Top Chinese Scientist Yuan Longping Dies

Top Chinese Scientist Yuan Longping Dies
Yuan Longping (C) stands in a field of hybrid rice in Handan in northern China's Hebei Province, on Oct. 15, 2017. Chinatopix via AP
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Yuan Longping, a Chinese scientist who developed higher-yield rice varieties, died Saturday at a hospital in the southern city of Changsha, the Xinhua News agency reported. He was 91.

Yuan spent his life researching rice. In the 1970s, Yuan developed a hybrid strain of rice that recorded an annual yield 20 percent higher than existing varieties.