In 2016, at the European Evo-Devo conference in Uppsala, some researchers from east Asia had an informal discussion about the idea to organize a biennial international evolutionary research conference located in Asia. The purpose of this conference was 1) to offer a platform for evolutionary researchers in Asian countries to present and discuss their work in the widest possible context, 2) to facilitate international collaboration on the cross-disciplinary research and education on evolutionary biology in Asia and beyond, 3) to enhance education of evolutionary thinking across the Asian countries, 4) to attract more talented students to join the field of evolutionary study. After the small discussion in Uppsala, the proposal was quickly spread out and received broad support from colleagues in Asia and the rest of the world. Particularly, China National Genebank, Center for Excellence in Animal Evolution and Genetics at Chinese Academy of Sciences, Society of Evolutionary Studies and Association for Propagation of the Knowledge of Genetics in Japan have provided generous support to the first AsiaEvo conference which was successfully organized in Shenzhen in 2018. During the meeting, we discussed that the second conference would be organized in Japan under the leadership of Professor Koichiro Tamura at Tokyo Metropolitan University. Encouraged by the success of the previous conference and the continuous and enthusiastic support from the colleagues from world-wide, we truly believe the evolutionary biology will have a bright future in Asia.

Guojie Zhang (Chair of the First AsiaEvo Conference)