Progress of collection, conservation and innovative utilization of pear resources in the National Pear and Apple Germplasm Repository (Xingcheng)

Pear belongs to the Rosaceae family, Pomaceae subfamily, Pyrus genus, and is cultivated all over the world. China has a long history of pear cultivation. It is generally believed that Pyrus originated in the mountainous areas of western or southwestern China during the Tertiary period, evolving and developing from east to west. The Pyrus plants are mainly distributed in Europe, North Africa, Asia Minor, Iran, Central Asia, China, Korea and Japan. In terms of geographical boundaries, the Pyrus plants distributing to the east of Tianshan and Xingdu Kush Mountains are called Oriental pears, while those to the west are called Occident pears. With the change of geographical environment, Pyrus plants gradually evolved into two major pear families and formed three secondary centers: China center, Central Asia center and Near East center. The scientific classification of Pyrus germplasm is of great significance for the collection, preservation, identification, evaluation and shared utilization of Pyrus germplasm resources. China has abundant and diverse Pyrus germplasm resources, which provide important material guarantees for pear breeding and pear industry development. The National Pear and Apple Germplasm Repository (Xingcheng) is one of the earliest established national fruit tree resource preservation repository in China, with the total collection and preservation of over 1600 Pyrus germplasm accessions. It has provided a large amount of resources for pear research, production and popular science education in China, and has played an important role in talent training, rural revitalization and pear industry development. During the past 20 years, with the increase and stable support of scientific research funding, pear researchers in China have carried out a large amount of research work on pear germplasm resources phenotype identification, resistance identification, fruit traits evaluation, functional component identification, molecular marker evaluation, transcriptome, genomics research and so on. Over the past 20 years, we have formulated 4 agricultural industry standards and 1 local standard related to pear germplasm resources evaluation, published 6 books on pear, published over 100 academic papers both domestically and internationally, acquired 13 national invention patents granted, obtained 5 software copyrights, and registered 22 hybrid pear varieties. Since the establishment of China Agriculture Research System of pear industry in 2009, the supply and utilization of pear germplasm resources have significantly increased, effectively supporting the implementation of scientific research projects and talent training. This article briefly introduces the development process and preservation status of the National Pear and Apple Germplasm Repository (Xingcheng), focusing on the excellent pear germplasm resources, phenotype evaluation, phylogenetic analysis, fruit traits evaluation, resistance evaluation and genome. It summarizes the relevant scientific research progress on the utilization of pear germplasm resources and the scientific researches in the National Pear and Apple Germplasm Repository (Xingcheng) during the past 20 years, and reviews the technical supports for industrial development, and looks to future research directions, in order to provide reference information for the effective utilization of pear germplasm resources and industrial development in the future.