April 4th, the experts group of U.S. Monsanto Company composed by Dr. Bei Zhang responsible for high-yield biotechnology traits research, senior research fellow Dr. Shengzhi Pang and Dr. Yanwei Cao visited Institute of Subtropical Agriculture (ISA) for academic communication.

The experts visited the Centre of Crop Ecology in Environmental Stresses of ISA accompanied by Xinjie Xia, the director of this centre, and foreign expert Pedro Rocha. Then, an informal discussion was held on the stress-resistant functional genes and mechanism of super hybrid rice, and the latest research results.

The visiting experts praised the research facilities and the achievements in scientific research of the centre. They were interested in the high-yield, high-quality and wide range of abiotic stress resistance rice genes which obtained by applying gene chip technology in the centre. The U.S. Monsanto Company and the Centre of Crop Ecology in Environmental Stresses of ISA will cooperate in the patent of new functional genes and biotechnology research of stress-resistant crops such as rice.

It has been known that U.S. Monsanto Company is the largest agricultural biotechnology companies in the world. The company is currently the leading transgenic seed producer, occupying a wide range of seventy percent to one hundred percent of seed crops market share.(Apr. 5, 2009)