Biography

Eugeniya Sinskaya was Head of the Taxonomy, Ecology and Geography Division at the Institute of Plant Industry (VIR), St Petersburg. She was also Professor of Biological and Agricultural Sciences, and a close associate of Nikolai Vavilov.

Sinskaya was a specialist on Russian cultivated plants, in particular the crucifers, and the wild and cultivated forms of Onobrychis and Medicago. From 1924 onwards she made several expeditions to Japan, the Caucasus and other parts of the then Soviet Union.

Sinskaya was born in Velikiye Luki, Pskov Oblast, and entered the Petrov Academy of Agricultural Sciences in Moscow (now the Timiryazev Agricultural Academy) in 1909, graduating as an external student from the Academy of Agricultural Sciences. She intermittently worked at the Department of Plant Growing over the next eight years, as an assistant at the Bezenčuk Experiment Station, at the Petrov Academy of Agricultural Sciences, Novozybkovskaya Experiment Station, and in 1917 in the Department of Turkestan Land Improvement. She took part in a series of expeditions to Central Asia, Belarus and the Northern Territory in this period.

In 1919, Sinskaya began work at the Saratov Province Land Department as a specialist on meadow culture, studying the Volga meadows. Simultaneously working with Nikolai Vavilov at Saratov University, she researched agrobiological characteristics of the crucifers. She continued this work after moving to Petrograd in 1921, where Vavilov and a group of scientists were organising the new Bureau of Applied Botany. Sinskaya was made Head of Cruciferae (and later of oleiferous and root crops) and was entrusted with developing research plans and departments. During this period she made an important expedition to the Altai (1924) and helped to found the Cuban, Maikop and other experimental stations of the Bureau.

The Bureau of Applied Botany evolved into the All-Union Institute of Plant Industry in 1925. Under Sinskaya's guidance, numerous studies on fodder, oil and vegetable crops were undertaken at the institute. She organised and took part in many collecting missions to various regions of the country, including the Caucasus, Central Asia, Polesye, the Volga region, the forest-steppe zone in the European part of the USSR and the Far East. She also made an expedition to Japan in 1928-1929, and spent 1940-1942 as a professor at the Leningrad Agricultural Institute. During the Second World War Sinskaya and other scientists were evacuated to Krasnodar and the Transcaucasus, where she continued her work and took the opportunity to collect plants.

Sinskaya returned to the Institute of Plant Industry in 1945 as Head of Taxonomy, Ecology and Geography. She was also temporarily Head of the Forage Crops division and remained at the Institute for the rest of her days, where her collections greatly extended the VIR herbarium. She continued to collect into her old age, particularly in the forest-steppe regions of the European part of Russia.

Sinskaya's later work dealt particularly with the development of Vavilov's concept of the species as a complex morphological and biologically dynamic system. She studied the variability of individual plants and the formation of natural populations In 1961 Sinskaya published the Flora of Cultivated Plants of the USSR in 1961, at which time the manuscript for her Historical Geography of Cultivated Plants (At the Dawn of Agriculture) was ready. It was published posthumously in 1969.

Sources:
1965, Taxon, 14(6): 206
F.K. Bakhteyev, T.V. Lizgunova, A.I. Mordvinkina, V.V. Suvorov and M.A. Šebalina, 1965, Der Züchter, 35(8): 337-338
V. Borkovskaya, 1966, Nature, 211(5055): 1240
A. Filatenko, 1990, "E.V. Sinskaya - a centenary. Her major activities in the field of establishing and studying world collections of plant genetic resources (1889-1965)", Plant Genetic Resources Newsletter, 81-82: 1-3.

Biography

Eugeniya Sinskaya was Head of the Taxonomy, Ecology and Geography Division at the Institute of Plant Industry (VIR), St Petersburg. She was also Professor of Biological and Agricultural Sciences, and a close associate of Nikolai Vavilov.

Sinskaya was a specialist on Russian cultivated plants, in particular the crucifers, and the wild and cultivated forms of Onobrychis and Medicago. From 1924 onwards she made several expeditions to Japan, the Caucasus and other parts of the then Soviet Union.

Sinskaya was born in Velikiye Luki, Pskov Oblast, and entered the Petrov Academy of Agricultural Sciences in Moscow (now the Timiryazev Agricultural Academy) in 1909, graduating as an external student from the Academy of Agricultural Sciences. She intermittently worked at the Department of Plant Growing over the next eight years, as an assistant at the Bezenčuk Experiment Station, at the Petrov Academy of Agricultural Sciences, Novozybkovskaya Experiment Station, and in 1917 in the Department of Turkestan Land Improvement. She took part in a series of expeditions to Central Asia, Belarus and the Northern Territory in this period.

In 1919, Sinskaya began work at the Saratov Province Land Department as a specialist on meadow culture, studying the Volga meadows. Simultaneously working with Nikolai Vavilov at Saratov University, she researched agrobiological characteristics of the crucifers. She continued this work after moving to Petrograd in 1921, where Vavilov and a group of scientists were organising the new Bureau of Applied Botany. Sinskaya was made Head of Cruciferae (and later of oleiferous and root crops) and was entrusted with developing research plans and departments. During this period she made an important expedition to the Altai (1924) and helped to found the Cuban, Maikop and other experimental stations of the Bureau.

The Bureau of Applied Botany evolved into the All-Union Institute of Plant Industry in 1925. Under Sinskaya's guidance, numerous studies on fodder, oil and vegetable crops were undertaken at the institute. She organised and took part in many collecting missions to various regions of the country, including the Caucasus, Central Asia, Polesye, the Volga region, the forest-steppe zone in the European part of the USSR and the Far East. She also made an expedition to Japan in 1928-1929, and spent 1940-1942 as a professor at the Leningrad Agricultural Institute. During the Second World War Sinskaya and other scientists were evacuated to Krasnodar and the Transcaucasus, where she continued her work and took the opportunity to collect plants.

Sinskaya returned to the Institute of Plant Industry in 1945 as Head of Taxonomy, Ecology and Geography. She was also temporarily Head of the Forage Crops division and remained at the Institute for the rest of her days, where her collections greatly extended the VIR herbarium. She continued to collect into her old age, particularly in the forest-steppe regions of the European part of Russia.

Sinskaya's later work dealt particularly with the development of Vavilov's concept of the species as a complex morphological and biologically dynamic system. She studied the variability of individual plants and the formation of natural populations In 1961 Sinskaya published the Flora of Cultivated Plants of the USSR in 1961, at which time the manuscript for her Historical Geography of Cultivated Plants (At the Dawn of Agriculture) was ready. It was published posthumously in 1969.

Sources:
1965, Taxon, 14(6): 206
F.K. Bakhteyev, T.V. Lizgunova, A.I. Mordvinkina, V.V. Suvorov and M.A. Šebalina, 1965, Der Züchter, 35(8): 337-338
V. Borkovskaya, 1966, Nature, 211(5055): 1240
A. Filatenko, 1990, "E.V. Sinskaya - a centenary. Her major activities in the field of establishing and studying world collections of plant genetic resources (1889-1965)", Plant Genetic Resources Newsletter, 81-82: 1-3.