Апрель
2009 г. |
Российская наука и мир
(по материалам зарубежной электронной прессы) |
Шесть добровольцев примут участие в уникальном эксперименте - они проведут 105 дней в закрытом помещении в рамках эксперимента по имитации полета на Марс.
Сооружение, состоящее из металлических капсул, соединенных между собой кабелем и металлическими трубами, расположено на территории Института медико-биологических проблем (ИМБП). В помещении будет, насколько это возможно, воссоздана атмосфера космического корабля.
In a car park not so far away... It is a big brother experiment like no other, an experiment which will boldly go where few have gone - or probably wanted to go - before.
Six apparently fearless volunteers are to take part in a unique test by being locked up in what amounts to a series of small steel tins off a parking lot in Moscow for 105 days as scientists simulate a space rocket ride to Mars.
On Tuesday the team will step into a chain of cramped metal capsules, connected by cables and corrugated metal pipes, in a hangar at the back of the Institute of Medical and Biological Problems (IMBP) in the Russian capital, swing close the hatch and "blast off".
The idea is for the 550 cubic-metre "ground exploration complex" (GEC) to recreate as closely as possible the atmosphere of a spacecraft racing through the solar system, bombarded by cosmic radiation. Any return flight to Mars - at least 34 million miles from our planet - would take between 18 months and three years, including landing and exploration.
The volunteers - four Russians, a French airline pilot and a German army engineer - will be kept under constant camera surveillance to record the physical and psychological impact of their time in the isolation chamber.
They will eat packaged rations, wash with damp tissues and spend several hours each day conducting experiments, just as astronauts would on a real space flight. They will use the same toilet as crew on the international space station, which has fans to propel waste into a "sanitary receptacle". They will eat together, work out in a tiny gym - and may even get in to the odd punch-up.
Mark Belokovksy of the IMBP admitted the psychological pressure of living in close quarters with five other human beings could crack even the toughest guinea pigs.
"Tension is inevitable," he said candidly. The fact the 105-day "flight" will be a single-sex trip on this occasion may be a blessing. During a similar experiment in 1999 the participants were given vodka to celebrate New Year's Eve: two members then got in a fist fight after one tried to kiss a female volunteer from Canada.
The capsules have no windows and the explorers' only contact with the outside world will be via an internal email system and a delayed radio link to the "control centre" positioned alongside the GEC.
Each member of the team has a narrow bed and only three cubic metres of personal space. They can take one bag with books and DVDs with them, but will have no access to television or the internet.
"Just like cosmonauts we will have eight hours sleep, eight hours work and eight hours for personal matters - intake of food, physical exercise and free time," said Sergei Ryazansky, 34, a space research expert, who will lead the crew.
Crew members are expected to deal with all but the severest medical emergencies themselves - one of the Russian volunteers is a doctor - although each maintains the right to quit the project at any moment without giving a reason.
While the virtual journey cannot recreate weightlessness - without going into space that is only possible for brief periods in an aircraft - separate tests may be used to simulate the long-term effects of zero gravity. Head-down bed-rest tests, where a volunteer stays for weeks or months in a bed that slopes by six to eight degrees towards the head, recreate the redistribution of blood in the body without gravity.
Other experiments will monitor microbiological contamination using an "electronic nose" and examine the effect of long periods of restricted activity on the bones of the crew members.
Since the Apollo flights of the late 1960s and early 1970s there have been no manned flights beyond Earth's orbit. While a flight to Mars is thought to be 20 to 30 years away, Belokovsky said conducting such experiments brought the date ever closer. "The knowledge gleaned from the experiment will be invaluable in planning for such a trip," he said.
Volunteers on the 105-day stint will receive a payment of €15,000 (£14,000), but Belokovksy said money was not the main motivating factor. "They are driven by the chance to take part in an experiment of international significance," he said.
"Like being stuck in a lift"
What will happen to the human guinea pigs? Dr Claudia Herbert, chartered clinical psychologist and clinical director of the Oxford Stress and Trauma Centre, explains:
"Obviously three months in a capsule is going to be a highly stressful experience and I wonder what preparation and testing the Russian authorities have conducted in choosing and preparing these volunteers for the experiment. They are going into a small social group from which no one can escape, with different personalities, temperaments, cultures and languages. It will be like being stuck in a lift, which can be very stressful even in ordinary conditions - we all have a personal space which we do not like to be invaded by others. What happens in groups is that somebody will crystalise as the leader and in these circumstances, depending on how carefully the group has been chosen and bearing in mind the sort of people who volunteer for these sorts of exercises, there may be two or three displaying leadership characteristics. They are likely to be risk takers and strong personalities, which in itself can make cooperation difficult.
It would be good if they have had some mindfulness training: clearing their minds, meditating, taking deep breaths: being aware what is going on in your own mind and learning not to be affected by others. I hope the volunteers do not have vulnerability factors such as traumas from their past that they may not have thought about but which may now surface in such stressful conditions."
guardian.co.uk © Guardian News and Media Limited 2009.
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Сотрудники Института химической биологии и фундаментальной медицины СО РАН исследовали микроорганизмы рода Arthrobacter и Pseudomonas, выделенные из антарктического льда, и обнаружили у этих бактерий множественную устойчивость к антибиотикам.
Устойчивость к антибиотикам микроорганизмов - различных возбудителей болезней, стала одной из серьезнейших проблем современной медицины, которая уже ставит под сомнение смысл терапии антибиотиками.
Des chercheurs de la section sibérienne de l'Académie des sciences russe ont découvert de nouveaux microorganismes résistants aux antibiotiques, remettant un peu plus en question l'efficacité future de ces médicaments.
Ces microorganismes prélevés dans l'Antarctique, des variétés Arthrobacter et Pseudomonas, ont la faculté de résister aux antibiotiques. Disséminées dans des milieux nutritifs divers et à des températures variables, la plupart de ces bactéries ont résisté à treize des dix-sept antibiotiques testés. La néomycine et la tétracycline n'ont pas rencontré de résistance mais certaines des bactéries auraient même la faculté de se servir des antibiotiques comme agents de leur propre croissance.
Les bactéries de type Pseudomonas sont aussi répandues dans l'air que dans le sol et l'eau. Un seul type peut atteindre l'Homme et provoquer des irritations au niveau de la peau et des muqueuses. Ces bactéries sont considérées comme agents infectieux liés au développement des infections nosocomiales. Les bactéries de type Arthrobacter sont naturellement résistantes à certains antibiotiques et sont même capables de fabriquer des antibiotiques pour lutter contre d'autres bactéries.
Cette étude montre aussi que l'Antarctique n'est plus aussi vierge qu'on pouvait le penser. L'Homme, comme les courants marins, y amène des microorganismes.
© 2009 Maxisciences.
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Запуск российской автоматической межпланетной станции "Фобос-грунт", намеченный на октябрь 2009 года, откладывается до 2011 года. Целью проекта было исследование спутника Марса Фобоса и доставкиа образцов его грунта на Землю.
Russia will announce a two-year delay of its flagship planetary mission this month, a project participant told IEEE Spectrum.
The 11-ton Phobos-Grunt spacecraft, designed to land on the surface of the Martian moon Phobos and return samples of its soil back to Earth, was scheduled to lift off October 2009. A number of science institutions around the world have contributed instruments and experiments for the ambitious project. However, according to Francis Rocard, a scientist at CNES, the French space agency, which supplied some of the scientific payloads for the project, Russian space officials are about to announce a postponement of Phobos-Grunt's launch to 2011.
"What we know is that they are waiting for the 2009 budget [to be finalized], and then they will announce a delay," says Rocard. Since the orbital mechanics only allow launches to Mars once every 25 to 26 months, the next opportunity for the Phobos-Grunt mission to leave Earth would not come until the end of 2011 or beginning of 2012.
Many reports cite unnamed sources saying there were problems with the spacecraft development during 2008 and 2009, but Russian space officials continue to insist that the mission will leave for Mars as scheduled during the 2009 launch window.
The Phobos-Grunt spacecraft would be the first Russian attempt to send the planetary probe beyond the Earth orbit since 1996, when another mission to the Red Planet involving wide international participation ended in a launch mishap. In the ensuing years, the Phobos-Grunt project had acquired an important political purpose: to prove that Russia was returning to deep-space exploration and could lead a major international science project. As a result, Russian scientific and engineering managers in charge of the project were probably under political pressure to maintain the promised launch date despite overwhelming odds. Although Phobos-Grunt has been on the books since the end of the 1990s, the real funding for the project started in 2007 - way too late for the development of such a complex mission, say experts.
Representatives of the Russian space agency and the state-controlled Russian press continued to actively promote the project as late as the beginning of 2009. In the meantime, anonymous postings on Internet forums - such as Novosti Kosmonavtiki, a magazine popular among Russian space engineers - were saying that many critical aspects of the mission, such as flight control computers and software, were in the embryonic state of development, making an October launch seem impossible and calling into question even the 2011 launch date. Critics have long called the Phobos-Grunt an overly ambitious enterprise that is beyond the current experience of a Russian space industry battered by a decade of economic crisis, dwindling staff, inadequate funding, and poor management.
"All this is going to end up in a scandal," says Roald Sagdeev, a physics professor at the University of Maryland and former director of the Space Research Institute (IKI), in Moscow, which oversees the science program of the Phobos-Grunt mission. "This project became so politically loaded that people involved will probably be reluctant to admit the true state of affairs until the very last minute," he says.
Lev Zelenyi, the current director of IKI, would not comment when Spectrum questioned him about the status of the mission.
Russia is not alone in having to delay a Mars mission. In December 2008, NASA's Mars Science Laboratory mission, featuring the largest rover yet to drive on the surface of Mars, was postponed from 2009 to 2011. In October 2008, the launch of a European rover, which was expected to focus on the search for life on Mars, had to be pushed back from 2013 to 2016.
© Copyright 2009 IEEE - All Rights Reserved.
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В России начинается разработка корабля, который должен прийти на смену "Союзу" к июню 2010 года. Это будет корабль многократного использования, рассчитанный на экипаж до 6 человек и способный при некотором усовершенствовании достигать даже орбиты Луны. Корабль также будет подстраховывать экспедиции на Луну, запланированные Китаем, Европой, Японией и Индией на 2020-е годы.
Russia is embarking on its most ambitious space project since the heady days of the space race: planning a new spaceship, launcher and even a new launch site. The plans are remarkably similar to NASA's Orion project and could provide a vital fallback if the US, Russia or other nations run into trouble with space missions.
Until now, Russia (and formerly, the Soviet Union) has simply upgraded its existing space facilities and hardware. Its three-person Soyuz spacecraft, for example, is now in its fifth generation in 40 years. But with top-level Kremlin backing, the Russian space agency Roskosmos is planning to entirely replace its current launch facilities, the rockets used to reach orbit, and the Soyuz itself. Future launches will take place from a new site near the Pacific coast city of Vladivostok.
"Post-Soviet Russia has never had a massive project of this kind," boasted Aleksey Krasnov, head of the agency's human spaceflight programme in a recent press briefing.
On Monday, the agency announced that the space firm Energia would receive 800 million rubles ($24 million) to design the 20-tonne Soyuz replacement by June 2010. The first manned flight is planned for 2018.
New space race?
The craft is to carry up to six people - twice the seating of the Soyuz - or else a cargo load of 500 kilograms. It will be reusable, with up to 10 flights before retirement.
The basic design will be able to either orbit the Earth on its own or dock with the international space station, and may even be able to even repair or retrieve orbiting satellites. A beefed-up version could be capable of flights to lunar orbit and back - and perhaps beyond.
The design's suite of capabilities is similar to NASA's Orion spacecraft already under development, already earning Russia's spacecraft the tongue-in-cheek nickname "Orionski".
The Obama Administration has endorsed NASA's Bush-era plans to return astronauts to the moon, and the new craft could let Moscow achieve the same goal. This will give NASA a long-hoped-for boost in Congress by echoing the space race motivations of the 1960s.
However, the new craft will also provide a valuable lifeline for all space-faring nations. After the 2003 Columbia disaster grounded NASA's shuttle fleet for several years Soyuz provided the only way to keep the space station going. The new Russian vehicle could enhance the flexibility, effectiveness, and safety of lunar missions planned by China, Europe, Japan and India in the 2020s.
© Copyright Reed Business Information Ltd.
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Le Phénomène Soljenitsyne / Georges Nivat. - éd. Fayard. - 430 p.
Крупнейшее парижское издательство "Файяр" выпустило монографию "Феномен Солженицына". Ее автор - Жорж Нива, специалист по СССР и России, славист, директор "русской серии", издаваемой "Файяр" уже много лет и главный редактор изданной во Франции "Энциклопедии русской литературы". Нива также является переводчиком на французский ряда трудов Солженицына.
Scientifique, dissident, historien, pourfendeur de l'Occident... il a vécu maintes vies. Georges Nivat, son traducteur et ami, offre un éclairage incomparable sur l'œuvre du grand prosateur russe.
Peut-on rendre compte du "phénomène Soljenitsyne", comme le promet dans son nouvel essai Georges Nivat? Entre critique féroce et éloge stérile, les biographies du grand homme n'étaient jusqu'à présent guère mesurées. Traducteur et ami de l'écrivain, Nivat possède une connaissance intime de son œuvre, éclairée par une juste vision de sa valeur et de sa portée. Cela rend son essai essentiel, car ouvert aux paradoxes et à la contradiction.
Soljenitsyne, mort en août 2008 à l'âge de 89 ans, a connu plusieurs vies. Scientifique de formation, officier de l'Armée rouge pendant la Seconde Guerre mondiale, il est envoyé dans un camp de travail pour avoir critiqué Staline dans une lettre privée. C'est au bagne qu'il commence à écrire. Une journée d'Ivan Denissovitch (son seul ouvrage paru en URSS, en 1962), Le Premier Cercle ou Le Pavillon des cancéreux révèlent l'écrivain dissident, qui obtient en 1970 le prix Nobel de littérature. Ces trois livres sont certainement les meilleures œuvres littéraires de l'écrivain. C'est cependant avec L'Archipel du Goulag, explique Nivat, qu'il s'impose comme un titan des lettres, par "l'immensité du témoignage, la rigueur de son architecture, le souffle épique, la richesse de l'émotion, la force de l'ironie et, surtout, la lumière qui traverse ce sous-sol déshumanisé de notre planète". Ecrite dans des conditions extrêmement hostiles, cette fresque de l'horreur concentrationnaire est publiée en Occident en 1973, ce qui vaut à l'auteur arrestation et expulsion d'URSS.
Déchu de la nationalité soviétique, Soljenitsyne s'exile à Zurich puis aux Etats-Unis, dans le Vermont. De là, il se lance dans le projet le plus démentiel de sa carrière: de 1976 à 1991, il travaille en ermite à La Roue rouge, 6 600 pages (1) au cours desquelles l'écrivain se transforme en historien et met à nu les causes de la Révolution russe de 1917. Un projet qu'il mûrit depuis l'âge de 18 ans, mais qui est accueilli dans l'indifférence. Un "échec de génie", selon Nivat. Soljenitsyne, qui avait prophétisé la chute du communisme, retrouve la Russie en 1994. L'ex-dissident devient sur le tard un apôtre du pouvoir central renforcé et le lauréat du prix d'Etat du Kremlin, remis par Vladimir Poutine. Dénonciateur féroce des années Eltsine, il a vu dans l'actuel Premier ministre l'acteur d'une possible stabilisation du pays. L'avenir lui donnera-t-il une fois de plus raison?
Polémiste infatigable, Soljenitsyne a été accusé, jusqu'à la fin de sa vie, de tous les maux. C'est qu'il a toujours refusé le compromis. Pourfendeur du communisme, il s'est opposé à la détente. Critique majeur du totalitarisme soviétique, il est devenu un imprécateur anti-occidental tout aussi virulent. Etait-il pour autant le "fanatique doctrinaire", "nationaliste", "mystique", ou même antisémite que ses ennemis ont décrit?
Non, soutient Nivat, même si les grandes convictions comportent leur part d'aveuglement, les grandes vérités leur part d'ombre. En fait, souligne l'essayiste, "nous ne pouvons mesurer Soljenitsyne à l'aune des habituels concepts du débat intellectuel: gauche ou droite, passéiste ou progressiste, nationaliste ou universaliste".
"Dante de notre temps"
Hors du temps et de la mode, l'écrivain enseigne à son lecteur qu'en toutes circonstances il faut rester soi-même, qu'il est possible de créer une démocratie à la base plutôt qu'au sommet, et qu'il convient de pratiquer l'autolimitation dans sa vie personnelle comme dans la consommation de masse. Message trop exclusivement russe, tout entier tourné vers une démarche spirituelle chrétienne? C'est la limite et la grandeur de Soljenitsyne. "Dante de notre temps", il a changé notre vision du monde, lui restituant le sens de l'enfer et du salut, du bien et du mal. XXe siècle, âge terrible: siècle de Soljenitsyne.
(1) La Roue rouge. T. 4-1. Avril 17, quatrième noeud, à paraître chez Fayard courant avril.
© Copyright L'Express.
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Статья о музее космонавтики в Москве.
There is the small capsule used by Laika, the first dog in space. There are the other two space dogs, Belka and Strelka, both of them stuffed.
Hanging from the ceiling is the world's first satellite - the wok-like Sputnik. Then there is the tiny Vostok capsule used by Major Yuri Gagarin, the first human in space.
After two decades of Russia's apparent lost interest in cosmic exploration, space is back. There is a simulated mission to Mars, a spacecraft programme destined to outlive Nasa's, and now a £ 54m museum designed to acquaint the post-Gagarin generation with Moscow's interplanetary heritage.
During the 1990s the Soviet Union's scientific and technological achievements in space were largely forgotten. Unique relics from the Soviet space programme, including Gagarin's spacesuit, were sold to Washington. Others were dumped on the street. Now, however, space has again become relevant to the Kremlin, keen to revive the Soviet Union's lost prestige.
In the museum gift shop visitors can buy tinned astronaut food, Sputnik caps, and T-shirts showing Laika, sent by the Politburo on a one-way space journey on 3 November 1957. Asked whether she was still up there museum director Yuri Solomko replied: "No." He explained: "Laika was sent up on a low orbit. Unfortunately she burned up re-entering the earth's atmosphere."
The space dogs Belka and Strelka are better known in Russia, he said. On returning to Earth the dogs lived out a natural life, with one of their puppies given to President Kennedy's family in the US by the Soviet leader, Nikita Khrushchev. He went on: "Belka and Strelka were strays. The Soviet Union discovered that strays did better in space than other dogs. They were genetically orientated to survive."
Inside the museum there is a walk-in replica of Russia's Mir orbital space station. There is also a real-time satellite link-up with today's International Space Station, allowing visitors to plot its current position. "Today's space programme is exploring in new directions, towards Venus and Mars," ex-cosmonaut Alexander Aleksandrov said yesterday. Aleksandrov, who spent 309 days in space during missions in 1983 and 1987, admitted that the early days of space travel were probably more exciting than now.
"The first 20 years of space exploration, from 1957 to 1977, were the best. They were more interesting, more romantic," he said. Of the prospect of a manned mission to Mars - a feat that could rekindle global interest in space flight - he said: "Technically it's possible. But there are problems of finance. There are problems protecting astronauts. And it takes one and a half years to get there. Once you set off there's no turning back if you fall ill." But he concluded: "It will happen. I just don't know when."
In another part of Moscow six scientists are simulating a manned mission to Mars. They are spending 105 days in a chain of cramped metal capsules to recreate the effects of a lengthy journey in a spacecraft bombarded by cosmic radiation. All participants are men: in 1999 two volunteers got into a fist fight after one of them tried to kiss a female volunteer from Canada.
guardian.co.uk © Guardian News and Media Limited 2009.
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