Eco-regions In China Research Articles

Genetic diversity and peculiarity of annual wild soybean (G. soja Sieb. et Zucc.) from various eco-regions in China

Annual wild soybean (Glycine soja Sieb. et Zucc.) is believed to be a potential gene source for future soybean improvement in coping with the world climate change for food security. To evaluate the wild soybean genetic diversity and differentiation, we analyzed allelic profiles at 60 simple-sequence repeat (SSR) loci and variation of eight morph-biological traits of a representative sample with 196 accessions from the natural growing area in China. For comparison, a representative sample with 200 landraces of Chinese cultivated soybean was included in this study. The SSR loci produced 1,067 alleles (17.8 per locus) with a mean gene diversity of 0.857 in the wild sample, which indicated the genetic diversity of G. soja was much higher than that of its cultivated counterpart (total 826 alleles, 13.7 per locus, mean gene diversity 0.727). After domestication, the genetic diversity of the cultigens decreased, with its 65.5% alleles inherited from the wild soybean, while 34.5% alleles newly emerged. AMOVA analysis showed that significant variance did exist among Northeast China, Huang-Huai-Hai Valleys and Southern China subpopulations. UPGMA cluster analysis indicated very significant association between the geographic grouping and genetic clustering, which demonstrated the geographic differentiation of the wild population had its relevant genetic bases. In comparison with the other two subpopulations, the Southern China subpopulation showed the highest allelic richness, diversity index and largest number of specific-present alleles, which suggests Southern China should be the major center of diversity for annual wild soybean.

Erratum to: Classification and characteristic of maturity groups of Chinese landraces of soybean [Glycine max (L.) Merr.

To link Chinese soybean classification with the world soybean maturity group system suggested by American researchers, 264 soybean landraces from China and 48 varieties of 13 soybean maturity groups from the United States (US) were tested under the natural and extended day-length at Nanjing, China. Based on comparing Chinese with the US soybeans in days to maturity, Chinese soybean landraces were classified into maturity group (MG) 000, 00, 0, I, II,..., IX, which only MG X might not exist in China. Chinese soybean landraces in each of MG 0, I, II and III revealed large variation in days to flowering and were almost grown in all eco-regions in China. These four maturity groups were further divided into eight sub-groups according to the variation in days to flowering and geographical distribution of soybeans of the same maturity group. The geographic distribution of soybean maturity groups in China was also presented in this paper. This study should be significant for soybean researchers in the world to understand the whole feature of Chinese soybean landraces germplasm.

Global 200: an approach to setting large_scale biodiversity conservation priorities

Conservationists are far from able to protect all species under threat for lack of available resources and funding. This places a premium on setting priorities. Global 200, posed by the World Wildlife Fund, one of the approaches to setting large_scale biodiversity conservation priorities, frames a list of ecoregions to establish global conservation priorities. In this paper, we introduced method, and then evaluated limitations of the Global 200, emphasized the ecoregions in China involved in the Global 200, and compared their coincidence to current critical regions in China.