Lixia Zhou is an Associate Research Fellow at the Hainan Key Laboratory of Tropical Oil Crops Biology, Coconut Research Institute, Chinese Academy of Tropical Agricultural Sciences, Wenchang, China. She earned, a Master of Science in Biochemistry and Molecular Biology from Hunan University in 2011. From 2011 to 2012, she was a Research Intern at the BGI Genomics Institute, Shenzhen. From 2012 to 2021, she was an Assistant Research Fellow at the Coconut Research Institute. Her research focuses on molecular breeding of tropical oilseed crops. She developed molecular markers for cold resistance in oil palm and created new cold-resistant oil palm germplasm, providing materials and technical support for breeding groundbreaking new oil palm varieties adapted to the country’s climate.