Over the past decade, China has witnessed remarkable advances in pan-genome research of major cereal, fiber, and oil crops, including rice, wheat, maize, soybean, cotton, rapeseed, and peanut. Researchers have systematically constructed high-quality pan-genomes for representative cultivated varieties and their wild relatives of these key crops. Genome resequencing, single-nucleotide polymorphism (SNP) chips, and structural variation (SV) chips have been widely deployed to dissect crop genetic diversity, decipher cultivar evolutionary trajectories, and clarify the molecular mechanisms underlying interspecific hybrid sterility via precision gene mapping and functional cloning. Driven by continuous innovative outputs, China has ranked first globally in the volume of relevant academic publications in crop genomic research.
In staple crops including rice, maize, and wheat, Chinese research teams have conducted systematic studies on ideal plant architecture. Representative breakthroughs include the genetic dissection of spring-to-winter growth habit transition and the unfavorable linkage effects of elite genes in wheat, as well as the molecular basis of maize cold tolerance that underpins the northward expansion of maize cultivation from tropical regions to subtropical, temperate, and even cold climatic zones. Pioneering progress has also been achieved in dissecting nutritional and quality-related traits, such as iron and zinc absorption and utilization efficiency, grain protein accumulation, and maize grain dehydration characteristics. These foundational advances provide robust theoretical and technical support for the subsequent genetic improvement of crop yield and nutritional quality. In terms of crop cultivation and production management, extensive studies have focused on improving nitrogen and phosphorus use efficiency, aiming to reduce agricultural input costs and sustain agroecological balance. For fiber and oil crops such as cotton and rapeseed, researchers have systematically elucidated the genetic architecture of polyploid genome domestication, as well as the molecular mechanisms governing fiber quality and edible oil quality formation. Furthermore, China has developed breeding chips, established a one-station artifical intelligence (AI)-driven breeding platform, and constructed an intelligent and efficient genomic design breeding system.
China is a critical center of origin and domestication for multiple staple and minor crops, including rice, soybean, foxtail millet, broomcorn millet, and buckwheat. Investigations into the geographic distribution and genetic diversity of traditional landraces, together with the tracing of crop origin and evolutionary processes, provide essential insights for de novo domestication of new crops. Evolutionary studies on rice and soybean have proposed a core domestication model, in which early cultivated crops repeatedly hybridized with wild or semi-wild progenitors, followed by artificial re-domestication of hybrid progenies to generate improved cultivars. Preliminary evidence supports the universality of this evolutionary model in wheat domestication as well. Relevant research has further confirmed that China’s Yellow River Basin serves as a primary domestication center for foxtail millet and broomcorn millet. In addition, systematic studies on Qinghai-Tibet Plateau-originated buckwheat have uncovered the molecular mechanisms of cold and UV-B tolerance in wild buckwheat. A specific genomic fragment deletion was verified to be closely associated with the reduced stress adaptability of cultivated buckwheat, providing a valuable research paradigm for the domestication and genetic improvement of minor crops. Collectively, these innovative achievements have firmly established China’s leading position in global crop fundamental research.
Benefiting from its complex and diverse agro-ecological conditions, China has also made outstanding progress in exploring crop resistance against biotic and abiotic stresses, including disease, drought, and cold stress. Notably, China takes a global lead in the identification and functional utilization of resistance genes against major crop diseases, including wheat Fusarium head blight, maize stalk rot, rice blast and bacterial blight, rapeseed clubroot, and peanut bacterial wilt. In response to increasing climate warming challenges to global crop production, Chinese researchers have also made pioneering progress in dissecting the molecular regulatory networks of heat tolerance in rice, wheat, and other staple crops.
As a populous country with 1.4 billion people, ensuring stable self-sufficiency of grain and edible oil is the fundamental guarantee for national food security and social stability. Over the past decade, the yield of rice, wheat, maize, peanut, and other major crops have achieved a steady and substantial increase. China has maintained a high self-sufficiency rate for rice and wheat, the two core staple grains. Supported by intelligent agricultural equipment such as artificial intelligence systems and unmanned aerial vehicles, modern crop production capacity and field management efficiency have been significantly improved.
The year 2026 marks the start of the China’s 15th Five-Year Plan (2026–2030), as well as the 25th anniversary of the Journal of Integrative Agriculture (JIA). To celebrate this important milestone, the Crop Science Section of the JIA Editorial Board has launched a special focus comprising eight review articles. This special focus systematically summarizes the landmark progress of China’s crop sciences and production research over the past decade, and prospectively outlines key research priorities and emerging developmental trends for the next decade (Fang et al. 2026; Hao et al. 2026; Ming et al.
2026; Sun et al. 2026; Tao et al. 2026; Wang et al. 2026; Xu et al. 2026; Zhao et al. 2026). It aims to comprehensively present the frontiers and applied-basic advances in China’s crop-science research to scientists across the globe, while serving as authoritative references for postgraduate education, scientific research, and talent development at agricultural universities and research institutions. We would like to express our sincere gratitude to all authors who contributed to the preparation of these review articles, as well as to the peer reviewers for their valuable comments and suggestions. We regret that we could not include all relevant publications owing to space constraints.
