A team of more than 50 people set off on September 20 in Lhasa for the no-man's land of Kekexili (Hoh Xil) for a one-and-half-month scientific exploration and human beings' first journey in the central area of Kekexili.

The explorers will conduct the first ever adventure into the central area of Kekexili and there will be much unknown for them to discover and study, said Ding Lin a research fellow with the Institute of Tibetan Plateau Research (ITP) under Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS).

The team will "cross" various climate belts, and will see different landforms such as volcano, spring, karst plateau and iceberg discharges, etc. On their way they will pass suture zone and tectonic belt, which are of high value for scientific exploration.

After setting off from Lhasa, the team will pass Namucuo (Nam Co), Twin Lake, Kekexili Lake and Mangya and at last reach Germu (Golmud). Such 40-day exploration will be made every year for three consecutive years in the transition from spring to summer and from autumn to winter.

With an average altitude of 5, 300 meters, the Kekexili no-man's land is one of the places where original conditions are preserved. Cold and windy all the year round, the average temperature is four Celsius below zero and the lowest can be 40 Celsius below zero. Due to its high altitude, low air pressure, thin oxygen, it is dubbed "forbidden zone of humankind".

Kekexili is in the hinterland of Qinghai-Tibet Plateau. "Hoh Xil" in Tibetan means "beautiful lass". Its main body is Kekexili Mountain, and covers northern Tanggula Mountain and southern Kunlun Mountains.

Kekexili no man's land is the world's third largest and China's largest unpopulated area.

Ding said, since the first contemporary scientific exploration there more than one hundred years ago, especially since the founding of the People's Republic, scientists of several generations have stepped on the soil there and made notable achievements. However, limited by the conditions, no exploration team has ever succeeded in crossing the "forbidden zone".

"Now it is time to do what has not been done," said Chen Junchi, deputy captain of the team.

The team is mainly composed of 13 CAS scientists under the guidance of 20 academicians from 12 disciplines and fields.

It will be the longest and most distant exploration into Kekexili.

By People's Daily Online