Апрель 2005 г.

Российская наука и мир (по материалам зарубежной электронной прессы)

CONTENTS / ОГЛАВЛЕНИЕ


• Pétard mouillé
• Neutrino To Be Lucky Catch
• Green Tea For Nerve Cells
• Young Scientists Get $100,000
• Hibernation Prevents Aging
• Filter that makes viruses adhere
• Le programme IST de l'UE arrive en Sibérie grâce au projet SITE
• Russian hydrogen power development program may be approved this year
• Tissue engineering restores cornea
• Russia reviewing restoration of SEZs
• Russian academician calls for state regulation of nano-technologies
• 200 Russian scientists win personal grants for research
• FSB to protect Russian scientific-technical potential
• Russian federal nuclear research centre celebrates jubilee
• Deal inked to build Soyuz launch base in Kourou
• Russian Professor Says NASA Stole Space Elevator Concept From Soviet Scientist
• Green light for Lazio–Sirad
• China, Russia, U.S. Jointly Build, Manage Fiber-optic Network
• Renowned Physicist Dies

Более 200 российских ученых получили персональные гранты на исследования. Деньги выделил Фонд содействия отечественной науке, учрежденный отечественными бизнесменами.
11 выдающихся ученых получили по 10 тыс долларов на год, 43 доктора наук - по 5 тыс, 40 кандидатов наук - по 3 тыс. Впервые за 5 лет работы фонда в этом году отмечены молодые специалисты - 200 аспирантов Российской академии наук (по 2 тыс долларов).

Eleven outstanding scientists received 10,000 dollars a year each, 43 Doctors of Science - 5,000 dollars each, and 40 Candidates of Science - 3,000 dollars each.
In 2005, the foundation noted young specialists for the first time since the beginning of operation five years ago: 200 post graduates of the Russian Academy of Sciences /RAN/ will receive 2,000 dollars each for research purposes.
RAN vice-president Nikolai Laverov said the Academy was particularly thankful for the foundation for supporting young researchers: " We are saying through these grants: don't leave the country."
One of the foundation sponsors, chairman of the Troika-Dialogue company Alexander Mamut called the fund's work successful and useful.
"We would like to support our scientists morally and financially; and we can pride ourselves on the fact that of all the grant recipients just a few have left Russia," Mamut said.
In all, the foundation has provided 7.3 million dollars of grants to 1,150 scientists.
Gerasim Eliashberg, a grant winner, complained that if Russia had launched this measure ten years ago, it would have kept dozens of thousands of top-rate scientists from leaving the country.
But nuclear physicist Valery Subbotin disagreed with his colleague, saying Russian researchers should rid themselves of an inferiority complex before the U.S. science which he said " we still lead in many fields."

17 марта в Сыктывкаре состоялась встреча начальников региональных управлений ФСБ России по Северо-западу. Речь шла о необходимости более действенных мер в деле защиты научно-технического потенциала и интеллектуальной собственности России. По мнению объединения "Беллона", в ближайшем будущем это вполне может привести к началу новой серии шпионских дел против российских ученых и исследователей.

The FSB directors representing Russian Northwest regions discussed these problems at a meeting in Syktyvkar in Komi republic on March 17, Interfax reported. Speaking at the opening ceremony of the meeting, the head of Komi republic Vladimir Torlopov said the leadership of the republic always relied on the support of the security services. During recent 5 years the FSB made particular efforts to provide security for the science and technical facilities, development designs and prevention of accidents. The military counterintelligence service carried out operations on protecting the perspective arms projects in the frames of the separate State Arms program for 2001-2010, said Vladimir Torlopov.
The Kaliningrad region FSB director vice-admiral Vladimir Sotnikov expressed his opinion to the journalists in the end of the meeting: "The issue of the scientific-technical potential protection is actual for the whole country. Especially in the light of recent decision taken on the level of the Russian government – to establish big institutions where the science could develop. More efficient measures for intellectual property protection are needed. Today it is a product, which should belong, first of all, to the Russians, who develops it." "Our practical scientists have enough experience and developments, which are not precious only for the state. It is big money. It is very important to protect research institutes, plants. It is needed to make order and we will take active part in it" concluded the FSB director.
The Komi republic FSB director major general Nikolay Piyukov reminded about the old soviet system of measures, which "protected the Russian science very well". Due to the new situation and new legislation the role of the security service is increasing. The task of the FSB today is to secure the normal operation of the enterprises, allow honest businessmen to take part in the state programs and prevent stealing of the accumulated resources added the Komi FSB chief, SeverInform reported.
After such statements it is quite likely to expect a new round of spy cases against Russian scientists and researches in the nearest future.

5 апреля 2005 года Российскому федеральному ядерному центру - ВНИИ технической физики (РФЯЦ - ВНИИТФ) исполнилоь 50 лет. Институт (первоначально НИИ-1011) был создан 5 апреля 1955 года для разработки ядерных зарядов и боеприпасов, исследований физических процессов ядерного взрыва и его действия, осуществления авторского надзора за производством и эксплуатацией ядерных зарядов и боеприпасов, для фундаментального и технологического обеспечения всех этапов их разработки и жизненного цикла.

SNEZHINSK (Chelyabinsk region), April 5 - The all-Russia Physics Technical Research Center based in Snezhinsk in the Urals is celebrating the 50th jubilee on Tuesday.
The nuclear research centre that was created in the epoch of the Cold War after its predecessor, Arzamas-16, enabled to step up the development and production of modern weapons and create competition between scientific projects. It was the Snezhinsk nuclear research center where scientists created a first thermonuclear warhead in 1957 that was used to equip the Soviet armed forces.
An interesting exhibiition of photographs will be displayed in Chelyabinsk on jubilee dates. The photographs feature dozens of weapons, created by talented nuclear researchers from the Urals, that make up Russia's nuclear shield used to the present day.
"Our scientists are proud of a series of unique projects created at the Snezhinsk center", said Director of the Federal Nuclear Research Center Georgy Rykovanov. In particular, he mentioned the tiniest nuclear warhead for an artillery shell 152 millimetres in diameter - the lightest nuclear block with ideal parameters intended for the strategic nuclear forces.
The nuclear research centre has been conducting research not only in the field of nuclear weapons production. It has been working on projects for prevention of the proliferation of nuclear technologies, develops methods for control over the implementation of the Nuclear Test Ban Treaty and designs systems for purely peaceful purposes, such as dike and canal construction and geological prospecting. Most of these systems have no analogues in the world. (Itar-Tass).

Руководитель Роскосмоса Анатолий Перминов и глава компании Arianespace Жан-Ив Ле Галль подписали контракт на изготовление и поставку российского оборудования для создания комплекса запуска в рамках проекта "Союз в Гвианском Космическом Центре". Контракт является первым этапом на пути реализации межправительственных соглашений, заключенных Россией, Францией и Европейским космическим агентством по размещению РН "Союз" в Гвианском космическом центре.

Russian and French officials gathered Monday in Moscow to sign a contract setting the stage for the development of a South American launch site for Russia's venerable Soyuz rockets.
Anatoli Perminov, head of Russia's Federal Space Agency Roscosmos, and Arianespace CEO Jean-Yves Le Gall met to put finishing touches on a joint partnership for Soyuz rockets to begin launching from the European spaceport in Kourou, French Guiana. The signing comes after four documents agreed upon last month concerning program financing. Officials have been working on joint Russian and European programs more frequently over the past decade, and several governmental treaties and industry agreements over the past few years have been leading up to the final contract signing that came Monday.
The $446 million project will require infrastructure provided by Russian contractors tailored for the Soyuz rocket, which is manufactured by TsSKB Progress located in Samara. Rockets to be flown from Kourou will be fitted with a Fregat upper stage built by NPO Lavochkin, while an industry team led by the KBOM design office will be responsible for ground systems.
The cost will be split between $289 million in direct funding from the European Space Agency, while $157 million will be in the form of a loan to Arianespace from the European Investment Bank.
Activities outlined by the contract include the construction of the launch pad components and their assembly, system testing, required modifications of the Soyuz to work using the Guiana Space Center's tracking and support equipment, and final development of the upgraded Soyuz 2-1b vehicle scheduled to debut next year with a French science satellite payload.
The Soyuz 2-1b features an upgraded third stage engine that enhances performance. A transitional vehicle called the Soyuz 2-1a tested a new digital control system last November that can deliver spacecraft into more precise orbits and allows for an enlarged four-meter payload fairing to carry larger satellites.
With technical upgrades and the ability to take advantage of the Earth's rotation at an equatorial launch site, the Soyuz can double its carrying capacity above its current capability from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan. Launches from Baikonur are currently marketed by Starsem, a joint company owned by Arianespace and other European and Russian industry leaders.
The Soyuz will use a brand new launch complex located about 10 kilometers north of the operational ELA-3 launch pad that hosts the heavy-lift Ariane 5 booster. The ELA-1 facility -- used to launch the earliest Ariane rockets over two decades ago - is now being transformed for launches by the small-satellite Vega launcher currently under development.
The new Soyuz facility in Kourou will consist of a forward zone containing the launch pad and a rear zone where rockets will be assembled and payloads can be attached. The vehicle will be transferred horizontally on 700-meter rail tracks to be erected on the launch pad for final preparations.
Construction of the launch complex should get underway soon, and it is expected to be complete in less than two years in advance of the first blastoff in the next chapter of the Soyuz program's storied history some time at the end of 2007 or in early 2008.
When all three launch systems are in place beginning in 2008, Arianespace will offer rockets covering virtually the entire space launch market. The Ariane 5 rocket currently competes for heavy-lift commercial and European civil missions, and can deliver between six and 10 metric tons to geostationary transfer orbit. Soyuz rockets will capture the mid-level market consisting of payloads to a similar orbit, while the solid-fueled Vega will truck smaller satellites to low orbits.
Le Gall reported that Arianespace has already penned customers for the first Soyuz launch from Kourou in 2008. It is believed the flight will carry a pair of French research satellites and an Australian Optus communications satellite.

Новосибирский ученый, профессор Юрий Ведерников, в соавторстве с Евгением Никольниковым (Институт вычислительной математики и математической геофизики СО РАН), представил на проходящей в Ханты-Мансийске международной конференции, посвященной последним достижениям в теории обратных задач геофизики и дистанционного зондирования Земли, тезисы своего доклада "Космический лифт Ю.В. Кондратюка при использовании геостационарных природноресурсных искусственных спутников Земли".
Ведерников утверждает, что НАСА воспользовалась идеей советского ученого Юрия Кондратюка для создания спутникового лифта. В 1938 году рукопись Кондратюка таинственным образом исчезла и, по некоторым данным, могла попасть в НАСА.

A Russian professor has accused the United States of stealing ideas for a "space elevator" from a famous Russian engineer.
Addressing a scientific conference in Khanty-Mansiisk, Novosibirk professor Yuri Vedernikov accused the United States of stealing the ideas of the famous Russian engineer Yuri Kondratyuk.
Khanty-Mansiisk is currently the venue of an international conference on the latest achievements in geophysics and remote probing of the Earth held under the auspices of the Yugorsky Scientific Research Institute for Information Technologies.
Scientists Yuri Vedernikov and Yevgeny Nikolnikov of the Institute of Calculus Mathematics and Mathematical Geophysics addressed the conference with a paper entitled "The space elevator by Yuri Kondratyuk for geostationary man-made satellites for natural resources studies."
In comments for Russian Information Agency Sibir, Vedernikov said that the idea of a space elevator was first proposed by Yuri Kondratyuk in the 1920s, but he intentionally omitted the chapter on the invention from his book "Exploration of Interplanetary Space", published in Novosibirsk in 1929, as he believed it was too early to make the project public as it could end up "in the hands of the untrustworthy, including the military".
Nonetheless, later Kondratyuk included the chapter in the so-called "final manuscript" printed in three copies. In 1938 the manuscript was lost.
According to some reports, Vedernikov claims, one of the copies of the final manuscript was obtained by the Soviet KGB, another could have fallen into the hands of NASA. The Novosibirsk professor believes that a copy could also have been handed over to German rocket scientist Werner von Braun who moved to the U.S. in 1945 where he soon became the chief ideologist of the U.S. space program.
Vedernikov claimed that NASA used Kondratyuk's ideas to launch the project for building a "space elevator". A space elevator, as Kondratyuk saw it, is a geostationary man-made satellite put into space by a rocket where it is positioned over the equator at a height of 30-95,000 kilometers. Then the satellite releases a thin cable along which an observing receiver slides up and down. The receiver is equipped with devices enabling it to monitor the environment, predict earthquakes, etc.
NASA announced its plans to build a space elevator several years ago. In 2002 U.S. scientists said they were working on turning a science fiction concept that first appeared in Arthur C. Clarke's book "The Fountains of Paradise" over 20 years ago.
NASA began considering the concept in June 1999 at the Advanced Space Infrastructure Workshop on "Geostationary Orbiting Tether 'Space Elevator' Concepts" held at the Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Alabama. It brought together several dozen experts from NASA and private industry, G4TV.com Web-site reported.
In theory, the space elevator consists of a thin cable placed by the Space Shuttle into low Earth orbit (200 to 300 miles above Earth), and then raised to a stationary, geosynchronous orbit about 22,000 miles up. The cable is then lowered down to the Earth's surface and anchored to a mobile ocean-going platform in the Pacific Ocean along the equator, several thousand miles off the coast of Ecuador - an area chosen for its lack of hurricanes and ship traffic. The cable is as thin as paper, but not as fragile. In fact, it has the same strength as diamonds, and consists of the same base element, carbon nanotubes.
The concept was first described in 1895 by Russian author K.E. Tsiolkovsky in his "Speculations about Earth and Sky and on Vesta."

На МКС начинается эксперимент по предсказанию землетрясений. Результаты совместных наблюдений российских, итальянских и американских ученых дали основания полагать, что природным детектором землетрясений могут служить так называемые радиационные пояса Ван Аллена (кольца из заряженных частиц, лежащие вблизи плоскости экватора и удерживаемые магнитным полем Земли). Эту гипотезу предстоит проверить системе Lazio-Sirad (Law Altitude Zone Ionization Observatory - Self-indicating Instant Radiation Alert Dosimeter). Первые результаты ожидаются к концу 2005 года.

Lazio-Sirad is ready to gather data. The experiment is installed on the International Space Station and its aim is to trace the slight variations of the so-called Van Allen belts that seem to occur before earthquakes.
At the same time the experiment will gather data that will make possible the development of techniques of protection from radiation for astronauts. The astronaut Roberto Vittori will carry out measures. He will leave for the International Space Station tomorrow April 15th and he will reach it after about 2 days. Lazio-Sirad was developed by the Infn sections and by the Universities of Perugia, Rome "Tor Vergata" and Rome Tre, in collaboration with the Infn National Laboratories of Frascati, the Serms University Laboratory of Terni, the MePhi Institute of Moscow, the Ferrari Bsn, Nergal and Airtec with the participation of Filas (Lazio Region).
Our planet is incessantly bombarded with a rain of cosmic rays, charged stable particles, such as protons and electrons. This flux is partly prevented by the Earth magnetic field, that traps a part of it out of atmosphere, to a height of hundred up to thousand kilometres. The distribution of these particles is not though homogeneous: they place themselves in areas called Van Allen belts, after the name of the American physicist that discovered their existence in 1958. In whole, the Van Allen belts behave like a huge antenna, sensitive to the slightest variation of the Earth magnetic field. The surprising aspect is that preliminary measures gathered by Russian and American researchers in more than 15 years and analyzed in details by Russian and Italian researchers, indicate that this natural antenna is able to reveal precursory phenomena of intense earthquakes four or five hours in advance. The Lazio-Sirad experiment is the first sensor planned with the aim of verifying such a hypothesis in the Space, and it is clear the interest of such researches in a country exposed to seismic risk like Italy.
In which way can the Earth's crust tensions reflect on the cosmic particles trapped out of atmosphere? It was observed, trough measures realized at earth, that from the area of a future earthquake, electromagnetic waves of different frequency are generated in the underground: among these, low-frequency waves can reach atmosphere, cross it and interact with the particles trapped in the Van Allen belts. In this way, it is possible to produce rapid variations of the charged particles flux: measuring these variations it would be possible to state the area in which the emission of low-frequency waves occurred and so state where an earthquake is taking place.
"In order to study the interaction between the Van Allen belts and geophysics phenomena as the seismic events, Lazio-Sirad uses sophisticated and innovative particles detectors based on the use of silica and scintillating plastics. The measure of the particles trapped in the Van Allen belts will be related to the magnetic field measurements made through a precision magnetometer, called Egle, part itself of Lazio-Sirad programme. Once the physics principal of the instrumentation and its functioning in orbit will be verified, it will possible to open way to new Earth monitoring methods using not expensive micro-satellites", explains Roberto Battiston, director of the Infn section in Perugia, who coordinated the realization of Lazio-Sirad project, in close collaboration with Piergiorgio Picozza, director of the Infn section of Roma Tor Vergata, and with Vittorio Sgrigna, physics professor at the University of Roma Tre and spokesman of the Egle magnetometer.
In this circumstance the experiment Sileye3/Alteino, brought on board of the International Space Station just by Roberto Vittori during his previous mission "Marco Polo", will be put back into service. "The experiment Sileye3/Alteino is particularly important to develop new materials and new technologies to protect man from bombing of cosmic particles during future lunar and interplanetary missions", explains Piergiorgio Picozza, who participated in Lazio-Sirad coordination and is also spokesman of the Sileye3/Alteino experiment.
"The Lazio-Sirad experiment has another important goal: to improve the study on the phenomenon of the light flashes, observed by the astronauts on board of the Mir and of the International Space Station, by analysing, in particular, the interaction between the different kinds of cosmic rays and the astronauts' visual apparatus", explains Marco Casolino of the Infn section of Roma Tor Vergata, spokesman for the Lazio-Sirad part dedicated to the study of the light flashes.
Lazio-Sirad will work at least for six months since the beginning of the operations of data acquisition. The first results of the data analysis are foreseen by the end of 2005. Lazio-Sirad has involved about 30 persons, among these: physicists, geophysicists, engineers and technicians from the different institutes that have participated. The instrument has been realized in a very short time (less than 6 months since the beginning of the project to the delivery to the Russian Space Agency on January the 25th) respecting all the complex security procedures, verification and space qualification required by the European Space Agency (Esa) and by the Russian Space Agency (Energia).
The project takes place in the context of the European mission Eneide, born from the collaboration between the Italian region Lazio, the Military Aeronautics, Alenia Spazio, the Chamber of Commerce of Rome, Esa, and Asi. The Eneide mission will start tomorrow April the 15th from the space polygon in Baikonur, in Kazakhistan, and it will travel on board of the Russian capsule Soyuz Tma, directed to the International Space Station. All the scientific experiments of Eneide mission will be managed from the control centre "Lazio user Centre", already working and settled in the Infn section of Roma Tor Vergata.

Продолжается работа по созданию и развитию глобальной высокоскоростной компьютерной сети, охватывающей Северное полушарие и предназначенной для передачи научной информации. Проект, начатый в 1997 году и получивший название GLORIAD (Global Ring Network for Advanced Application Development), первоначально объединял Россию и США, в 2003 к нему присоединился Китай. Сеть поддерживает широкий диапазон научных исследований: ядерная физика, геология, астрономия, биоинформатика, экологические наблюдения, эпидемология и т.д.

Washington - China, Russia and the United States have joined forces to build and manage a fiber-optic network that circles the Northern Hemisphere, creating a high-bandwidth Internet-like system that links scientists, educators and students worldwide.
The Global Ring Network for Advanced Applications (GLORIAD) is funded by government agencies in all three countries. The network also has industry partners in Korea, the Netherlands and Canada.
"At its simplest level, just think about fiber-optic cable around the Northern Hemisphere," said Greg Cole, research director at the Joint Institute for Computation Science in the Department of Energy's Oak Ridge National Laboratory. "We're under the ocean in the Atlantic and the Pacific and across the tundra."
The emphasis is on connecting science communities, particularly those that do not have a long tradition of working well together.
"It's not as much about networking as it is about getting our scientists, educators and students working openly and together," Cole added. "The network is something we leverage to bring people to the table so we can open new areas of cooperation."
GLORIAD began in 1997 as NaukaNet (Russian for ScienceNet), a network funded by the U.S. National Science Foundation (NSF) and the Russian Ministry of Science.
In 2003, the United States and Russia invited China to join the GLORIAD partnership, and the network was extended to China in 2004 – with trans-Atlantic and trans-Pacific telecommunications services provided by Tyco Global Networks. Later in 2003, the network crossed the Russia-China border to complete the ring.
Funding for GLORIAD comes from NSF in the United States; the Russian Ministry of Science; the Kurchatov Institute and the Russian Academy of Science in Russia, and the Chinese Academy of Sciences.
"Money is a problem for us on this project in the United States and in Russia," Cole said. "In China, it hasn't seemed to be."
The network supports a range of scientific applications, including the most advanced areas of collaborative research in peaceful applications of high-energy, nuclear and fusion-energy physics; atmospheric science; astronomical observation; geological sciences; environmental monitoring; bioinformatics; protection of nuclear materials; epidemiology, and others.
These data-intensive applications -- too massive to work across the commercial Internet -- require a dedicated network. GLORIAD now supports such applications and is still being improved.
"The [commercial] Internet is called a packet-switched network," Cole said. "You do something and your packets go into the network and come out the other side. You don't care how they get there; you just want them to get there reliably."
"The network we're building now will support that model -- general traffic, web, e-mail. In the new [hybrid] network, you'll be able to get a dedicated circuit across the network for two hours, so you'll have quality guarantees in terms of available bandwidth," he said.
The Chinese "have been very reliable partners," Cole said, "doing what they've promised -- completing circuits to the U.S. and completing the circuit with our Russian partners across the Russia-China border."
But more than that, he added, "China is rapidly developing its domestic infrastructure to support science cooperation with the U.S., and the importance of that cannot be overestimated."
Just a few years ago, China did not have much in the way of a telecommunications infrastructure, Cole said, but that has changed.
Today, he said, "they are putting in 1-gigabit links all over the country ... they have demonstrated a real eagerness backed by resources to develop good telecommunications to their science facilities."
GLORIAD has high-level government support in both Russia and China. In China, Jiang Mianheng, a vice president with the Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS) responsible for computing, networking and information technology issues, leads the GLORIAD effort for CAS.
Yan Baoping directs the 360-member staff of the China-wide Computer Network Information Center. She is responsible for developing the CAS network and related programs and operating GLORIAD in China.
"Moving into these much higher-performance networks," Cole said, "involves tying together computation facilities and more closely integrating our science communities. In Russia and China, you need very senior leadership to make sure it stays on the right track."
Although it is mainly a science-and-education project, Cole said, GLORIAD's economic impact is potentially enormous.
"For example, in China it means we're going to be that much more engaged and that will lead to business deals," he said. "Any project that encourages sharing and cooperation, as we're trying with GLORIAD, leads to increased business cooperation. We don't do this project without business involvement."
Already, he added, GLORIAD is fostering stronger ties and working relationships among the three countries and helping build trust from the highest levels of government to the next generation of leaders.

Cкончался выдающийся российский физик академик Борис Захарченя, основоположник широко известной научной школы по спектроскопии и магнитооптике полупроводников.

Leading Russian physicist Boris Zakharchenya of St. Petersburg's Ioffe Physico-Technical Institute died on Sunday and was buried on Thursday.
Zakharechnya was born in the town of Orsha near the Russia-Belarus border on May 1, 1928, and graduated from the physics faculty of Leningrad State University in 1952.
He began working at the Ioffe Institute the same year and remained associated with the institute for the rest of his life, rising to the rank of director of its division of solid state physics.
Zakharechnya's biggest contribution to Russian and international science won him the Lenin Prize in 1966 for his fundamental research into the physics of excitons. In 1976 he won a State Prize and the Lebedev Gold Medal of the Academy of Sciences for his researches on new effects of alignment and optical orientation of electrons with the help of polarized light in semiconductors and quantum-dimensional semiconducting structures.
With this work, Zakharechnya founded a scientific school of spectroscopy and magnetic-optics of semi-conductors.
Zakharechnya was the author of many publications, reviews and scientific papers. For many years he edited the journal "Solid State Physics."

Начало дайджеста за АПРЕЛЬ 2005 года (часть 1)

предыдущий месяц

1998-2005

следующий месяц