History of Soybean Physiology and Botany Research (250 BCE to 2021)
William Shurtleff, Akiko AoyagiISBN: 978-1-948436-44-1
Publication Date: 2021 July 19
Number of References in Bibliography: 3014
Earliest Reference: 250 BCE
Click here to download the full text to open and read book 
Brief Chronology/Timeline of Soybean Physiology and Botany Research
250 BCE – The Hanfeizi (Book of Master Han Fei) states that a particular frost was not heavy enough to kill the soybean plants.
1082 CE – The Zhenglei Bencao [Reorganized Pharmacopoeia], by Tang Shenwei, gives the earliest known botanical description of a soybean plant.
1853 May – John Lea of Cincinnati, Ohio, speaking of the Japan Pea, states that it “flourishes under great heat and drought.” As far as we know, the Chinese had never reported this key observation.
1854 – A.H. Ernst of Cincinnati, Ohio, is the first to praise the Japan Pea (soybean) “for its hardihood to resist drought and frost, together with its enormous yield.”
1879 – Heinrich Attems, writing in German, reports that the soybean “accepts massive wetness (Hamburger Garten- und Blumenzeitung).
1920 March – The word “photoperiod” is first used in connection with soybeans by Garner & Allard of the U.S. Department of Agriculture. The flowering of soybean plants depends very largely on the number of hours of darkness they receive each day.”
1926 Jan. – The first issue of Plant Physiology is published. It is a peer-reviewed, scientific journal that is readily available from home computers. To search its entire archive/contents for soybean(s) go to: academic.oup.com/plphys
Click Issues > Search icon > Advanced search > Modify your search. Type in “soybean” Filter: Title > Update: Click. Sort by: oldest first. We got 1339 records from April 1928. Part II: Use Google Scholar to find the entire record. We added Address of authors, References cited, and the same limited abstract used by Google Scholar. We stopped adding records in Oct. 1976; there were just too many.
1939 May – Growth regulators or floral hormones are first discussed by Obsil.
1943 Dec. – The term “maturity groups” is first used by Mulvey of Indiana.
1951 – Parker and Borthwick, plant physiologists, are the first report the discovery of a soybean that is “day-neutral” or photoperiod insensitive. This greatly expands the area, worldwide, where soybeans can be grown.
1972 Sept. – Criswell and Hume of Guelph, Ontario, Canada, have conducted to experiments to identify soybean varieties "that were nonsensitive to photoperiod for possible use as parental lines in a breeding program.” They reported finding numerous varieties that were “unaffected by photoperiod.”
1972 Nov. – D.E. Polson, Univ. of Minnesota, writes an article titled “Day Neutrality in Soybeans.”
1974 Nov. – Shanmugasundaram et al. write an article titled “Photoperiod Insensitivity in Soybeans.”
1979 March – Inouye at al. refer to “photo-insensitive soybean varieties.”
1993 – The term “long juvenile trait” is first used as a synonym for photo-insensitive or day-neutral – by Neumaier and James. In June 1995 Carlos Spehar refers to it as the “long-juvenile character.” And in 2001 Destro et al. in Brazil refer to it as the “long juvenile period” (LJP).