Dear Friends & Colleagues,

Rabbits have been long used for many fields in human bioscience and agriculture. As an animal model, rabbits have made a great contribution to antibody production and understanding human disease and development of therapeutics. Therefore, it is essential for researchers to grasp both basic and modern knowledge about this species. The first transgenic rabbits were produced by microinjection in 1980, whereas knock-out rabbits now have emerged as another important model since 2011 due to the appearance of ZFN, TALEN and CRISPR-Cas9 technology. In 2014 and 2016, two groups have successfully completed genomic analysis of rabbits (European rabbits, New Zealand white rabbits, Japanese white rabbits, and Watanabe heritable hyperlipidemic rabbits) along with RNA sequencing of many organs with metabolic disorders and atherosclerosis.

The International Congress on Rabbit Biotechnology was first held in University of Tsukuba, Japan in 2005 aiming to enhance the use of transgenic rabbits for medical research. After that, this meeting was organized every two years in Jouy en Josas (France), Xi’an (China), Budapest (Hungary), Shanghai (China), and Lyon (France). This is an interdisciplinary meeting because we exchange all information on rabbit research among industry and academia.

This year, we planned to have this meeting held in Yamanashi, the most beautiful and famous place in Japan for the Mt. Fuji (the world heritage in 2014). Therefore, at this meeting, you can learn not only state of the art information on rabbit research but also enjoy visiting the Mt. Fuji. Yamanashi is also famous for sweet fruits and delicious wine in addition to Japanese historic sites. We welcome all of you to attend this compact and informative meeting in Yamanashi and spend a wonderful time in Japan.

Jianglin Fan
University of Yamanashi
Congress Chair
Organizing Committee