On April 23, 2015, Prof. Fu Xiangdong, member of Institute of Genetics and Developmental Biology, CAS and supervisor for PhD candidates, visited our School and gave a lecture in the framework of Advancedagriculture lecture series, followed by in-depth exchange of ideas with representatives of faculty and students.
The topic of Prof. Fu Xiangdong’s lecture is“Beyond the green revolution: new approaches for improving grain yield in rice”. In his presentation, Prof. Fu Xiangdong elaborated that nitrogen fertilization is essential to increase grain yield, whereas it also promotes stem and leaf elongation and makes crop plants more susceptible to lodging. It is well-known that Green Revolution is the introduction of semidwarfism into wheat and rice, which also improves the harvest index by the reduced plant height. However, the semidwarf (sd1) gene also causes the reduction of panicle branching and biomass in rice. Through genetic mapping, we identified a major QTL in rice , qDEP1, which encodes a plant specific G-protein γ-subunit and determines both panicle architecture and nitrogen growth responses. Different DEP1 alleles confer different nitrogen responses, and genetic diversity analysis suggests that DEP1 has been subjected to artificial selection during japonica rice domestication. Interestingly, dep1 plants are not only semidwarf but also have increased nitrogen-use efficiency. The DEP1 protein physically interacts with Gα (RGA1), and Gβ (RGB1) and reduced RGA1 or enhanced RGB1 activity represses nitrogen-mediated growth. Further, DEP1 could physically interact with transcriptional factors and regulate the expression of their down-stream genes. Modulation of the G-protein signalling thus represents an important strategy to simultaneously improve nitrogen-use efficiency and grain yield over what is currently achievable.
After the lecture, the audience actively interacted with Prof. Fu Xiangdong through discussions on the theme of the lecture.
Prof. Fu Xiangdong: Bachelor of Biology in Wuhan University, 1991; Master in Wuhan Institute of Botany, CAS, 1994; visiting scholar in John Innes Centre, UK, 1996-1997, joint PhD program of Zhejiang University and John Innes Centre, 2001, post-doctorate program in John Innes Centre, 2001-2005, listed among “Hundred Talents Program” of CAS in 2005 and appointed as Vice Director of State Key Laboratory of Plant Cell and Chromosome Engineering. Prof. Fu mainly focuses on the molecular mechanism of plant hormones regulating plant morphogenesis and did innovative work in Gibberellins（GA）signal transduction and molecular regulation mechanism of high-yield character of rice, with over 30 SCI papers published in Nature and Nature: Genetics among other key international journals. He received National Science Fund for Distinguished Young Scholars in 2005, special allowance of the State Council in 2009 and the 11th Young Science & Technology Award of China in 2010 and was listed among Young and Middle-Aged Pioneer Talents in Science and Technology Innovation, Innovative Talents Promotion Plan initiated b
