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Objectives

Introduction

Our laboratory is focusing on important agronomic traits of rice, such as yield, resistance and nutritional utilization efficiency. In combination with gene editing techniques, multi-omics, and molecular biology techniques to explore gene functions, create important genetic resources, and screen high-quality rice breeding materials. More specifically: 1. Leaf is an important plant organ, it is the place for plant photo-synthesis. And leaf is also the heat source, carbon source and it can feed oxygen, water to atmosphere. Our lab studies the mechanism of leaf development, especially leaf polarity establishment in rice. Through different methods, like histology, live imaging and transcriptome analysis, we would like to find out key genes for leaf polarity establishment and characterize function of these genes. And we try to build up a genetic regulation network and understand molecular mechanism. Through the study of leaf development, it can shed more light on plant morphogenesis theory and also provide important genetic resources for breeding. 2. Improvement of the gene editing technology of wild rice, and use wild rice resources to create new available breeding materials. 3. Characterization of rice genes for stress tolerance, nutrition utilization efficiency , and reveal their regulatory mechanism. The research group has 15 personnel,including 1 PI, 1Associate Researcher, 3Postdoc,1 Support and Management Staff, 3 PhD Student, 6 MSc student.

Research Areas

Lianguang Shang

Shang Lab focused on wild and cultivated rice germplasm collection and innovation, as well as elite gene mining and molecular design breeding in rice. They assembled 251 high-quality rice genomes to build the largest population-scale, genome-annotated super pangenome, which was the most systematic in Oryza genera by now. The group includes 1 PI, 3 postdoctoral fellows, 3 Ph.D. students, 8 MSc. students, and 1 management and support staff.

Postdoc

Zhipeng Zhang Xianmeng Wang Wu Chen

PhD Student

Xiaoxia Li Yang Lv Hongge Qian

PI

Yongfu Tao Lab focuses on genetic breeding of sorghum as its main research direction. Sorghum is known for its drought resistance, heat tolerance, salinity and alkalinity tolerance, and adaptability to poor soils, making it an excellent "pioneer" for marginal lands. Exploring genes related to sorghum's resistance to environmental stress and understanding their molecular mechanisms is crucial for breeding stress-resistant varieties and ensuring food security.

In the preliminary stage, the research group collected a wild sorghum NAM population and a natural population of over a thousand samples. The aim is to utilize these germplasm resources to dissect the genetic basis of sorghum's adaptation to environmental stress using multi-omics approache. The group seeks to identify excellent genes related to sorghum's high yield and stress resistance and investigate the molecular regulatory mechanisms underlying sorghum's high yield and response to environmental stress.

The research group has 8 personnel ,including 1 PI , 3 Postdoc, 2 Support and Management Staff , 1 MSc student.

Associate Researcher

Postdoc

Support and Management Staff

MSc student

Research Team

1) The team focuses on rice genome-assisted germplasm innovation. Specific research areas include 1. Gene mapping and allele mining, particularly through the introduction, characterization and resequencing of rice germplasms;

2) Analysis of the molecular and genetic regulatory mechanisms of traits related to direct seeding, salt tolerance, drought tolerance, grain zinc content and cadmium accumulation;

3) Genomic prediction in the management of germplasm resources and breeding;

4) Germplasm enhancement and variety development with particular interests in direct-seeding, abiotic tolerance and grain nutritional quality.