Qifa Zhang
Huazhong Agricultural University
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Primary Section: 62, Plant, Soil, and Microbial Sciences Secondary Section: 26, Genetics Membership Type:
International Member
(elected 2007)
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Biosketch
Qifa Zhang is a Professor in the College of Life Science and Technology at Huazhong Agricultural University, Wuhan, China. Dr. Zhang is a plant geneticist recognized for his work on rice functional genomics, the biological basis for the utilization of heterosis in rice including the genes and regulation of photoperiod sensitive male sterility and intersubspecific hybrid sterility, and the genetic basis of heterosis of hybrid rice. He also proposed the notion of Green Super Rice and led the team in developing rice varieties requiring less fertilizers, pesticides and water with high yield and quality by using genomic technologies. Dr. Zhang was born in Gongan County, Hubei Province. He graduated from Huazhong Agricultural College in agronomy and from University of California Davis in 1985 with a PhD in genetics, where he also worked as a postdoctoral fellow. He joined the faculty in Huazhong Agricultural University in 1986. He served as the Dean of the College of Life Science and Technology and the Director of the National Key Laboratory of Crop Genetic Improvement. He has been the Director of Hubei Hongshan Laboratory. He is an academician of the Chinese Academy of Sciences and a foreign associate of the National Academy of Sciences, USA.
Research Interests
Qifa Zhang’s laboratory is interested in rice functional genomics and genomic breeding of Green Super Rice (a new class of rice varieties that Dr. Zhang proposed for the development of resource saving and environment-friendly agriculture requiring less pesticides, fertilizers and water to achieve high yield and superior quality). The research activities in his lab in the past three decades include functional characterization of genes for agronomically important traits, and understanding the genomic basis for utilization of heterosis for hybrid rice improvement. His work unraveled a number of key genes and the molecular mechanisms regulating yield heterosis, male sterility, and inter-subspecific hybrid sterility. His group also formulated the concept of genomic breeding and built the related technologies, and developed GSR varieties using genomic breeding technologies.
