The State Key Laboratory of Yunnan Biological Resources Conservation and Utilization is a provincial and ministerial state key laboratory jointly established by Yunnan Agricultural University and Yunnan University, and officially approved by the Ministry of Science and Technology for construction and operation in December 2015. Based on the rich biodiversity in southwest China, the laboratory faces the national strategic biological resources and ecological security needs, serves the national and Yunnan biological industry development, solves major scientific problems and key technologies in biological resources conservation, sustainable biodiversity utilization and special biological resources excavation, gathers and cultivates first-rate talents in biodiversity, and builds a research center with international influence The research center will provide strong scientific and technological support for the development of biodiversity conservation and utilization and bio-industry in China.
Research Direction
The laboratory mainly focuses on the following three research directions.
1、Protection and utilization of special biological resources
Focus on the collection, conservation and evaluation of biological resources with important economic and research values represented by microorganisms and crop germplasm resources, construct the characteristic biological germplasm resources bank, and develop new technologies for evaluation and excavation. Carry out the evaluation of crops’ important characteristics, such as high yield, high quality, drought resistance, cold resistance, efficient utilization of plant nutrition and water, and adaptability; germplasm resource innovation and research on new biological products. Research on the mechanisms and effects of crop-biological species interactions, mainly in the farmland, to provide a theoretical and material foundation for the effective utilization of bio-resources, and to provide foundation for the development of crop germplasm resources and new technology so as to increase the effects of chemical fertilizer and chemical pesticide use and reduce the amount of use. Discover natural active products with important economic value, reveal their biosynthesis and regulatory mechanisms, explore efficient synthesis methods of natural products with potential applications, design analogous natural products and elucidate the relationship between structure and function. As such, it will provide material and technical support for the in-depth utilization of resources, development of environmentally friendly new pesticides and fertilizers, and innovation of drugs.
2、Systematic evolution and adaptation of important biological biome
The study will use the rich and unique vertebrate, insect, and microbial biome in Yunnan and surrounding areas as the research objects, and utilize multi-gene molecular markers and genome-level pedigree analysis to reveal the origin and evolution of important biological taxa. On the basis of understanding the evolutionary history of the system, we select some representative organisms in extreme and special environments, target some key aspects of biological adaptation (such as starvation, hypoxia, low temperature, host infestation and defense response, etc.), and employ comparative genomics and proteomics technologies to study the molecular mechanisms of biological adaptation. Therefore, to explore the motives and basic laws of biodiversity evolution and maintenance.
3、Ecological function and construction of key areas
Taking the important ecological function areas of Yunnan as the object, we explore the ecological advantages of developing plateau characteristic agriculture, study the dominant crops with advantageous features, develop and apply specific plating technology, so that a high degree of compatibility between the unique crop resources and local bio-resources can be achieved.. To study the structure of biological communities, biodiversity maintenance mechanisms and spatial patterns in ecologically sensitive areas of Yunnan, and to reveal the ecological security barrier function of ecosystems in maintaining regional ecological health and water quality in watersheds; to elucidate the key ecological processes of different communities and ecological structures on pollution and degraded environment restoration, and the optimal mechanism of biodiversity maintenance and economic production in farmland ecosystems; to explore the integrated theory and methods of using biodiversity to control pests and diseases, efficiently utilize water and fertilizer resources, and prevent and control farmland surface pollution, and to build a system for sustainable agricultural development in Yunnan.
Staff and Platform Conditions
The laboratory has 86 permanent staff, including one academician of Chinese Academy of Sciences (double-appointed), one academician of Chinese Academy of Engineering, five Jieqing, four national hundred million talents, one national young top talent, two He Liang He Li Award winners, two national "973" chief scientists, more than 80% have doctoral degrees and senior titles. The laboratory has one innovation team of Ministry of Science and Technology, one innovation team of Ministry of Education and four provincial innovation teams.
The laboratory has 12,000 square meters of research space, and has built up basic conditions platforms such as characteristic bio- resources, lead compounds, functional genomes, agricultural biodiversity, pollution ecology and ecotoxicology, etc. The total value of equipment reaches more than 80 million RMB.
In the past 5 years, the laboratory has undertaken 3 Projects supported by the State Key Development Program for Basic Research of China (973), 2 national science and technology major projects, 1 outstanding youth fund, 3 projects supported by the Major Research plan of the National Natural Science Fundation of China, 1 national fund NSFC-Yunnan joint key 9,the total contract funding of the projects under research is 463 million yuan, 612 papers have been published in Nature Genetics, Nature Communications, PNAS and other international high-level journals, more than 80 invention patents have been authorized, 10 monographs have been published.The lab has received 26 awards, including the Second Prize of National Science and Technology Progress and the Special Prize of Yunnan Provincial Science and Technology Progress.
Lab website: http://www.cub.ynu.edu.cn/
