OPTICHINA

Breeding to Optimise Chinese Agriculture

 Partecipanti

Mappa

 Word cloud

Esplora la "nuvola delle parole (Word Cloud) per avere un'idea di massima del progetto.

 Obiettivo del progetto (Objective)

'OPTICHINA (Breeding to Optimise Chinese Agriculture) aims to link the crop breeding research activities carried out by European and Chinese researchers. This Co-ordination Action build on previous and ongoing collaborative research experience of European and Chinese partners collaborating in this consortium. To date there have not been specific actions devoted to coordination of breeding research activities for better crop adaptation to abiotic stresses. Despite this European and Chinese scientists have been collaborating in a number of EC-funded research projects from 5th and 6th FP, together with other projects from specific EU member States, aimed at breeding the major grain crops for improved adaptation to abiotic stresses. OPTICHINA will focus specifically on research requirements to breeding for improved adaptation to abiotic stresses and sustainability of major herbaceous crops in both China and Europe. This require an integrative approach linking diverse disciplines and scales.This Co-ordination Action will integrate Chinese and European scientists internationally recognized as experts in different areas around crop breeding and adaptation to major abiotic stresses and avenues to raise yield potential. Coordinators and partners of different International Cooperation European projects together with Chinese researchers with high ranking of bilateral collaboration between China and Europe will actively participate.

The specific aims of the OPTICHINA initiative are: To support networks of European agricultural scientists working with China. To develop an inventory of experimental resources and datasets. To ensure adoption of existing knowledge and technology and the implementation of best practices. To fund short training visits of Chinese researchers in other laboratories To build links between research scientists working in molecular, genetic, bioinformatics and physiological, environmental research and the end users of their science. To build up fut'

Introduzione (Teaser)

A recent project has stimulated collaboration and dissemination in crop breeding and agricultural science between Chinese and European crop scientists. It also involved exchanges and short visits of Chinese students in European research institutions participating in the project.

Descrizione progetto (Article)

Modern agriculture is threatened by growing demands for fresh food, decreased availability of land and looming climate change. Collaboration between national research and breeding programmes is essential for us to meet this challenge.

http://www.optichinagriculture.com (OPTICHINA) (Breeding to optimise Chinese agriculture) was an EU-funded Coordination Action project that built on previous and ongoing collaborative research efforts between China and the EU.

OPTICHINA focused specifically on research into breeding for stress resilience and sustainability of major crops. The specific aim was to support networks of European agricultural scientists working with China. The efforts will improve widespread adoption of existing knowledge and technologies.

Project work was divided into eight sections, including the organisation of workshops, a website, publications, training fellowships and advanced courses.

Chinese partners ran courses on molecular genetics, new breeding strategies, advanced statistics and bioinformatics. OPTICHINA also organised a number of workshops and conferences for both Chinese and European participants, mainly in China but also in Europe.

The project awarded 24 fellowships for research exchanges and visits. In some cases these led to formal collaborations and memorandums of understanding between Chinese and EU research institutions. Finally, OPTICHINA researchers published more than 20 academic papers during the project's lifetime. In Journal of Integrative Plant Biology, two special issues on 2012 and one special issue on 2014, and one special issue in The Crop Journal (2015).

OPTICHINA is expected to improve Euro-Chinese research relations in the long term. This will ensure that the challenges of modern crop science are addressed with a global perspective that integrates economic, political and societal dimensions.