Grade: The second prize
Winners: Chen Fadi, Fang Weiming, Chen Sumei, Guan Zhiyong, Teng Nianjun, and Yao Jianjun
  Chrysanthemum originated in China and is one of the ten major traditional and famous flowers in the country and one of the four major cut flowers in the world, and is therefore of great ornamental and economic values. At the beginning of the present program, the major chrysanthemum varieties cultivated in China were mainly imported from overseas. These varieties are low in resistance to aphid and cold, and subject to degeneration, which forms a bottleneck in development of the chrysanthemum in the country. The researchers of this program have spent 26 year on research for solutions to this issue. Responding to lack of elite germplasms of chrysanthemum with strong resistance to aphid and cold, they have given priority to innovation in germplasms of the plant and breeding new and peculiar chrysanthemum varieties of fine quality and strong stress and disease resistance, exploited elite and resistant germplasms of related species of chrysanthemum, developed a new technological system of intergeneric distant hybridization and transgenic breeding, created new elite germplasms and cultivated new and peculiar chrysanthemum varieties of fine quality and strong resistance, and formulated a technological system of efficient breeding of virus-free seedlings, so that new chrysanthemum varieties could be widely extended in growth. The inventions made in this program are as follows:
  (1) Identification of 78 copies of elite germplasms of related species of chrysanthemum with resistance to aphid and cold. The researchers of the program have collected and stored 5109 copies of plants of chrysanthemum and its related species, the largest storage in China; first created the storing technology of slow in vitro growth of chrysanthemum with a storage time as long as 12 months, solving the problems of likely mixture, loss and disease contraction in soil preservation; established an evaluation system for the resistance of chrysanthemum to aphid and cold and so on, identifying 19 copies of aphid-resistant germplasms, 16 copies of cold-resistant ones and 43 copies of germplasms resistant to other stresses or diseases; found for the first time that Gold mugwort and Ajania przewalskii are the optimal genetic resources for breeding aphid-resistant and col-resistant chrysanthemum varieties, respectively.
  (2) Establishment of a technical platform of transgenic breeding based on the method of whole plant inoculation and transformation, realizing directed improvement of important resistances of chrysanthemum to aphid and sold and so on. The researchers have identified 16 elite and aphid and cold resistant germplasms of chrysanthemum from the kore germplasms in resistance breeding; built an efficient genetic transformation system of 65 copies of transgenic germplasms, such as those of aphid-resistant WRKY48, ICE1, and so on, so that improvement in important resistances can be directed to aphid, cold and so on.
   (3) Creation of a technological system of breeding chrysanthemum by integrating distant hybridization and molecular breeding, resulting in a series of new and special varieties of fine quality and strong resistance. The researchers have illustrated that the major reason for the obstacle to distant hybridization of chrysanthemum is its hybrid embryo abortion caused by programmed cell death, and developed an assistant selective technique by molecular marking of important characters. They have created 254 types of hybrid chrysanthemum with resistance to aphid and cold; obtained for the first time six intergeneric resistant hybrids of chrysanthemum with Gold mugwort, Crossostephium chinense, Tanacetum vulgare and Opisthopappus taihangensis, and new germplasms polymerized with three genera and four species; made breakthroughs in comprehensive improvement of chrysanthemum characters of resistance, flower color and type, plant type, and so on,  being the first in successful breeding of 49 new and special varieties which are of fine quality, strong resistance and are in green color, ping-pong and wind-mill types, with the number of the new varieties accounting for 30% of all the commercialized varieties in China.
  (4) Creation of multiple detections of chrysanthemum viruses and formulation of a technological system of efficient breeding of fine-quality and virus-free seedlings. The research team is the first in creating a multiple RT-PCR technology for detecting viruses in chrysanthemum. They have developed a technique of detoxification, purification and rejuvenation of chrysanthemum by a combination of secondary stem tip culture, heat treatment and virazole, solving the problem of degeneration of the plant; and established a technological system of producing fine-quality and virus-free chrysanthemum seedlings taking virus-free female parents as the breeder seeds, and realized specialized and large-scale seedling production with an export of 100 million plants.
  By now, the research team has been issued 28 patents and 48 variety rights with one registered in Japan, has formulated seven provincial-level regional standards, has published 199 research articles including 87 in SCI journals, has won two provincial and ministerial first prizes and one grand industry prize for their research on chrysanthemum breeding and extension of their technologies. Their research results have contributed to increase in production value by 2.76 billion RMB and in profit by 1.02 billion RMB, which is of great significance in construction of beautiful countryside, development of rural leisure tourism, precision of poverty alleviation, as well as leading the development of chrysanthemum industry by enhancing chrysanthemum breeding and cultivation in China.