In open filed cultivation, the average growth period of rice is around 120 days. The long growth period severely restricts the efficiency of rice breeding. Through collaboration with the research team of Academician Qian Qian from the China National Rice Research Institute （CNRRI）, the Innovation Research Team of Plant Factory from the Institute of Urban Agriculture, Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences (IUA, CAAS), has made a  breakthrough in rice rapid harvest in 60 days and halved the growth period. This technique provides an efficient solution in solving the issue of long crop breeding cycle and low efficiency.

The rice rapid breeding experiment was carried out in a plant factory with intelligent LED lighting which is located in IUA, Chengdu, Sichuan province. Six dwarf rice varieties obtained from CNRRI were used to conduct a rapid breeding experiment. In this plant factory, the day and night temperature, CO2 level, and nutrition elements of the nutrition solution were precisely controlled. After three independent round experiments, two of the six dwarf varieties were harvested in around 63 days, nearly half of the 120-day normal average growth period. The average yield was calculated as 9.78 metric tons per hectare. This technology breaks the bottleneck of only two or three generations of rice breeding to achieve breed 5-6 generations every year. This technology not only provides an efficient method of crop breeding, but expands the application flied of plant factory.

This achievement has been exhibited in National Scientific and Technological Innovation Achievement Expo and received extensive attention from the national leaders and the public.

This research team has also established an agricultural demonstration park in Romania and a smart farm base in the United Kingdom to further develop the technique.

By Bian Zhonghua (bianzhonghua@caas.cn)