The status study of Biotechnology in East Azerbaijan Province

Biotechnology is one of the most important scientific strategies in today's world and involves application of various techniques in direct or indirect usage of living organisms or their byproducts in natural or modified forms for different fields. Significant advances of biotechnology in recent decades, especially after the acquisition of new methods of genetic engineering for gene isolation, their modification and transferring from one species to another have made biotechnology one of the most productive present and future technologies. Iran with a wide variety of climate and the variety of living organisms is the most suitable region for access to technologies derived from biological sources. It is evident that management and planning in biotechnology, as in all fields, requires a good understanding of the researchers in that field, In this study we attempted to identify researchers, institutes, universities and companies operating in various fields of biotechnology along with their research areas so as to identify strengths and weaknesses of biotechnology to help making targeted decision in the province and the country. The results of this study showed that more than 40% of the provincial biotechnological activities are related to agriculture, about 25% are related to animal science and 35% to other sectors. The main activities in the agricultural biotechnology are related to study of different growth conditions of plants. Study on medicinal plants, plant tissue culture and production of transformed plants are other activities in this section. Factors affecting the growth of livestock, animal health and livestock products are main activities related to animal biotechnology as well as cloning of useful genes and control of pathogenic microorganisms in microbial biotechnology. Review, treatment, and diagnosis of genetic diseases through biotechnology in the medical field and, finally, production of pharmaceutical products and the use of biotechnology in the food industry are also activities which are carried out by researchers in various fields of biotechnology in East Azerbaijan Province. Based on these results, activities related to environmental biotechnology and especially industrial biotechnology are under-represented in East Azerbaijan Province and serious attention should be paid to this section.