Cold and Arid Regions Environment and Engineering Research Institute, Chinese Academy of Sciences (Abbreviated as CAREERI, CAS) is a newly re-organized institute in June 1999 from former three institutes of Chinese Academy of Sciences in Lanzhou, the Institute of Glaciology and Geocryology, Institute of Desert Research and Institute of Plateau Atmospheric Physics. The new institute aims at disciplinary integration and scientific synthesis, based on retaining the unique and distinguished present disciplines. Now there are 200 full-time employees, with 55 titled as professors, in the new institute.