The third International Conference of Tropical Plants was held in Kunming from February 13-16. Its theme was “AI drives tropical plants to provide nutritionally health and friendly ecological home”.
Focusing on the genetic and functional diversity of tropical plants, especially research themes related to the biology of tropical crops, the conference invited leading experts in the field of tropical plants and crop biology to discuss the research on tropical plants in the era of artificial intelligence.
9 keynote speeches were delivered. 5 session themes included gene discovery and genetic breeding in tropical plants; metabolomics and nutritional health; smart agriculture and forestry and plant protection in tropics; multiomics, database and technological tools; ecological conservation of tropical rainforests. In total, 116 oral presentations were made at the conference.
Dr. Charles Cannon from Singapore Botanic Gardens presented the history and endangered status of large-scale evolution of tropical rainforest plants, proposing how to use multi-species genomes for species evolution research expectations.
Academician Huang Sanwen of the Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS) and President of the Chinese Academy of Tropical Agriculture reported online about the Plant System Network Plan (PLANet), suggesting that in the post-genomic era, planned genome sequencing should be conducted according to plant phylogenetic families, genera, and species, and an integrated information system of important crops should be constructed using multi-omics technologies.
Robert Henry, Academician of Australian Academy of Technology and Engineering, showcased his team's extensive genomic research results on important tropical economic crops and closely related wild plants, proposing new approaches for domesticating and utilizing wild plants.
The conference was co-sponsored by Hainan University and Yunnan Agricultural University, Yunnan Academy of Agricultural Sciences, Xishuangbanna Tropical Botanical Garden(XTBG) and State Key Laboratory of Biological Breeding of Tropical Crops, and co-organized by Maxium Academic Press and the journal Tropical Plants.
The conference effectively established a communication platform between scientific research and industrial development in the field of tropical plants, laying a solid foundation for promoting collaboration between domestic and international experts and resources in the tropical plant domain. The International Conference on Tropical Plants will be held annually in global tropical regions, bringing together outstanding scholars and enterprises to discuss the bottlenecks and opportunities for the future development of tropical plants, focusing on key technologies, and strengthening multifaceted cooperation.
third International Conference of Tropical Plants
Prof. Yang Yongping delivers a speech.
Participants pose a group photo.
