Ноябрь 1999 г.

Российская наука и мир (по материалам зарубежной электронной прессы)

CONTENTS / ОГЛАВЛЕНИЕ


• Science and Higher Education in Russia
• Moscow will help build Large Hadron Collider
• Search of Russian ecologist's flat 'illegal'
• U.S. Cuts Retraining of Russian Weaponeers
• Russian peace researcher detained
• Argonne Biochips May Halt Tuberculosis Epidemic
• New Flea Imperils Fish, Fouls Gear
• $2m ransom sought for kidnapped ecologists
• Stalking a Killer in Russia's Prisons
• Israel shuts four 'incubators' for high-tech companies
• Newsweek: Exclusive Interview: Texas Governor George W. Bush
• Tri-Valley Profits Up
• New NASA Probe To 'Listen' to Mars
• China Holds Unmanned Space Test

Двое польских ученых - экологов и двое российских ученых из института биологических ресурсов Российской Академии наук были похищены в Чечне.

Ассоциация международных организаций по здравоохранению объединяет свои усилия в борьбе против туберкулеза среди заключенных, а также гражданского населения в Томской области.

Nowhere is the problem of drug-resistant strains of tuberculosis more acute than in Russia, particularly in its teeming prisons. Now a consortium of international health organizations is combining a traditional treatment program with a targeted attack on drug-resistant strains, the largest ever mounted. The effort, which will treat both civilians and the prison population throughout the Russian region of Tomsk, will provide a model for other wider campaigns against TB in Russia, say public health experts.

В следующем году в Израиле будут закрыты 4 из 16 организаций " инкубаторов" , в которых проверяются высокие технологии. Эти организации были созданы в 1991 году первоначально для того, чтобы помочь ученым-иммигрантам из бывшего Советского Союза продолжать свои исследования.

JERUSALEM -- Four of Israel's 16 publicly supported " incubators" for high-tech entrepreneurship are to close next year, says the office of Israel's chief scientist. The incubators were set up in 1991, originally to help immigrant scientists from the former Soviet Union develop their research. Dafna Zamir, assistant to chief scientist Orna Berry, says that the closures are intended to make the programme more efficient, and that there will be no cuts in the number of projects accepted. No decision has been taken on which incubators will close, says Zamir. But the main criterion will be the number of projects that they have been able to attract. The decision to close the incubators follows a fierce debate in the country's newspapers. Critics, including economists and some entrepreneurs, argue that the programme is a waste of money that has failed to produce profitable companies. But the programme's director, Rina Pridor, denies this and has fought successfully to preserve the current level of funding in the face of a move by treasury officials to make cuts. The programme provides US$300,000 in seed funds over a two-year period, as well as managerial and administrative assistance. According to the latest figures, which cover the period up to June 1999, more than half of the projects that began in the incubators have continued under their own steam after leaving the framework, most with private funds. There has been $240 million of private investment in incubator projects since the programme began, notes Pridor, while the government has invested $180 million. One of the criticisms of the programme is that some of the incubators are in outlying areas rather than big cities. This was intended to attract high-tech industry away from the crowded central region and to make the incubators available to immigrants housed in these areas during a period when Israel had to absorb more than half a million immigrants in three years. Zamir says that geography will not be a consideration in deciding which ones to close. Elie Englender, the director of the Ofek La'Oleh incubator, located in a small town near Haifa, says he's not worried, because he has no shortage of projects. He says the current grants make it difficult for incubator start-up companies to pay their researchers decent salaries.

" I Don't Intend to Lose It," When Asked if He Could Win Nomination if He Loses New Hampshire Primary
On Whether He Thought President Bush Should Have Sent Troops to Baghdad in Gulf War, " No, I Don't" ; " It Would Have Changed The Nature Of The War"

На вопросы корреспондента отвечает губернатор штата Техас Джорд В. Буш. На вопросы о внешней политике Д. Буш ответил, что он бы полностью изменил решение Конгресса о сокращении бюджета для переучивания российских ученых- разработчиков ядерного оружия.

NEW YORK, Nov. 14 /PRNewswire/ --When asked whether he can win the nomination if he loses the New Hampshire primary, Texas Governor George W. Bush tells Newsweek in an exclusive interview, " The answer is, I don't intend to lose it. You're trying to get me to admit I could lose it and, you know, I'm a positive guy." Yet he acknowledges that it has happened in the past, saying, " I think the candidates can stumble in early primary states somewhere and still recover. But I intend to give it my best shot in each state." When Bush is asked why he thinks Arizona Senator John McCain is drawing such a good response in New Hampshire, he says, " I think John is a good man. I do think his story is compelling, and I think people become interested in a man who has served as a POW. He's a straight talker. The way I'm going to campaign in the primaries is, I'm going to treat John with respect," he tells Chief Political Correspondent Howard Fineman in the current issue. (Photo: http://www.newscom.com/cgi-bin/prnh/19991114/HSSU001 ) In the interview Bush also discusses the decision of former president George Bush Sr. to not send troops to Baghdad during the gulf war. " First of all, the commander in chief listens to the military, and he listened to the military. Secondly, it would have changed the nature of the war. The coalition would have been very difficult to keep together. And it would have expanded the mission. When he got up in front of the world, he said, The mission is to free Kuwait.' That was the mission." When Bush, whose recent foreign policy missteps made headlines, is asked about talk of an independent military force for the European Union, he conveys a wait-and-see attitude. " NATO is ultimately going to be the alliance that helps us deal with Russia in the long term. The EU military is at its very early stages of planning... It depends on how it is ultimately structured. If it strengthens NATO, I'd support it. If it would weaken NATO, I wouldn't," he tells Fineman in the November 22 issue of Newsweek (on newsstands, Monday, November 15 ). On other foreign policy matters, he says he would reverse Congress's decision to cut the budget to retrain Russian scientists and he is in favor of China joining the World Trade Organization. But he says, " I think it' s very important for us to let the Chinese know we don't appreciate violations of human rights and we don't appreciate the spread of weaponry."

Компания Tri-Valley продолжает работу с Центральным научно-исследовательским геологоразведочным институтом (ЦНИГРИ), базирующимся в Москве. Ученые ЦНИГРИ определили новое месторождение золота на части территории, закрепленной за компанией Tri-Valley's. Кроме того, был обследован участок в 10 квадратных миль из 160 акров площади разведки, чтобы проследить тенденцию.

BAKERSFIELD, Calif.--(BUSINESS WIRE) --With an exceptionally strong third quarter net income of $549,198, Tri-Valley Corp. (OTCBB:TRIL - news) posted a nine months to date net income of $219,414 compared with losses of $294,977 and $870,870 for the previous year's third quarter and nine months, respectively. Gross assets rose from $2,278,519 to $9,823,817 it was announced Monday by F. Lynn Blystone,president and chief executive officer. Increases were due to the activities of the company's subsidiary, Tri-Valley Oil & Gas Co., which is focusing on the burgeoning deep oil play in the South San Joaquin Valley outside its headquarters city of Bakersfield. TVOG is a major player in what is emerging as the biggest onshore oil and gas play in North America. Sale of a portion of its interest in this deep play, code-named Ekho Project, brought Tri-Valley's revenues to $1,956,867 for the three months ending Sept. 30, 1999, and $2,350,120 for the nine months ended Sept. 30, 1999, compared with $217,005 and $768,692 for the same periods for the previous year. TVOG, as Operator, recently joined with nine Canadian companies in an area of mutual interest of more than 300,000 acres to pursue deep targets of billions of barrels of oil and trillions of cubic feet of natural gas in place in the midst of the premier market of California, the world's seventh largest economy. The initial test well has been funded at $9.5 million with two more to follow in the consortium test program. On the mineral scene, Tri-Valley's 61.5 square mile claim block at Richardson, Alaska, continued positive results from Placer Dome U.S. Inc. exploration activity and from Tri-Valley's joint work with TsNIGRI, the principal Russian mineral research institute based in Moscow. PDUS conducted a broad grid of soil auger tests on its 36 miles of optioned claims and core drilled three information holes at the end of the season. As a result, Tri-Valley's property survived the first cut on Placer Dome's worldwide property retention list. TsNIGRI scientists identified a new gold-bearing zone on Tri-Valley's retained portion of the claim block and another 10 square miles of 160-acre prospecting sites was staked to cover the trend. Tri-Valley management believes the Richardson database continues to support commercial mining potential in its claim block. TVOG is the wholly owned subsidiary of Tri-Valley Corp., which is publicly traded over-the-counter on the electronic bulletin board under the symbol " TRIL." Both companies have headquarters in Bakersfield, and share the Web site www.tri-valleycorp.com. This news release contains forward-looking statements that involve risks and uncertainties. Actual results, events and performance could vary materially from those contemplated by these forward-looking statements. Among the factors that could cause actual results, events and performance to differ materially are risks and uncertainties discussed in the company's quarterly report on Form 10-QSB for the quarter ended Sept. 30, 1999, and the annual report on Form 10-KSB for the year ended Dec. 31, 1998.

В следующем месяце предполагается посадить на поверхность Марса космический летательный аппарат с прибором обнаружения света и измерения дальности , разработанными в России, с целью записать звуки, идущие с Красной планеты. С помощью прибора можно изучить состав марсианской пыли , в нем есть место для размещения источников питания и связи, а также микрофонов, используемых обычно в говорящих игрушках и телефонах. Российские коллеги согласились разместить микрофоны в своем приборе бесплатно.

PASADENA, Calif. (AP) - A NASA spacecraft set to land on Mars next month will attempt for the first time to capture the sounds of the Red Planet - using a $15 microphone connected to a chip commonly found in talking toys and telephones. Unlike other instruments aboard the $165 million Mars Polar Lander, the Mars Microphone is privately funded and has no clearly defined scientific mission.
Its purpose is simply to capture the planet's noises, whether they be the whoosh of a dust devil, the crackle of lightning or the whir of sand blowing through the thin atmosphere. Dead silence is another possibility.
Sponsors believe the 10-second sound bites it can record will further fuel the public's interest in an alien world that for years has been fodder for science fiction - and serve as a tool to teach the physics of sound.
"This is going to be another way of getting another sense on Mars - and a sense of Mars," said Louis Friedman, executive director of the Planetary Society, a private group that spent less than $50,000 on the entire microphone project. The microphone is the culmination of a quarter century of dreams, rejections, dismissal by some scientists and clever planning. Carl Sagan, the late planetary scientist who successfully fought for cameras on spacecraft in the 1960s, first proposed wiring a lander for sound during the Viking missions to Mars in the 1970s.
But the idea never became a priority because scientists believed other instruments such as thermometers and spectral analyzers could provide more valuable data.
"With our knowledge of what you get out of listening to sound, how important is that relative to other measurements?" said Joseph Boyce, the lander's program scientist at NASA. "It's probably important, but not as important as temperature or pressure."
Two proposals to wire wind-measurement experiments for sound were rejected for the lander mission. Friedman thought there might be another way.
After raising money from the group's 100,000 members, the society approached the Russian Space Research Institute, which was placing that nation's first instrument aboard the Mars Polar Lander.
It turned out that Russia's Light Detection and Ranging device, which will study the makeup of Martian dust, had leftover space, power and communications resources, leaving room for the microphone. The Russians agreed to host it for free.
Meanwhile, the Planetary Society partnered with scientists at the University of California, Berkeley's Space Science Lab to construct and test the equipment.
"Because the instrument was not built within the NASA framework, extra costs were bypassed," said Janet Luhmann of the Berkeley lab.
The instrument consists of off-the-shelf parts, including a computer sound chip commonly found in toys and a hearing-aid microphone half the size of a pea. The whole unit is the size of pack of Post-it notes and weighs less than 2 ounces.
"When we presented that to NASA, it was an offer they couldn't refuse because it wouldn't cost them anything, it was privately funded and was for educational purposes," he said.
About five hours after landing on Dec. 3, the microphone will record the sounds from the deployment of the lander's camera. On subsequent days, it will try to capture the noises of the planet itself with the spacecraft kept quiet. "We sense there will be a lot of noises to listen to," Friedman said. "And what they will allow us to discover we're not sure yet."
The device is programmed to record 10 seconds at a time, with louder sounds erasing the previous recording. The quality will be equivalent to a telephone call. It can be improved, but only by reducing the recording time. After the sounds are collected and transmitted, they will be posted on the Planetary Society's Web site and played at the group's PlanetFest '99 convention on the weekend of the landing. A previous attempt to record noise from another planet never reached such an audience. Soviet scientists are believed to have placed a microphone on a Venus spacecraft in the Venera program, but results were never published. The latest microphone may sound like an expensive PR stunt, but the sounds could help both scientists and mission engineers.
"Almost anything that you put on a spacecraft that has a sensor on it, scientists will use for science," Boyce said. "The microphone is going to be no exception to that. Some enterprising scientist will come up with many ways we haven't thought of to use it."

Китай еще на один шаг приблизился к космическим программам США и России после проведения испытания непилотируемого полета космического корабля.
Китайские ученые адаптировали российский космический корабль Союз, но он тяжелее, имеет 4 солнечных батареи по сравнению с двумя, передний модуль имеет не сферическую, а цилиндрическую форму. Китайские ученые также использовали систему жизнеобеспечения российского космического корабля для тренировки космонавтов.

BEIJING (AP)-- China is one step closer to catching up to the U.S. and Russian space programs after conducting its first unmanned test of a spacecraft designed to carry astronauts. The spacecraft Shenzhou safely touched down on land in north China's Inner Mongolia early Sunday after 21 hours orbiting Earth.
Western experts say after this accomplishment - a breakthrough for the nation's secretive space program - China will probably send its first manned mission into space next year.
While the most recent flight was unmanned, the Shenzhou (pronounced shun-jo) is capable of carrying astronauts, who are dubbed "taikonauts" in Beijing from the Chinese word for space.
"This looks to have been an excellent start to the Chinese manned space program and puts them on a course for a manned flight in about a year's time," said Phillip Clark, a British expert on the Chinese program.
He predicted a manned flight sometime in October to December of next year, if no problems arise. The state-run Xinhua News Agency said more unmanned tests were planned before a manned flight, but gave no timetable. China did not announce Sunday's flight until after the craft had landed.
The spacecraft was adapted by Chinese scientists from the design of the Russian Soyuz craft, but it is heavier, has four solar panels compared with two, and has a forward module that is cylindrical instead of spherical, Clark said.
China also turned to Russia for the craft's life-support system and for astronaut training, he said. As early as 2001 or 2002, the nation is likely to put into orbit a small lab that future crews can visit, Clark said. Chinese experts also have discussed a new family of modular launch vehicles, including a large one that would likely be for a moon landing, possibly in 10 or 20 years, he said.
According to Clark, the test flight over the weekend was originally scheduled for last fall, and the first manned flight for this October, around the time of the 50th anniversary of communist rule on Oct. 1. But development problems with the new Long March 2F rocket caused a yearlong delay. Although China's space program has been highly secretive, Western observers knew a test launch was imminent when China deployed four space-tracking ships at sea, Clark said.
James Oberg, a 22-year veteran of the U.S. space shuttle program who now works as an independent consultant, said U.S. space command officials also tracked the latest launch, flight and landing. "This basically is proof they have attained a very exclusive level of space capability," he said.
The Shenzhou, which means "magic vessel" but whose characters sound the same as a name for China, was launched from the Jiuquan center in northwest China's Gansu province on Saturday, the state media reported.
President Jiang Zemin approved the manned space program, named Project 921, in 1992. China launched its first satellite in 1970. The program is a source of pride for the largely rural nation, where average incomes hover at only $260 per year. An unidentified official in charge of the manned flight project was quoted by the Chinese media as saying it would "strengthen the country's comprehensive national strength, promote the development
of science and technology, enhance national prestige (and) boost the nation's sense of pride and cohesiveness."
In addition to boosting national pride, China expects practical results from its space mission. Chinese military officers have written about the need to improve satellite communications and to develop space-based weapons.

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