Commenting on the Sept. 18 decision by the European Organization for Nuclear Research (CERN) to eliminate hundreds of Russian scientists that were working near Geneva on the large Hadron Collider, Mikhail Kovalchuk, president of Russia’s Kurchatov Institute National Research Center told Izvestia Sept. 21 that it would have a beneficial effect on Russian science. He noted that the separation, as any termination of relations in science, as well as other fields, is always painful. But for Russian science, however, “this is a positive moment,” he said, “since the mega-projects developing in Russia today require many scientists and engineers.”
“We have a large program for the development of mega-science installations in the country, launched by a presidential decree. Huge amounts of money have been allocated for it—more than half a trillion rubles for a fairly short period—until the early 2030s,” he said. He pointed to the world’s most powerful high-flux neutron research reactor in Gatchina, a different unique facility combining an X-ray free-electron laser and a synchrotron accelerator in Protvino, a new fourth-generation synchrotron source SKIF (Siberian Ring Photon Source) in Siberia, as well as two SKIF experimental stations for the Vector Virology Center in Siberia, and a new Russian Photon Source Facility on the campus of the Far Eastern Federal University which studies proteins, molecular and atomic structures. In addition he pointed to a lithography synchrotron in Zelenograd, which was built in Soviet times, but now is operating at full capacity, as well as a new Tokamak at the Kurchatov Institute.
“We have always had some of the best nuclear physics installations in the world, for high-energy physics, elementary particles, and for synchrotron-neutron research,” Kovalchuk said. He also noted the loss that CERN and other scientific centers in Europe would suffer by the banishment of the Russian researchers and scientists working at them.
“Indeed, in addition to the fact that we are an intellectual donor, and in fact, all these projects were launched thanks to the arrival of Russian scientists in the West, in Europe, we were also one of the largest financial donors,” he said. “Therefore, let them think about what consequences they will now have from our departure. In every sense, both financial and intellectual.”
Kovalchuk also noted the fundamental breakthroughs by Russian science which had allowed the development of some of these projects. “We and the Americans were actually the only countries that developed and invented these installations on a full scale. For example, any accelerator in the world, colliding beams, colliders—all of this was invented in Russia. Each accelerator has a principle of autophasing. And it was proposed by Academician Veksler. Synchrotron radiation itself was predicted by our academicians Pomeranchuk and Ivanenko,” he noted, not forgetting to add the invention by Russia of the tokamak, which is now the workhorse of fusion development.
