The N. I. Vavilov All-Russian Institute for Plant Genetic Resources (VIR) is the oldest gene bank for sunflower, with the first entries in 1922. The sunflower collection at VIR totals 2730 accessions with 2288 accessions of cultivated (Helianthus annuus L.) and 442 of wild sunflower belonging to 24 species. In the ongoing report we will describe the collection structure, and outline the ways of its utilization in fundamental and applied studies. The main pool of collection accessions represents local varieties, landraces and cultivars from Russia and other countries. The sunflower genetic collection at VIR includes 368 lines with various manifestation of morphological, physiological and biochemical traits. The collection accessions are used as source material in breeding programmes, for creating new donors of valuable biological trats, and also as material for exchanging with other gene banks. Currently, the routine studies are focused on phenotyping and genotyping of collection accessions. To broaden the genetic diversity of the collection, the studies on interspecific hybridization were performed, and the new inbred lines originated from crosses of CMS inbred lines H. annuus as female parents and 14 wild perennial Helianthus species as male parents were developed. These highly homozygous lines carry valuable genes for pathogen resistance and pollen fertility restoration which probably have been introgressed from the wild parents. The studies of inheritance pattern of morphological marker traits have helped to identify Mendelian genetic factors involved in manifestation of leaf and ray flowers color, leaf shape, plant height. A special attention was paid to sunflower seed proteins as domestication-associated characters. With the use of a complex approach involving biochemical, classical genetic and molecular methods, the genetic variation of sunflower seed proteins, helianthinin, 2S albumins and protein enzyme inhibitors, was characterized within the sunflower gene pool. The validation of molecular markers of valuable biological characters is carried out using the genetic collection lines. The studies on peculiarities of inheritance of pollen fertility restoration trait in the hybrid progenies from crosses of CMS lines with restorer lines are now in progress.