One of the purposes of the research project is to build a “Sample Zone of International Cooperative Research in Eurasian Continental Arid Area” and make it into a natural laboratory and an international cooperative base for researching the carbon cycle and carbon “black hole effect” in arid area as well as a platform for researching global change in arid area. In order to achieve this purpose, our institute will cooperate with the academies of sciences in Central Asia, especially with Kazakhstan Academy of Sciences.

　　Director Gulnara Sitpaeva from Kazakhstan Institute of Botany and Director Chen and other scientists of our institute had a discussion on the concrete matters concerning the cooperative research projects.