Recently, The Molecular Ecology Prize Committee has announced the 2021 recipient of the award. Prof. WEI Fuwen from Institute of Zoology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, won the 2021 Molecular Ecology Prize. This is the first time that Chinese scientist win this prize.
Prof. WEI, member of Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS) and doctoral supervisor of University of Chinese Academy of Sciences (UCAS), has long been engaged in research on animal ecology and conservation biology of endangered animals, focusing mainly on giant pandas and red pandas. He applied genetic and genomic techniques to deeply analyze the past, present and future of giant panda evolution, reconstructed its evolutionary history, and revealed giant panda’s adaptive mechanism to its specialized bamboo diet. Based on the research results, he proposed scientific protection strategies including the reintroduction of giant pandas and the construction of corridors, which were reviewed as "Hope for Wild Pandas" by the journal Science. With the achievements he has got, he won the second prize of the National Natural Science Award, the Outstanding Scientific and Technological Achievement Prize of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, and the Lifetime Achievement Award for Giant Panda Research and Conservation. Prof. WEI has also trained numerous students and postdocs, actively take part in the international cooperation of zoologists and conservation biologists, and promoted the development of Molecular Ecology.
Founded by the internationally renowned journal Molecular Ecology in 2005, Molecular Ecology Prize awards one scientist every year for their outstanding contributions to Molecular Ecology. The scientists previously won the prize include: Godfrey Hewitt, John Avise, Pierre Taberlet, Harry Smith, Terry Burke, Josephine Pemberton, Deborah Charlesworth, Craig Moritz, Laurent Excoffier, Johanna Schmitt, Fred Allendorf, Louis Bernatchez, Nancy Moran, Robin Waples, Scott Edwards, and Victoria Sork.
Read more: The 2021 Molecular Ecology Prize goes to Fuwen Wei, for pioneering panda genomics
Translator: GAO Yuan
Editor: GAO Yuan
