Located in the north suburb Heilongtan scenic area of Kunming, Yunnan, the famous “Spring City”, Kunming Institute of Botany (KIB), CAS is originally the Yunnan Provincial Institute Agricultural and Forestry Botany that was founded in 1938, and is renamed the present title in 1958. Adhering to the tenet of “trace the origins of mountains and rivers, exhaustively name all of the plants and trees”, KIB dedicates to identifying and utilizing plants so as to benefit human. Present Director General of KIB is Dr. Li Dezhu and China’s botanists of older generations such as Hu Xianxiao, Yan Chujiang, Wang Fazan, Yu Dejun, Cai Xitao, Chen Fenghuai, Wu Zhengyi, Zhou Jun, Sun Handong and Xu Zaifu, etc. once worked at KIB as a leader. The nation and Party top leaders including, Zhou Enlai, Zhu De, Deng Xiaoping, Li Xiannian and Hu Jintao ever inspected and visited KIB, giving suggestions and advice for development. Through the first and second phase Knowledge Innovation Program of CAS, KIB appropriately optimized and integrated its research subjects and identified scientific research goals in accordance with national and regional strategic needs and scientific frontiers, creating a strategic system of “two laboratories, one garden and one germplasm bank". Relying on multidisciplinary research contents, KIB has achieved a bunch of breakthroughs in health medical care, plant resources conservation and sustainable utilization, especially the registration of the new anti-HIV/AIDS drug, SH Capsule in Thailand, resulting in remarkable international impacts. Steady progresses have been made for the State Key Science and Technology Project, “Southwest China Wild Species Germplasm Bank” and significant improvements made for international cooperation. Work of scientific knowledge dissemination, informatization and creative culture building proceed continually and environments at KIB have become more beautiful. KIB has a total of 436 staff members. Among them there are 256 retired employees, 102 scientific researchers and technicians, including 3 CAS academicians, 41 professors, 58 associate professors and senior technicians, among which are six winners of National Outstanding Youth Foundation, more than 60 research staffs holding the job title of associate professor or higher. The average age of scientific research staffs is 38.5 and professor researchers under the age of 45 account for 82% of the total. For the senior researchers, 85% of the total has the experience of studying and/or living outside China ranging from one to six years. In addition, KIB owns 36 PhD supervisors, 135 PhD candidates, including 4 foreign students, 60 master supervisors and 139 master’s degree candidates, 11 postdoctoral fellows and 5 visiting researchers. KIB occupies an area of 1018 mu with construction area exceeding 50,000 square meters and owns a great many large and middle-scale apparatuses such as 400 MHz and 500 MHz superconduct nuclear magnetic resonance spectrometer, high-resolution mass spectroscope, ultracentrifuge and confocal scanning laser microscopy, etc. The herbarium (KUN) of KIB collects over 1.2 million plant specimens and the library conserves 270,000 volume books. In addition, the newly built library, Huali Building, Logistics Center Building, Culture Plaza and two newly-decorated graduate student apartment buildings provide the institute with scientific research platforms, technological supports and logistic services. Ever since 1999, KIB has presided over 250 scientific research projects, compiled more than 60 monographs, published over 1,500 scientific articles and received 60 awards of provincial and ministerial level or higher, obtained over 60 patents, with one new drug and 5 pesticides registered. Relying on the institute’s technology and transfer of scientific and technological achievements, the annual transfer value in 2005 amounted to RMB1.059 billion yuan with tax payment of RMB 102 million yuan (Yunnan only). Through exploring the channels of studying abroad by public expenses and international cooperation, KIB has sent scientific research personnel to over 20 overseas countries and regions for more than 400 person-times in terms of visit, study tour, continuing study and participating in conferences, etc. To date, KIB has established bilateral relations with more than 20 countries and regions including Japan, US, UK, Germany, France and Thailand, etc.
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