Origin and Evolution of the Chinese Cultivated Rice

Four main hypotheses for the origin of Chinese cultivated rice are summarized and discussed in present paper.There are South China origin,Yunnan origin,middle and lower Yangtze River area origin and middle Yangtze River and upper Huai River area origin,respectively.At present,no hypothesis completely accords with the four conditions as the rice origin region.Some scholars also suggest the multi-regional origin of the cultivated rice;The recent progresses in the study of differentiation of Indica and Japonica are illustrated in view of molecular biology.The single domestication and the double domestication hypotheses are outlined and the latter hypothesis is accepted widely;Some approaches including ancient DNA,the relationship between shattering and domestication,morphological analysis of phytoliths are introduced for the further research of origin and evolution of rice.