Tillering is a crucial trait closely associated with yield potential and environmental adaptation in cereal crops, regulated by the synergy of endogenous (genetic) and exogenous (environmental) factors.  The physiological and molecular regulation of tillering has been intensively studied in rice and wheat.  However, tillering research on barley is scarce.  This review used the recent advances in bioinformatics to map all known and potential barley tiller development genes with their chromosomal genetic and physical positions.  Many of them were mapped for the first time.  We also discussed tillering regulation at genetic, physiological, and environmental levels.  Moreover, we established a novel link between the genetic control of phytohormones and sugars with tillering.  We provided evidence of how environmental cues and cropping systems help optimize the tiller number.  This comprehensive review enhances the understanding of barley’s physiological and genetic mechanisms controlling tillering and other developmental traits.

As an emerging class of non-coding transcripts, circular RNAs (circRNAs) are proved to participate in the complex process of myogenesis in diverse species.  A previous study has identified circular RNA EDC3 (circEDC3) as a typical covalently closed circular RNA abundant in chicken skeletal muscle.  This study found that circEDC3 is a conservative circular RNA and performed functional analysis to investigate the role of circEDC3 in chicken muscle growth.  The results indicated that circEDC3 could inhibit (P<0.05) chicken skeletal muscle satellite cells (SMSCs) proliferation and differentiation but had no significant influence on SMSCs apoptosis.  Additionally, bioinformatics analysis showed that circEDC3 had promising coding potential.  The open reading frames (ORF) were found in circEDC3 in this study.  Furthermore, this study predicted that circEDC3 had internal ribosome entry sites (IRES) and N6-methyladenosine (m6A) motifs in different species, implying that circEDC3 might be translatable.  This study revealed that circEDC3 might be a negative regulator in chicken muscle development and suggested it has protein-coding potential in different species.