LAUSR

This thematic issue of BMC Plant Biology continues the series of BioMed Central special post-conference issues presenting materials from the conferences on bioinformatics and systems biology collectively known as BGRS\SB (Bioinformatics of Genome Regulation and Structure\Systems Biology) held in Novosibirsk. It contains the papers discussed at the international conference “Belyaev Readings 2017” (BR-2017) (http://conf.bionet.nsc.ru/belyaev100/ en) and Young Scientists School “Systems Biology and Bioinformatics 2017” (SBB-2017) (http://conf.bionet.nsc.ru/sbb2017/en/). The year 2017 marks the 100-th anniversary since birth of Full Member of the USSR Academy of Sciences, Professor Dmitry K. Belyaev (1917–1985), an outstanding scientist, evolutionist and geneticist. In view of this memorable date, the Institute of Cytology and Genetics of the Siberian Branch of the Russian Academy of Sciences (ICG SB RAS) held the international Belyaev Conference on Genetics and Evolution (Novosibirsk, August 7-10, 2017). The memorial Belyaev conference-2017 continued traditions of BGRS\SB and PlantGen conference series comprising several science sections including Plant Biology. Over the last two decades, since 1998, the BGRS/SB series gained a reputation as a prime meeting venue in Russia for biologists, computer scientists, mathematicians and biochemists working in the interdisciplinary systems biology field, now focusing more on computational plant biology. The section on Plant Biology at Belyaev Conference-2017 was dedicated to genomic and post-genomic approaches to analysis of the organization of the plant genomes, the development of sequencing and genotyping applications for plants, with special emphasis to important crop cultivars. Plant-Gen-2017 event in Almaty, Kazakhstan (http://primerdigital.com/PlantGen2017/en/) gathered both the international scientists and the Committee members of Plant Biology section of the Belyaev Conference-2017 from Novosibirsk, thus joining the research efforts two largest post-Soviet countries and ensuring the exchange of expertise in plant genetics. BMC Plant Biology published special thematic issue presenting materials of PlantGen2017 event (https://bmcplantbiol.biomedcentral.com/articles/supplements/volume-17-supplement-1). Previously published special issues of BMC Plant Biology and BMC Evol Biol covered the proceeding of BGRS\SB-2016 conference and SBB-2015 School in Novosibirsk [1–4] as well as BGRS\SB-2014 event (https://bmcgenomics.biomedcentral.com/articles/supplements/volume-15-supplement-12). In 2017, “Vavilov Journal of Selection and Breeding” published a series of memoirs publications about Prof. Belyaev (http://vavilov.elpub.ru/jour/issue/view/32/showToc). The article by V.K. Shumny [5] tells the history of Belyaev’s life, while other publications discuss importance of Belyaev’s work on the theory of evolution and domestication. The material on plant biology discussed at Belyaev conference-2017 were in part published in Russian at next issue of “Vavilov Journal of Selection and Breeding” (http://vavilov.elpub.ru/jour/issue/view/ 33/showToc). Current issue extends the line of breakthrough publications on a variety of agricultural crops, including potato, flax and wheat, as well as highlights the area of pathogen resistance in plants. Olesya Y. Shoeva and co-authors [6] systematically reviewed the environmental factors affecting anthocyanin biosynthesis pathway genes in plants. In various plants, relative strengths of selective pressure differ, with genes of dicots undergoing stronger pressure than in monocots, and in pollinator-dependent plants more than that in pollinator-independent species. This observation highlights an important role of insects-dependent pollination in the evolution of the anthocyanin biosynthesis gene network. The research topics of next few papers consider agriculturally important features of higher plants. Wheat * Correspondence: [email protected] Institute of Cytology and Genetics SB RAS, Novosibirsk, Russia Novosibirsk State University, Novosibirsk, Russia Full list of author information is available at the end of the article