China unveiled its first digital platform dedicated to tropical biodiversity on International Biodiversity Day on Thursday, offering global access to over 90,000 verified species records. The "Xishuangbanna biodiversity platform," developed by the Chinese Academy of Sciences' Xishuangbanna Tropical Botanical Garden, is now globally accessible. The platform showcases the region's rich ecological heritage.
The Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS) unveiled the 2025 catalogue of biological species in China on Thursday, documenting a total of 162,717 species and infraspecies, including dragonflies and earthworms for the first time. "Biodiversity is the foundation of sustainable development, and a species catalogue reflects the richness of a country or region's biological resources," said Ma Keping, deputy director and secretary-general of the Biodiversity Committee of the CAS.
Nearly 400 orchid species are on display at an exhibition that opened April 19 at Kunming Botanical Garden in southwest China's Yunnan Province. The exhibition, the second of its kind, is housed in the garden's orchid pavilion, which is operated by the Kunming Institute of Botany under the Chinese Academy of Sciences.
Luo Shixiao, curator of the SCBG herbarium, said through an independently developed intelligent specimen management system, named Cathaya, the herbarium in 2024 completed the reception of over 50,000 plant specimens and uploaded 300,000 pieces of spatiotemporal distribution information concerning the collected specimens. This system has enabled efficient management of the entire process from field investigation to digital sharing of specimens -- setting a new paradigm for biodiversity research and intelligent management.
A research team has discovered a new lichen genus on the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau, which is known as the "roof of the world." The genus has been named Pseudosolorina, according to the Kunming Institute of Botany, Chinese Academy of Sciences.
A new lizard species has been discovered in Chengdu, the capital of southwest China's Sichuan Province, according to the Chengdu Nature Reserve and Wildlife Protection Center. Named Scincella chengduensis sp. nov., the species belongs to the genus Scincella. The newly identified species has a slender, medium-sized body, with a snout-vent length ranging from 28.4 to 43.2 mm.
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