February 8 is the 300th anniversary of the founding of the Russian Academy of Sciences and the Day of Russian Science, when there are many celebrations throughout the country. In addition to the Academy in Moscow, there is a Far Eastern branch, a Siberian branch, and now they have created a St. Petersburg branch, a city that was once the Academy home before it moved to Moscow in 1934. In an interview today with Izvestia, RAS President Gennady Krasnikov gave a picture of what areas the Academy will be focusing on, in “New High-Tech Industries Are Being Created in Russia.”
“Today, priority is given to machine-tool building, instrument making, materials science, neural networks, genetics, microelectronics and other areas that will determine our lives in the near future,” Krasnikov said. “Also under our close attention are issues related to security—biological, food and information.”
He emphasized the need for Russia to become self-sufficient in production of high-tech goods in many areas. “We used to live in a big supermarket. They believed that any technology could be bought. The confidence played a cruel joke, because often company leaders knew better what was being done abroad than what was being created nearby—in a neighboring research institute. Today the situation has changed, and issues of technological sovereignty are in first place…. Technological chains are being formed again—from scientific research to actual production. Many enterprises develop their own development departments, which work in contact with institutes. This process is important because it expands funding for science from the commercial sector,” he told Izvestia’s Andrey Korshunov.
