USDA-ARS Scientist Visits OCRI-CAAS

A senior research geneticist, Dr. Mingli Wang, from Plant Genetic Resources Conservation Unit of USDA-ARS, Griffin, USA, visited the Oil Crops Research Institute (OCRI) of CAAS, during 15-16th October, 2014 in Wuhan, Hubei Province. In his staying in Wuhan, Dr Wang visited the laboratories of sesame, peanut, quality testing, genebank, wild Arachis nursery and discussed various issues with OCRI scientists working on sesame and peanut improvement.

During his visit, Dr. Wang made a presentation of research progress on genetic analysis of peanut and sesame germplasm with emphasis on quality profiling and development of detecting techniques for quality attributes, in a seminar attended by OCRI staff. He introduced the conservation of peanut and sesame germplasm in his research station at Griffin and intensive analysis for peanut mini core collection, as well as his promising progress on producing high oleic acid sesame mutants.

Professor Boshou Liao, the Deputy Director of OCRI, presented the overview of peanut industry and research progress in China in the seminar. In the general discussion, the OCRI peanut scientists showed much interest in quality characterization of edible peanuts in the USA, for which, further cooperation would be initiated. Dr. Wang also discussed with Prof. Xiurong Zhang and the sesame team about cooperation on sesame germplasm exchange, quality characterization, high oleic acid sesame breeding, and sesame functional genomics research in the future.