Май 2005 г.

Российская наука и мир (по материалам зарубежной электронной прессы)

CONTENTS / ОГЛАВЛЕНИЕ


• High technologies of the 21st century international forum opens in Moscow
• Hydro Plan Irks Scientists
• Les plaies de l'après-Tchernobyl
• Un physicien russe a inventé une source d'énergie inédite
• Projet RUSERA - Intensification de la coopération entre les chercheurs russes et communautaires à l'échelle régionale
• Russian scientists offer Eurasian supercomputer - Mini TERA to Kazakhstan
• Russia's Alfyorov, Germany's Riedle win Global Energy Prize
• L'Agence spatiale russe veut que la Nasa finance la construction des Soyouz
• Ice Scalpel For Explosives
• Insurgental Biological Warfare Against Gipsy Moth
• Pleistocene Park Underway: Home for Reborn Mammoths?
• No Need To Fly To The Moon For Lunar Soil
• Russia to launch the Radioastron laboratory
• First Solar Sail Spacecraft Ready for Daring Flight
• Nanoscale Markers Revolutionise How Cancer is Treated

Роскосмос предлагает, чтобы НАСА взяло на себя часть финансирования постройки дополнительных кораблей "Союз". Об этом сообщил на пресс-конференции заместитель руководителя Федерального космического агентства Александр Медведчиков.

L'Agence spatiale russe (Roskosmos) souhaiterait que la Nasa participe au financement de la construction des vaisseaux spatiaux habités russes Soyouz, nécessaires pour développer le projet de la Station spatiale internationale (ISS), a affirmé vendredi un responsable russe. Quand l'équipage permanent de l'ISS sera composé de six personnes, comme le prévoit le projet, "il sera nécessaire d'envoyer vers la station, des Soyouz supplementaires qui serviront de vaisseaux de sauvetage pour les spationautes", a expliqué le vice-directeur de Roskosmos, Alexandre Medvedtchikov, lors d'une conference de presse.
"Mais nous ne sommes pas prêts à le faire gratuitement", a-t-il dit. Actuellement, un Soyouz, vaisseau spatial non réutilisable à trois places, est arrimé en permanence à l'ISS. En cas d'accident à bord de la station, les spationautes peuvent monter à bord du vaisseau et revenir sur Terre. Avec un délai d'utilisation de six mois, le vaisseau de sauvetage doit être remplacé par un nouveau deux fois par an. L'équipage permanent de la station est actuellement composé de deux membres, mais si leur nombre augmente, cela nécessitera l'envoi sur l'ISS de deux Soyouz deux fois par an.
"Les Américains avaient déjà essayé de commander un Soyouz supplementaire à Roskosmos", mais une loi américaine de 2000 - qui frappe Moscou en raison des soupçons exprimés par Washington sur un transfert de technologies sensibles à l'Iran - empêche la Nasa à financer les programmes spatiaux russes, a souligné M. Medvedtchikov.
"Nous espérons que nous trouverons une issue à ce problème", a estimé le responsable.

Исследователи из Тульского государственного университета предлагают использовать нечто вроде ледового скальпеля для того, чтобы извлекать взрывчатку из устаревших боеприпасов. "Скальпель" представляет собой выпускаемую под большим давлением струю воды, дополнительно насыщенной потоком замороженных капель. Оболочка боеприпаса разрезается и взрывчатка вымывается. По мнению ученых, это наиболее безопасный, в том числе и с экологической точки зрения, способ отделить металл от взрывчатки и пороха.

How can a tin be opened if it contains not tinned goods but explosives? Or a shell or something no less dangerous, for instance, a retired nuclear reactor?
Certainly, metal can be cut up mechanically, but this is very dangerous. Torch flame or laser beam do not suit the purpose even more so. However, a sheet of water released at high pressure, particularly if additionally saturated with a stream of frozen drops, would probably suit. The researchers from the Tula State University are sure of that.
They suggest that morally and physically obsolete ammunition should be reclaimed in this particular way - the casing should be cut up and explosives should be washed out. In their opinion, this is the safest way, also from the ecological point of view, to separate metal from nitrocompounds - explosive and powder. Information about that is contained in the advanced research database maintained by the International Science and Technology Center.
Evidently, it is not easy to produce such installation. The object itself is very dangerous. An incautious movement, blow, vibration is enough - and the explosion is inevitable. The stream should be sufficiently strong to be able to cut up metal and then to wash the content out of the casing without provoking the explosion. Besides, the equipment should be operated remotedly, it should be safe not only in the broad sense of the word, but also ecologically secure, and finally it should operate quickly and economically - spending minimum time and energy.
Therefore, from the point of view of the authors, first of all, it is necessary to carry out a phase of theoretical study. First, it is necessary to analyze physical processes taking place in a shell, when sheet of water at high pressure is directed at it, to clarify how explosives would respond to this impact. If a stream of icy granules flying at enormous velocity is used, it is necessary to create the pattern of their formation. It is necessary to investigate how the stream of compressed air, liquid and refrigerating medium may be transformed into a stream of racing pieces of ice. It is necessary to calculate how such abrasive will interact with explosive, and then the researchers can pass to experiments and create their own installation.
In general, it is known that abrasive - the finest bits of hard material - can be added to the sheet of water. Then, figuratively speaking, percussion force of sheet of water will be much more. The researchers have already developed and tested such experimental setup at the Skuratov engineering plant. A liquid jet with abrasive powder - for the time present without pieces of ice - easily cuts up aluminium alloy plate A10, about 3 millimeters thick, and steel angle bar 6 millimeters thick. This can be done rather quickly - depending on the object - at the velocity from 0.5 through 3.2 millimeters per second.
However, this installation is demonstration of the method's possibilities, rather than the final result. The authors are sure that in the future they will be able also to create compact mobile installations. With their help, pressure of the stream on the surface of the object will be measured by dozens of thousands of atmospheres.
The researchers also tried to wash various types of explosives out of ammunition through the fuse opening. The stream parameters selected by the authors based on mathematical calculations allowed to perform that efficiently and accurately. Then the bits of explosives may be simply drained and the clean water can be reused.
On top of that, the method should be economical enough - quick, convenient and inexpensive, and also ecologically secure for the environment. It is worth noting that the probability of explosion in this case should be completely excluded.
For the time being, an "ideal" installation - small, efficient and secure - has not been created yet. A number of theoretical and practical tasks are pending resolution. However, the experience in the area of basic research and experimental investigation accumulated by the group of researchers under the guidance of Professor Brenner, honoured worker of science and engineering of the Russian Federation, is the evidence that the researchers are capable of solving tasks of this kind.

Специалисты из Института систематики и экологии животных СО РАН, при поддержке РФФИ, изобретают эффективные способы борьбы с азиатскими популяциями непарного шелкопряда, поедающего березовые листья. Методы борьбы, применяемые в Северной Америке и Европе, против азиатских популяций недействительны.

Specialists of the Institute of Taxonomy and Ecology of Animals (Siberian Branch, Russian Academy of Sciences) investigate peculiarities of struggle against Asian populations of Gipsy moth - one of the most widespread and economically significant forest pests. The methods applied in the North America and Europe do not work with Asian populations of the vermin. In Siberia, the climate is different, other tree species grow in the region and Gipsy moth is slightly different.
In recent years, outbursts of mass gipsy moth propagation have taken place more frequently and the vermin persistently expand their area. The reasons of this phenomenon are not clear but are probably connected to climate fluctuation. However that may be, the researchers have to fight back. Biological war is one of the most efficient and ecologically safe methods for Gipsy moth quantity control. Hotbeds of vermin propagation are sprayed by suspension of virus, but Asian Gipsy moths are very mobile, and females are capable of active flying. Therefore, the insects simply escape from the lesion focus.
The researchers worked in the territory of West-Siberian plain: in the Novosibirsk and Tumen Regions, Altai Territory and Eastern Kazakhstan. In these areas, Gipsy moths primarily feed on birch-tree leaves. Scarce birch-tree forests cover no more than 15 percent of the territory, the rest of the land is occupied by tillage, meadows and lakes. The Gipsy moth grain layings were processed by Virin-NSh viral preparation produced by the Institute of Taxonomy and Ecology of Animals (Siberian Branch, Russian Academy of Sciences).
The virus causes epidemic polyhedrosis disease with the insects of parental and filial generations. Actually, a lot of insects did fall ill and die in the year processing was performed. At the same time, inhabitants on single trees practically did not suffer on processed lots, and a major part of sick caterpillars died at an older age, having managed to eat a lot of foliage.
The researchers have assumed that the caterpillars which hatched from the grain processed by viral preparation, infect other insects very feebly, therefore, no more than 10 to 15 percent of vermin die from epidemic. This particular percentage of laying was processed by the researchers. As a result, within the first year when the preparation was applied many trees lost up to 90 percent of foliage. Besides, a lot of insects capable of eating through all leaves in the next season hibernated on these lots.
The Novosibirsk specialists applied such high doses of viral preparation that there is no sense in increasing them. To reduce the quantity of vermin significantly, the dose should not be increased, instead the pestholes of propagation should be processed twice. This is the only way to protect birch-trees from almost complete loss of foliage. According to researchers' estimates, complete suppression of Gipsy moth's quantity outburst only in the Novosibirsk Region would require at least 15,000 kilograms of viral preparation. Given its high cost and the lack of necessary production facilities, such needs should be considered unreal.
However, there is no more effective method available, besides, it has its own doubtless advantages. First, the method allows human processing. In Western Siberia, the roads are no good and woods are sparse, that is why there is no sense to use spraying machines. Foresters are quite capable of processing individual layings. In such a way, the preparation consumption is relatively low, and practically all infected territory can be covered thanks to weather during the processing period (late April - early May) being normally dry and warm enough in those regions. In the conditions of chronical shortage of money, it seems appropriate to ask a question if actions aimed at Gipsy moth quantity control are needed at all? It is known that Russian birch-trees can well survive even significant loss of foliage. Nevertheless, the Novosibirsk scientists believe that viral processing is necessary.
Firstly, during the Gipsy moth invasion the trees do not practically grow thicker, thus causing damage to forestry. Secondly, although birch-trees do not perish from the loss of foliage alone, they get impaired and can be destroyed by unfavorable conditions, for example, overdamped soil. Thirdly, defoliated trees almost do not protect from wind. In Kulugunda steppe, soil erosion increased due to outburst of Gipsy moth quantity. On top of that, social aspect is also important as vital activity of population in rural districts is tightly connected with woods. So, the Siberian foresters will have to examine every tree and to spread the preparation on each discovered laying.

Сергей Зимов, директор Северо-Восточной научной станции в Якутии, намерен создать парк плейстоцена на участке площадью 160 квадратных километров - с настоящими животными того периода, дожившими до наших дней, или их ближайшими сородичами. Создание такого парка поможет изучить влияние сочетания деятельности человека с изменением климата на время и место вымирания в северном полушарии многих животных видов, в частности мамонтов.

During the last ice age northeastern Siberia remained a grassy refuge for scores of animals, including bison and woolly mammoths. Then, about 10,000 years ago, this vast ecosystem disappeared as the Ice Age ended.
Now, though, the Ice Age landscape is on its way back, with a little help from the Russian scientists who have established "Pleistocene Park."
Here, the scientists hope to uncover what killed off the woolly mammoth and other Ice Age animals. To do so, they're restoring the prehistoric ecosystem once found in what is now the remote Sakha region of eastern Russia.
The land is slowly being turned into willow savanna, as it was 10,000 years ago. Dozens of wild horses are already grazing in the refuge, and there are plans of importing bison and musk oxen from Canada.
Most spectacularly, the wildlife park may one day become home to a genetic hybrid of the extinct woolly mammoth and the modern-day elephant.
By restoring the Pleistocene ecosystem, Sergey Zimov, who initiated the project in 1989, hopes to test the theory that hunting, not climate change, wiped out the animals that once thrived in northern Siberia. "I want to show how many animals can exist if nobody hinders them to live," said Zimov, who is the director of the Northeast Science Station in Cherskiy in the Russian republic of Sakha (also known as Yakutiya).
Great Mystery
In the area of Sakha where the park is located, the temperature fluctuates between a high of about 85 degrees Fahrenheit (30 degrees Celsius) in the summer and a low of -58 degrees Fahrenheit (-50 degrees Celsius) in the winter.
During the driest periods of the Pleistocene, which lasted from about 1.8 million to 10,000 years ago, the vegetation was mainly low grass. During warmer periods the land turned into meadows and steppes, ideal grazing grounds for woolly mammoths, rhinoceroses, bison, horses, elk, and yaks. Among the predators were cave lions and wolves.
When this vast ecosystem disappeared 10,000 years ago, the land turned into mossy tundra. The only plant eaters to survive were reindeer that grazed on lichens and moose that fed on willows.
The cause of the extinctions of large animals like the woolly mammoths has been a topic of great debate. Many scientists argue that the sudden shift to a warmer and moister climate proved catastrophic to the steppe vegetation and the animals that thrived on it.
"I'm completely on the side of natural, environmental causes of extinction," said Andrei Sher, a well-known paleontologist at Moscow's A.N. Severtsov Institute of Ecology and Evolution.
Skilled Hunters?
Zimov, however, believes that humans, using increasingly efficient hunting practices, killed off the woolly mammoths and the other large animals. But could a small population of hunters kill millions of animals?
"Imagine a picture in which someone from the neighboring tribe teaches you to make new super thrust weapons such as spears", Zimov said.
"Now you kill the first animal. Will you carefully prepare and consume all the meat, surrounded as you are by clouds of mosquitoes, or will you just cut out the tongue, knowing that there are millions more [animals]?"
"Over time, people probably understood that they should take care of the animals, but by then it was too late," he added.
By bringing back the Pleistocene animals, Zimov says scientists may be able to determine what role the animals played in maintaining their own habitat. Researchers may also better understand the forces that vanquished the Ice Age ecosystem.
While much of the Siberian tundra is now covered with moss, the 160 square kilometers (62 square miles) designated for the park is an even split of meadow, larch forest, and willow shrubland.
"All plants that were there in the Pleistocene epoch are preserved there today," Zimov said. "We need not sow grasses and herbs. They will occupy the area as soon as the fertility increases."
The whole park will eventually be cordoned off, though it will remain open to adventurous tourists who can get to such a remote location, which is accessible only by helicopter.
So far, only 20 square kilometers (about 8 square miles) have been cordoned off. Inside, hardy Yakutian horses, the closest descendants of the Pleistocene horse, roam alongside reindeer, and moose. The importation of Canadian bison, however, is on hold due to fears of bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE, or mad cow disease).
Zimov says he hopes to increase the density of plant eaters sufficiently to influence the vegetation and soil and stabilize the grasslands. Once herbivore populations have been established, the plan is to acclimatize Siberian tigers, predators whose modern survival is threatened by poaching.
Reviving Mammoths
But the park probably will not see its most majestic potential inhabitant, the woolly mammoth, for several decades, if ever. Japanese scientists, working with Russians, have for years been searching for mammoth carcasses to use for reviving woolly mammoths, which would then be introduced into Pleistocene Park.
The plan: to extract sperm DNA from frozen mammoth remains and inject it into a female elephant's eggs to produce a hybrid offspring. By repeating the procedure over generations, scientists would eventually create an animal that is mostly mammoth.
The problem, however, has been finding mammoth DNA that is sufficiently well preserved in ice to still be viable. The DNA in mammoth fossils that have been found has turned out to be unusable, damaged by time and climate changes.

За лунным грунтом не обязательно лететь на Луну - лунные метеориты регулярно падают на Землю сами, где их исследуют ученые при поддержке РФФИ и Бюро по научно-техническому сотрудничеству Австрийской службы обменов (Büro Für Wissenschaftlich-Technische Zusammenarbeit Des Österreichischer Austauschdienst).

It is not necessary to fly to the Moon to get lunar soil even if the sample is required from the other side of this planet. A meteorite originating from the other side of the Moon has recently got into the hands of scientists. The meteorite investigation required precision instruments and grants from the Russian Foundation for Basic Research and the Buro Fur Wissenschaftlich-Technische Zusammenarbeit Des Osterreichischer Austauschdienst (Bureau for Scientific and Technical Collabration of Austrian Exchange Service).
A piece of lunar soil (its weight being slightly less than one kilogram) was knocked out by a meteorite blow and later fell on the Earth. Judging by a microparticle of zircon mineral the specialists not only calculated its age, but also made conclusions about the event that had taken place on the Moon at that time. It has appeared that about 2 billion years ago the rock containing a particle of zircon endured some planetary cataclysm and melted, and 500 thousand years ago a piece of rock was thrown away from the lunar surface into space by a meteorite blow.
Meteorite Dhofar 025 was found in 2000 in the desert on the Arabian Peninsula (Oman). It weights 751 grams and consists of breccia - sintered fragments of various minerals from lunar continents. Several years were spent on investigation of this celestial stone. To determine its age, the researchers of four Russia institutes jointly with Austrian colleagues found a microscopical grain of zircon in it - the mineral consisting of oxides of zirconium, lead, thorium and uranium.
The isotopic composition in the two sections of this tiny speck was investigated on the SHRIMP mass-spectrometer. The researchers were interested in ratio of stable isotopes of lead 206, 207, 208 and radioactive isotopes of uranium - 238 and 235. The grain was extracted from the core of meteorite, i.e. it had been isolated from the environment while the meteorite was lying on the Earth. That allowed the researchers to compare quantitative ratios of isotopes with known and dated rocks of the Earth and the Moon and to determine the age of meteorite. On the Earth, for example, zircon contained in gabbro from Eastern Australia was accepted as the standard for the uranium-lead relation.
Geochemists discovered that zircon from Dhofar 025 was of the same age as others, already known lunar rocks - i.e. 4.3 to 4.4 billion years, but its composition had changed approximately 2 billion years ago. Most likely, that is the consequence of a powerful blow by a meteorite, as a result breccia was formed out of granite which contained zircon being investigated. This result, by the way, coincided with radiation age of meteorite calculated by isotopes of noble gases. Breccia was formed and carried out to the surface of the planet as a result of some catastrophe, and gases started to accumulate in it . However, that was not the meteorite bombardment well-known to researchers, to which the visible part of the Moon was exposed to 3.9 billion years ago. Consequently, the specialists believe that Dhofar 025 is nothing but a sample of lunar soil from the other part of the planet.
It is not for the first time that lunar meteorites were found in the region of Dhofar. Among the findings are, for example, Dhofar 305, 307 and others. Altogether, there were about 50 such meteorites found on the Earth. However, within thousands of years spent on the Earth with its oxygen atmosphere, under rain and sunshine, with temperature differences and in contacts with microorganisms that excrete deleterious substances, debris of the moon became gradually destroyed and by our time it turned out to be fairly contaminated by “terrestrial” atoms, it oxidized and lost part of original components. From this point of view, the integral Dhofar 025 meteorite is considered unique by the researchers.

Федеральное космическое агентство сообщило, что к 2007 году в космос будет запущена астрофизическая лаборатория "Радиоастрон" для наблюдения за внегалактическими объектами. Проект "Радиоастрон" сможет исследовать массивные черные дыры в удаленных и близких галактиках, черные дыры звездных масс в нашей галактике, нейтронные звезды, гравитационное поле Земли. Кроме того, с помощью "Радиоастрона" ученые надеются обнаружить новые сверхмощные источники энергии.

MOSCOW, Russia (UPI) - The Russian Federal Space Agency (Roscosmos) has announced plans to launch the Radioastron laboratory for observing extra-galactic objects in 2007, Vremya Novostei, a Russian daily has reported.
Radioastron will be able to study massive black holes inside both remote and neighboring galaxies, nuclei- stellar-mass black holes inside the Milky Way Galaxy, neutron stars and the terrestrial gravitation field. Scientists also hope to spot new super-powerful energy sources using Radioastron.
The project was co-authored by Nikolai Kardashev, a full-time member of the Russian Academy of Sciences.
The radio telescope, he said, will function in conjunction with other orbital telescopes. Their interaction will help create a huge system over a vast distance, roughly equal to that between the Earth and the Moon.
"As a result, we will obtain high-resolution images of black holes and neighboring galaxies. The resolution of such images will exceed that of the human eye by 20 million times," Kardashev said.
"This is an international project. However, Russia will assemble most scientific equipment and other hardware," Kardashev explained.
Radioastron features extremely sensitive equipment that has already been tested at specialized R&D centers. The Lavochkin science and production association has produced a model of the radio telescope.
Launching Radioastron was last discussed more than 20 years ago, but Kardashev said it never got off the ground because of inadequate funding.
Nikolai Sanko, who heads the department of instrument-packed spacecraft, said it would take over 1.5 billion rubles to complete the project, financed by the state.

Запуск космического аппарата с солнечным парусом (Космос 1) в очередной раз отложен - теперь уже на июнь. Новая дата запуска - 21 июня. Аппарат планируется запустить с помощью конверсионной ракеты-носителя "Волна" с борта субмарины.

Cosmos 1, the world's first solar sail spacecraft, has shipped in preparation for a launch window that opens on June 21, 2005, traveling from the test facility of Lavochkin Association in Moscow to Severomorsk, Russia. The innovative and first-of-its-kind solar sail, a project of The Planetary Society and Cosmos Studios, will launch atop a converted ICBM from a submerged Russian submarine. It will deploy in Earth orbit and attempt the first controlled flight of a solar sail.
"Reaching this milestone puts us on the doorstep to space!" said Louis Friedman, Planetary Society Executive Director and the Cosmos 1 Project Director. "We are proud of our new spacecraft and hope that Cosmos 1 blazes a new path into the solar system, opening the way to eventual journeys to the stars."
The Planetary Society is working with the spacecraft developers, the Lavochkin Association and the Space Research Institute in Russia, to fly this solar sail mission. Cosmos 1 was funded by Cosmos Studios, the science-based entertainment company led by Ann Druyan, who also serves as the solar sail mission's Program Director. Additional donations from members of The Planetary Society helped make the mission possible.
"Launching Cosmos 1 on the day of the summer solstice is a great way to honor our ancestors and to continue the journey to the stars that they began," said Druyan. "As the rays of the sun strike the ancient astronomical observatories of Stonehenge and Chaco Canyon, Cosmos 1 will rise from the sea into space to take its place in the great story of exploration."
Cosmos 1 has attracted world-wide attention by being the first attempt at a revolutionary and potentially much faster way of moving through space, and because the project was created by an independent, non-profit organization and financed by a private company. The combination of solar sail technology coupled with a submarine-based launch opens the door for new and low-cost space systems in the future.
Once Cosmos 1 achieves Earth orbit, the mission team will spend the first few days monitoring the spacecraft and allowing any remaining air in the packed blades to leak out before deploying its eight solar sail blades. The pressure of photons - sunlight - bouncing off the highly reflective solar sail will provide the spacecraft's only form of propulsion.
NASA, the European Space Agency (ESA), Japan and Russia all have developed solar sails, but none has yet tried to prove that the sails can propel a spacecraft under controlled flight. Russia and Japan have conducted flight tests of deployment, while NASA and ESA have conducted ground test deployments, but thus far they have no test flights scheduled.
Two U.S. government agencies, NOAA and NASA, have signed cooperative agreements with The Planetary Society to receive valuable flight data from the solar sail mission. In return, the no-exchange-of-funds agreements permit the Society to utilize agency facilities and expertise in tracking and mission operations of Cosmos 1.
An experiment to accelerate the spacecraft with a microwave beam from Earth will be conducted during a later stage of the mission. Led by James Benford of Microwaves Sciences, Inc. and Prof. Gregory Benford of the University of California-Irvine, their team will use a NASA Deep Space Network radar antenna to send the beam to the spacecraft. The Planetary Society must approve the activation of the experiment and will do so only after the prime mission objective of controlled solar sail flight is achieved. An international tracking network will receive mission data at stations scattered around the globe, from Moscow to Majuro in the Marshall Islands. The spacecraft will be tracked from the ground through its radio and an on-board GPS system and micro-accelerometer.
Solar Sail Watch, a program designed for the general public, will invite people around the world to help track Cosmos 1 and photograph its progress across the night sky. Once its sails unfurl, Cosmos 1 will be bright enough to be easily visible to the naked eye. The Planetary Society urges everyone to witness this historic mission first hand.
The spacecraft will be launched on a Volna rocket to an approximately 800-km high, circular, near polar orbit.
Konstantin Pichkhadze, first deputy of Designer General and Director General of Lavochkin Association, stated, "The solar sail is an important step in development of space technologies. Now we are running through the final stage of this project, which became a reality thanks to the efforts of The Planetary Society and Cosmos Studios. Lavochkin Association has been creating automatic spacecraft since 1965 and performed the first soft landings on the Moon and Venus in the 1960's and 70's. Building the solar sail spacecraft has involved interesting and complicated problems, which we worked on solving with the Institute of Space Research of the Russian Academy of Sciences. The Lavochkin Association team developed a number of successful project and engineering solutions which helped us to create this small spacecraft to help conduct great space ventures."

Группа ученых из Франции, России и Великобритании, при поддержке Международной ассоциации исследования рака, разработала метод маркировки определенных молекул клетки при помощи флюоресцирующих в любом спектре света наночастиц. Эта разработка может кардинально изменить методы диагностики и лечения раковых заболеваний.

Scientists funded by the Association for International Cancer Research have developed tiny fluorescent crystals barely visible to the human eye that could revolutionise cancer diagnosis and treatment in a big way.
In one of the largest international and interdisciplinary collaborations the UK-based charity has funded, researchers from France, Russia and Britain specialising in the highly-complex field of nanotechnology have developed a method of labelling specific molecules within cells using nano-scale marker particles that can be detected by their very strong fluorescence when any light from ultraviolet to red is shone on them.
Already the team are using them to study tissue samples from patients to detect and monitor in real time specific molecules inside cancer cells, made possible because of a series of scientific triumphs not previously achieved.
The first was to work out how to synthesise the nanocrystals in large enough quantities to use them to study biological samples. Next they had to make them soluble in water and the third stage was to develop a coating for the nanocrystals that prevented them from being too toxic to biological material.
Once these hurdles had been overcome, Dr Igor Bronstein of the University of York (currently working at the Institute for Animal Health in Compton, Berkshire) together with Professors Igor Nabiev from Reims, in France and Vladimir Oleinikov from the Russian Academy of Sciences in Moscow used sophisticated methods of protein chemistry to attach nanocrystals to antibodies and used them to identify the molecule p-glycoprotein which is known to make cancer cells resistant to chemotherapy.
Explains Dr Bronstein:"The nanocrystals were so bright that a single molecule of p-glycoprotein on the cell surface could be detected. The challenge then was to optimise the nanocrystals for their direct application to diagnosis by using surgical biopsies. The simultaneous multicolour labelling of different cancer markers was the proof of principle step, showing that nanocrystals could be used with any type of antibody to analyse any type of molecule in cancer cells and tissues more effectively and more accurately than had been possible before".
According to Derek Napier, AICR's Chief Executive, nanotechnology could change the way we approach cancer research. "To understand the rise and progression of cancer we need a long term tracking of cells and molecules. The available existing fluorescent dyes suffer from photodegradation and can't do it. Nanotechnology is removing these obstacles and moreover, these crystals are extremely stable and fluoresce for many days. I believe this important development has opened up a new path towards more effective methods to diagnose and treat cancer in the future".

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