Russian scientists of the past. The most famous scientists in the world
Pythagoras (c. 580-500 BC)
Every schoolchild knows: “In a right triangle, the square of the hypotenuse is equal to the sum of the squares of the legs.” But few people know that Pythagoras was also a philosopher, religious thinker and political figure; it was he who introduced the term “philosophy” into our language, which means “philosophy.” He founded a school whose students were called Pythagoreans, and he was the first to use the word “cosmos.”
Democritus (460-c. 370 BC)
Democritus, like other philosophers of the Ancient world, was always interested in the question of what is the fundamental principle of the Universe. Some sages believed that it was water, others – fire, others – air, and still others – everything combined. Democritus was not convinced by their arguments. Reflecting on the fundamental principle of the world, he came to the conclusion that it was the smallest indivisible particles, which he called atoms. There are a great many of them. The whole world consists of them. They connect and separate. He made this discovery through logical reasoning. And more than two thousand years later, scientists of our time, using physical instruments, proved that he was right.
Euclid (c. 365-300 BC)
Plato's student Euclid wrote the treatise "Elements" in 13 books. In them, the scientist outlined the foundations of geometry, which means in Greek “the science of measuring the Earth,” which for many centuries was called Euclidean geometry. The ancient Greek king Ptolemy I Soter, who ruled in Egyptian Alexandria, demanded that Euclid, who explained the laws of geometry to him, do this shorter and faster. He replied: “Oh, great king, in geometry there are no royal roads...”
Archimedes (287-212 BC)
Archimedes remained in history as one of the most famous Greek mechanics, inventors and mathematicians, who amazed his contemporaries with his amazing machines. Watching the work of builders who used thick sticks to move stone blocks, Archimedes realized that the longer the lever, the greater the force of its impact. He told the Syracusan king Hieron: “Give me a fulcrum, and I will move the Earth.” Hieron didn't believe it. And then Archimedes, with the help of a complex system of mechanisms, with the effort of one hand, pulled the ship ashore, which was usually pulled out of the water by hundreds of people.
Leonardo da Vinci (1452-1519)
The great Italian artist Leonardo da Vinci proved himself to be a universal creator. He was a sculptor, architect, inventor. A brilliant master, he made a huge contribution to art, culture and science. In Italy they called him a sorcerer, a wizard, a man who can do anything. Infinitely talented, he created various mechanisms, designed unprecedented aircraft such as a modern helicopter, and invented a tank.
Nicolaus Copernicus (1473-1543)
Nicolaus Copernicus became famous in the scientific world for his astronomical discoveries. His heliocentric system replaced the previous, Greek, geocentric one. He is the first to scientifically prove that the Sun does not revolve around the Earth, but vice versa. The Earth and other planets revolve around the Sun. Nicolaus Copernicus was a versatile scientist. Widely educated, he treated people, was knowledgeable in economics, and made various instruments and machines himself. Nicolaus Copernicus wrote in Latin and German throughout his life. Not a single document written by him in Polish has been found.
Galileo Galilei (1564-1642)
The young Florentine Galileo Galilei, who studied at the University of Pisa, attracted the attention of professors not only with clever reasoning, but also with original inventions. But the gifted student was expelled from the 3rd year because his father did not have money for his studies. But Galileo was lucky - the young man found a patron, the rich Marquis Guidobaldo del Moite, who was fond of science. He supported 22-year-old Galileo. Thanks to the Marquis, the world received a man who showed his genius in mathematics, physics, and astronomy. Even during his lifetime, Galileo was compared to Archimedes. He was the first to declare that the Universe is infinite.
René Descartes (1596-1650)
Like many great thinkers of antiquity, Descartes was universal. He laid the foundations of analytical geometry, created many algebraic notations, discovered the law of conservation of motion, and explained the root causes of the motion of celestial bodies. Descartes studied at the best French Jesuit college in La Flèche. And there, at the beginning of the 17th century, strict orders reigned. The disciples got up early and ran to prayer. Only one, the best pupil was allowed to stay in bed due to poor health - this was Rene Descartes. So he developed the habit of reasoning and finding solutions to mathematical problems. Later, according to legend, it was in these morning hours that he had a thought that spread throughout the world: “I think, therefore I exist.”
Isaac Newton (1643-1727)
Isaac Newton - a brilliant English scientist, experimenter, researcher, also a mathematician, astronomer, inventor, made a lot of discoveries that determined the physical picture of the world around him. According to legend, Isaac Newton discovered the law of universal gravitation in his garden. He watched a falling apple and realized that the Earth attracts all objects to itself, and the heavier the object, the more strongly it is attracted to the Earth. Reflecting on this, he deduced the law of universal gravitation: All bodies attract each other with a force proportional to both masses and inversely proportional to the square of the distance between them.
James Watt (1736-1819)
James Watt is considered one of the creators of the technological revolution that transformed the world. They tried to tame the energy of steam back in ancient times. The Greek scientist Heroes, who lived in Alexandria in the 1st century, built the first steam turbine, which rotated by burning wood in a heater. In Russia in the 18th century, mechanic Ivan Polzunov also tried to tame the energy of steam, but his machine was not widely used. And only the English, or rather the Scottish self-taught mechanic James Watt, was able to construct such a machine, which was used first in mines, then in factories, and then on locomotives and ships.
Antoine Laurent Lavoisier (1743-1794)
Antoine Laurent Lavoisier was a multi-talented man who was successful in financial transactions, but was especially interested in chemistry. He made many discoveries, became the founder of modern chemistry, and would have accomplished a lot if not for the radicalism of the Great French Revolution. In his youth, Antoine Lavoisier participated in a competition at the Academy of Sciences for the best method of street lighting. To increase the sensitivity of his eyes, he upholstered his room with black material. Antoine described his acquired new perception of light in the work he submitted to the Academy, and received a gold medal for it. For scientific research in the field of mineralogy, at the age of 25 he was elected a member of the Academy.
Justus Liebig (1803-1873)
Justus Liebig is credited with creating food concentrates. He developed a technology for the production of meat extract, which today is called a “broth cube”. The German Chemical Society erected a monument to him in Munich. The outstanding German professor of organic chemistry, Justus Liebig, spent his entire life researching methods of plant nutrition and solving issues of rational use of fertilizers. He did a lot to increase agricultural productivity. Russia, for the assistance it provided in the rise of agriculture, awarded the scientist two Orders of St. Anne, England made him an honorary citizen, and in Germany he received the title of baron.
Louis Pasteur (1822-1895)
Louis Pasteur is a rare example of a scientist who had neither medical nor chemical education. He made his way into science on his own, without any protégés, based on personal interest. But scientists showed interest in him, noticing considerable abilities in the young man. And Louis Pasteur became an outstanding French microbiologist and chemist, a member of the French Academy, and created the pasteurization process. An institute was created especially for him in Paris, which was later named after him. Russian microbiologist, Nobel Prize laureate in the field of physiology and medicine, Ilya Mechnikov, worked at this institute for 18 years.
Alfred Bernhard Nobel (1833-1896)
Alfred Bernhard Nobel, a Swedish chemical engineer, invented dynamite, who patented it in 1867 and proposed it for use in tunneling. This invention made Nobel famous throughout the world and brought him enormous income. The word dynamite in Greek means "strength". This explosive, which consists of nitroglycerin, potassium or sodium nitrate and wood flour, depending on the volume, can destroy a car, a house, or destroy a rock. In 1895, Nobel made a will, according to which most of his capital was allocated to prizes for outstanding achievements in chemistry, physics, medicine, literature and peace.
Robert Heinrich Hermann Koch (1843-1910)
Close communication with nature determined his future choice of profession - Robert Koch became a microbiologist. And it started in childhood. Robert Koch's maternal grandfather was a great lover of nature, often taking his beloved 7-year-old grandson with him into the forest, telling him about the life of trees and herbs, and talking about the benefits and harms of insects. Microbiologist Koch fought against the most terrible diseases of mankind - anthrax, cholera and tuberculosis. And he came out victorious. For his achievements in the fight against tuberculosis, he was awarded the Nobel Prize in Medicine in 1905.
Wilhelm Conrad Roentgen (1845-1923)
In 1895, a German scientific journal published a photograph of the hand of Wilhelm Roentgen’s wife, taken using X-rays (x-rays, later called X-rays after their discoverer), which aroused great interest in the scientific world. Before Roentgen, no physicist had done anything like this. This photograph indicated that penetration into the depths of the human body had taken place without physically opening it. It was a breakthrough in medicine, in the recognition of diseases. For the discovery of these rays, William Roentgen was awarded the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1901.
Thomas Alva Edison (1847-1931)
During his life, Edison improved the telegraph, telephone, created a microphone, invented the phonograph and, most importantly, illuminated America with his incandescent light bulb, and behind it the whole world. There has never been a more inventive man in American history than Thomas Edison. In total, he is the author of over 1,000 patented inventions in the United States and about 3,000 in other countries. But before achieving such an outstanding result, he, according to his own frank statements, made many tens of thousands of unsuccessful experiments and experiences.
Marie Skłodowska Curie (1867-1934)
Marie Skłodowska Curie graduated from the Sorbonne, the largest institution of higher education in France, and became the first female teacher in its history. Together with her husband Pierre Curie, she first discovered radium, a decay product of uranium-238, and then polonium. The study and use of the radioactive properties of radium played a huge role in the study of the structure of the atomic nucleus and the phenomenon of radioactivity. Among world-class scientists, Maria Sklodowska-Curie occupies a special place; she twice won the Nobel Prize: in 1903 in physics, in 1911 in chemistry. Such an outstanding result is a rare occurrence even among men.
Albert Einstein (1879-1955)
Albert Einstein is one of the founders of theoretical physics, Nobel Prize laureate, and public figure. But he made a strange impression on his contemporaries: he dressed casually, loved sweaters, did not comb his hair, could stick his tongue out at a photographer, and generally did God knows what. But behind this frivolous appearance hid a paradoxical scientist - a thinker, the author of over 600 works on various topics. His theory of relativity revolutionized science. It turned out that the world around us is not so simple. Space-time is curved, and as a result, gravity and the passage of time change, and the sun's rays deviate from the straight direction.
Alexander Fleming (1881-1955)
Alexander Fleming, a native of Scotland, an English bacteriologist, spent his whole life searching for medications that could help a person cope with infectious diseases. He was able to discover a substance in penicillium mold that kills bacteria. And the first antibiotic appeared - penicillin, which revolutionized medicine. Fleming was the first to discover that human mucous membranes contain a special liquid that not only prevents the penetration of microbes, but also kills them. He isolated this substance and called it lysozyme.
Robert Oppenheimer (1904-1967)
Robert Oppenheimer, an American physicist and creator of the atomic bomb, was very worried when he learned about the terrible casualties and destruction caused by the American atomic bomb dropped over Hiroshima on August 6, 1945. He was a conscientious person and subsequently called on scientists all over the world not to create weapons of enormous destructive power. He entered the history of science as the “father of the atomic bomb” and as the discoverer of black holes in the Universe.
photo from the Internet
Russia is rich in great scientists and inventors who have made a significant contribution not only to Russian progress, but also to the world. We invite you to get acquainted with the brilliant fruits of the engineering thought of our compatriots, which you can rightfully be proud of!
1. Galvanoplasty
We so often come across products that look like metal, but are actually made of plastic and only covered with a layer of metal, that we have stopped noticing them. There are also metal products coated with a layer of another metal - for example, nickel. And there are metal products that are actually a copy of a non-metallic base. We owe all these miracles to the genius of physics Boris Jacobi - by the way, the older brother of the great German mathematician Carl Gustav Jacobi.
Jacobi's passion for physics resulted in the creation of the world's first electric motor with direct shaft rotation, but one of his most important discoveries was electroplating - the process of depositing metal on a mold, allowing the creation of perfect copies of the original object. In this way, for example, sculptures were created on the naves of St. Isaac's Cathedral. Galvanoplasty can be used even at home.
The electroforming method and its derivatives have found numerous applications. With its help, everything has not been done and is still not being done, right down to the cliché of state banks. Jacobi received the Demidov Prize for this discovery in Russia, and a large gold medal in Paris. Possibly also made using this same method.
2. Electric car
In the last third of the 19th century, the world was gripped by a form of electrical fever. That's why electric cars were made by everyone. This was the golden age of electric cars. The cities were smaller, and a range of 60 km on a single charge was quite acceptable. One of the enthusiasts was engineer Ippolit Romanov, who by 1899 had created several models of electric cabs.
But that’s not even the main thing. Romanov invented and created in metal an electric omnibus for 17 passengers, developed a scheme of city routes for these ancestors of modern trolleybuses and received permission to work. True, at your own personal commercial peril and risk.
The inventor was unable to find the required amount, to the great joy of his competitors - owners of horse-drawn horses and numerous cab drivers. However, the working electric omnibus aroused great interest among other inventors and remained in the history of technology as an invention killed by the municipal bureaucracy.
3. Pipeline transport
It is difficult to say what is considered the first real pipeline. One can recall the proposal of Dmitry Mendeleev, dating back to 1863, when he proposed to deliver oil from the production sites to the seaport at the Baku oil fields not in barrels, but through pipes. Mendeleev's proposal was not accepted, and two years later the first pipeline was built by the Americans in Pennsylvania. As always, when something is done abroad, they begin to do it in Russia. Or at least allocate money.
In 1877, Alexander Bari and his assistant Vladimir Shukhov again came up with the idea of pipeline transport, already relying on American experience and again on the authority of Mendeleev. As a result, Shukhov built the first oil pipeline in Russia in 1878, proving the convenience and practicality of pipeline transport. The example of Baku, which was then one of the two leaders in world oil production, became infectious, and “getting on the pipe” became the dream of any enterprising person. In the photo: a view of a three-furnace cube. Baku, 1887.
4. Electric arc welding
Nikolai Benardos comes from Novorossiysk Greeks who lived on the Black Sea coast. He is the author of more than a hundred inventions, but he went down in history thanks to the electric arc welding of metals, which he patented in 1882 in Germany, France, Russia, Italy, England, the USA and other countries, calling his method “electrohephaestus”.
Benardos's method spread across the planet like wildfire. Instead of fiddling with rivets and bolts, it was enough to simply weld pieces of metal. However, it took about half a century for welding to finally take a dominant position among installation methods. A seemingly simple method is to create an electric arc between a consumable electrode in the welder’s hands and the pieces of metal that need to be welded. But the solution is elegant. True, it did not help the inventor meet old age with dignity; he died in poverty in 1905 in an almshouse.
5. Multi-engine aircraft “Ilya Muromets”
It’s hard to believe now, but just over a hundred years ago it was believed that a multi-engine aircraft would be extremely difficult and dangerous to fly. The absurdity of these statements was proved by Igor Sikorsky, who in the summer of 1913 took into the air a twin-engine aircraft called Le Grand, and then its four-engine version, the Russian Knight.
On February 12, 1914, in Riga, at the training ground of the Russian-Baltic Plant, the four-engine Ilya Muromets took off. There were 16 passengers on board the four-engine plane - an absolute record at that time. The plane had a comfortable cabin, heating, a bath with toilet and... a promenade deck. In order to demonstrate the capabilities of the aircraft, in the summer of 1914, Igor Sikorsky flew on the Ilya Muromets from St. Petersburg to Kyiv and back, setting a world record. During World War I, these aircraft became the world's first heavy bombers.
6. ATV and helicopter
Igor Sikorsky also created the first production helicopter, the R-4, or S-47, which the Vought-Sikorsky company began producing in 1942. It was the first and only helicopter to serve in World War II, in the Pacific theater of operations, as a staff transport and for casualty evacuation.
However, it is unlikely that the US military department would have allowed Igor Sikorsky to boldly experiment with helicopter technology if not for the amazing rotary-wing machine of George Botezat, who in 1922 began testing his helicopter, which the American military ordered him. The helicopter was the first to actually take off from the ground and be able to stay in the air. The possibility of vertical flight was thus proven.
Botezat's helicopter was called the "flying octopus" because of its interesting design. It was a quadcopter: four propellers were placed at the ends of metal trusses, and the control system was located in the center - exactly like modern radio-controlled drones.
7. Color photo
Color photography appeared at the end of the 19th century, but photographs of that time were characterized by a shift to one or another part of the spectrum. The Russian photographer was one of the best in Russia and, like many of his colleagues around the world, dreamed of achieving the most natural color rendition.
In 1902, Prokudin-Gorsky studied color photography in Germany with Adolf Miethe, who by that time was a worldwide star of color photography. Returning home, Prokudin-Gorsky began to improve the chemistry of the process and in 1905 he patented his own sensitizer, that is, a substance that increases the sensitivity of photographic plates. As a result, he was able to produce negatives of exceptional quality.
Prokudin-Gorsky organized a number of expeditions across the territory of the Russian Empire, photographing famous people (for example, Leo Tolstoy), peasants, churches, landscapes, factories, thus creating an amazing collection of colorful Russia. Prokudin-Gorsky's demonstrations aroused great interest in the world and pushed other specialists to develop new principles of color printing.
8. Parachute
As you know, the idea of a parachute was proposed by Leonardo da Vinci, and several centuries later, with the advent of aeronautics, regular jumps from balloons began: parachutes were suspended under them in a partially opened state. In 1912, the American Barry was able to leave the plane with such a parachute and, importantly, landed on the ground alive.
The problem was solved in every possible way. For example, the American Stefan Banich made a parachute in the form of an umbrella with telescopic spokes that were attached around the pilot’s torso. This design worked, although it was still not very convenient. But engineer Gleb Kotelnikov decided that it was all about the material, and made his parachute from silk, packing it in a compact backpack. Kotelnikov patented his invention in France on the eve of the First World War.
But besides the backpack parachute, he came up with another interesting thing. He tested the opening ability of the parachute by opening it while the car was moving, which literally stood rooted to the spot. So Kotelnikov came up with a braking parachute as an emergency braking system for aircraft.
9. Theremin
The history of this musical instrument, which produces strange “cosmic” sounds, began with the development of alarm systems. It was then that the descendant of the French Huguenots, Lev Theremin, in 1919, drew attention to the fact that changing the position of the body near the antennas of the oscillatory circuits affects the volume and tonality of the sound in the control speaker.
Everything else was a matter of technique. And marketing: Theremin showed his musical instrument to the leader of the Soviet state, Vladimir Lenin, an enthusiast of the cultural revolution, and then demonstrated it in the States.
The life of Lev Theremin was difficult; he knew ups, glory, and camps. His musical instrument still lives today. The coolest version is the Moog Etherwave. The theremin can be heard among the most advanced and quite pop performers. This is truly an invention for all times.
10. Color television
Vladimir Zvorykin was born into a merchant family in the city of Murom. Since childhood, the boy had the opportunity to read a lot and carry out all sorts of experiments - his father encouraged this passion for science in every possible way. Having started studying in St. Petersburg, he learned about cathode ray tubes and came to the conclusion that the future of television lay in electronic circuits.
Zvorykin was lucky; he left Russia on time in 1919. He worked for many years and in the early 30s he patented a transmitting television tube - an iconoscope. Even earlier, he designed one of the variants of the receiving tube - a kinescope. And then, already in the 1940s, he split the light beam into blue, red and green colors and got color TV.
In addition, Zvorykin developed a night vision device, an electron microscope and many other interesting things. He invented throughout his long life and even in retirement continued to amaze with his new solutions.
11. VCR
The AMPEX company was created in 1944 by Russian emigrant Alexander Matveevich Ponyatov, who took three letters of his initials for the name and added EX - short for “excellent”. At first, Ponyatov produced sound recording equipment, but in the early 50s he focused on developing video recording.
By that time, there had already been experiments in recording television images, but they required a huge amount of tape. Ponyatov and colleagues proposed recording the signal across the tape using a block of rotating heads. On November 30, 1956, the first previously recorded CBS News aired. And in 1960, the company, represented by its leader and founder, received an Oscar for its outstanding contribution to the technical equipment of the film and television industry.
Fate brought Alexander Ponyatov together with interesting people. He was a competitor of Zvorykin, Ray Dolby, the creator of the famous noise reduction system, worked with him, and one of the first clients and investors was the famous Bing Crosby. And one more thing: by order of Ponyatov, birch trees were necessarily planted near any office - in memory of the Motherland.
12. Tetris
A long time ago, 30 years ago, the “Pentamino” puzzle was popular in the USSR: you had to place various figures consisting of five squares on a lined field. Even collections of problems were published, and the results were discussed.
From a mathematical point of view, such a puzzle was an excellent test for a computer. And so, a researcher at the Computing Center of the USSR Academy of Sciences, Alexey Pajitnov, wrote such a program for his computer “Electronics 60”. But there wasn’t enough power, and Alexey removed one cube from the figures, that is, he made a “tetromino”. Well, then the idea came to have the figures fall into the “glass”. This is how Tetris was born.
It was the first computer game from behind the Iron Curtain, and for many people the first computer game at all. And although many new toys have already appeared, Tetris still attracts with its apparent simplicity and real complexity.
Russian scientists invented television, and Russian directors taught theater to the whole world. Which Russian made the greatest achievement?
Great Russian scientists
The whole world knows them. They did something that was beyond the control of the powers that be. They discovered “Russian science”, which the whole world started talking about.Pavel Nikolaevich Yablochkov, who worked all his life as an ordinary electrical engineer in Paris. It was he, an inconspicuous-looking “hard worker,” who invented the world’s first electric light bulb. It did not burn for long and had a light of dazzling power. It was unsuitable for small rooms, but was widely used in lighting streets and large rooms. But thanks to Yablochkov, enthusiasts appeared who were able to create the light bulb that illuminates our houses and apartments.
Alexander Popov in 1895 created a unique device that works wirelessly using electromagnetic waves. This radio is the greatest achievement of the Russian people, an indispensable assistant for any inhabitant of the planet. The Americans and British offered fabulous sums for Popov to sell them his invention. He firmly answered that everything he came up with belongs not to him, but to his Motherland.
Fate has always been favorable to the Russians. All the first world inventions belong to Russian people.
V.K. Zvorykin created the world's first electron microscope and the first television. Thanks to his invention, on March 10, 1939, the happy owners of televisions began to watch the first regular television programs broadcast from the television center on Shabolovka.
And the first airplane in the world was invented by a Russian - A.F. Mozhaisky. The complex design of the apparatus was able to lift a person into the sky for the first time.
Russian scientists invented the world's first satellite, ballistic missile and spacecraft. It was our compatriots who managed to create the first quantum generator, a caterpillar tractor and an electric tram. They always walked ahead - Russian scientists who managed to glorify our country.
The Russians were not only able to conquer the world. They discovered new lands, giving the whole world the opportunity to look into unexplored corners of the planet.
Famous Russian travelers
Two brothers, two village boys: Khariton and Dmitry Laptev. They devoted their lives to travel and exploration of the North. Having organized the Great Northern Expedition in 1739, they reached the shores of the Arctic Ocean, opening new lands to the whole world. The Laptev Sea is known throughout the world thanks to their courage and perseverance in exploring the wild North.Ferdinand Petrovich Wrangel led an expedition to explore Eastern Siberia. He discovered areas little known to science to the world and compiled a detailed geographical map of the northern coast of Eastern Siberia.
Nikolai Mikhailovich Przhevalsky explored the Ussuri region, discovering previously unknown geographical objects. He became the discoverer of the Altyntag Mountains in Central Asia. The whole world learned about the famous Przewalski's horse.
Miklouho-Maclay went to New Guinea in 1870, where he spent 2 years studying these lands, getting acquainted with the culture of wild tribes, their customs and religious rituals. In 1996, on the 150th anniversary of the traveler, UNESCO awarded him the title of “Citizen of the World.”
Our contemporary, Yuri Senkevich, conducted more than 100 studies of human survival in extreme conditions. He took part in an Antarctic expedition and visited the North Pole more than once. His famous program “Travelers Club” had an audience of millions.
Perhaps not everyone has read their books and is not familiar with their work. But despite this, their names are familiar to every person, because they are the geniuses of our era.
World-famous Russian writers
Leo Tolstoy - count, thinker, honorary academician, outstanding writer of the world. He had an amazing ability to learn foreign languages. Looking at the people, he learned to endure all the difficulties of life. Warming his hands by the stove, he immediately stuck them out the window into the cold to learn not only to bask in the warmth, but also not to be afraid of the cold. He made himself a canvas dressing gown, which he wore around the house, and at night it replaced his sheet. He wanted to be like Diogenes.
He was not interested in social life. At the balls he was distracted, thinking about his own things. The young ladies considered him boring because he did not try to carry on small talk, which for him was empty talk. He wrote many books that the whole world reads. His Anna Karenina and War and Peace became global bestsellers.
Fyodor Dostoevsky was the second child of 6 children in the family. My father was a priest and a doctor in a hospital for the poor. Mother belonged to a merchant family. He learned to read from the books of the Old and New Testaments. He knew the Gospel from childhood.
He spent 4 years in hard labor, then became a soldier. He was against the government, which renounced Christian morality and allowed the blood of the Russian people to be shed. His books are full of bitterness. Many consider him the most “depressive” writer of our era. But he created works whose influence greatly affected not only the culture of Russia, but also the West.
Bulgakov had a carefree youth, which he spent in the beautiful city of Kyiv. He dreamed of a carefree and free life, but the strong character of his mother and the hard work of his professor father instilled in him authority for knowledge and contempt for ignorance.
After receiving his education, he worked in military hospitals and was a rural doctor. He saved lives by fighting diseases. He lay in a typhoid fever, thinking every morning that this was his last day. It was the disease that radically changed his life. He left medicine and began to write.
“The Turbin Brothers”, “Heart of a Dog”, “The Master and Margarita” - brought the writer posthumous world fame. A triumphant procession of Bulgakov’s works began, which were translated into many languages of the world.
The Russians have conquered the world in all directions. They read our books. Songs and films have become part of foreign culture.
World-famous Russian singers and actors
Fyodor Chaliapin - Russian bass, People's Artist since 1918. For three years he sang at the Bolshoi and Mariinsky theaters, performing only the first roles. An opera singer whose voice cannot be confused with anyone else. He loved folk songs and romances, filling the space around him with a powerful voice with rich timbre shades.As fate would have it, he had to leave Russia. Since 1922, he sang only abroad. But despite this, the world considers him an outstanding Russian singer.
Her voice is known all over the world. This woman is a legend. Out of five thousand people, she became the only girl who was chosen at the competition to join Pyatnitsky’s choir. Lyudmila Zykina is an idol of the 60s and an ideal to follow at all times. Her “Orenburg Shawl” and “The Volga River Flows” are sung all over the world. She did not like to be “gray mediocrity.” She wore colorful outfits and had a weakness for jewelry.
She was an important person and had friendships with government officials. Everyone loved her: from the peasant and worker to the Kremlin minister. She was the embodiment of a Russian woman, a Russian soul. She is an outstanding singer, whose voice has become a symbol of Russia.
Mark Bernes is a handsome man, conqueror of women's hearts, singer, actor, sex symbol of his time. At the age of 15, he was able to visit the theater for the first time and fell in love with it for the rest of his life. He dreamed of the stage. He was a poster putter and worked as a barker for evening performances. He strove to be as close as possible to this temple of art.
He played his first, small episodic role in the film “The Man with a Gun.” In the film he sang “Clouds have risen over the city.” After the premiere of the film, the whole country started talking about it.
Playing in the film “Two Fighters,” he was sure that this was his last role in his life. The director was unhappy with him; the role “didn’t suit him.” They tortured him for almost two months, trying to create an image. And perhaps he would have had to say goodbye to cinema, but an inexperienced hairdresser saved him. Going in to get a haircut, Bernes fell into her hands. She cut his beautiful hair down to zero. Seeing this, the director's face lit up with a smile. This was the image he had been looking for for so long. For his role in this film, the government awarded Bernes the Order of the Red Star. In 1965 he became People's Artist of Russia.
Innokenty Smoktunovsky is a provincial actor who, having arrived in Moscow, was unable to enter the theater school. This failure “gave” the world this outstanding actor. Having settled in the studio theater at Mosfilm, he immediately gets a cameo role in the film “Soldiers”. And this became a boost in his career. After filming ended, he played in “The Idiot,” amazing with his acting, transitions and nuances from one state to another. Worldwide fame was prophesied for him, and this prophecy came true. Smoktunovsky’s extraordinary, multifaceted talent has cemented his reputation as the best actor of our time.
Modern Russian actors deserve special attention. .
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Science is a hard and not always rewarding endeavor. Many years of experimentation may not lead to tangible results, potentially important research often does not receive the necessary funding, and history forgets the names of people who had a hand in great discoveries. Look At Me brought together eight scientists who helped make important discoveries - and sometimes made them alone - but were forgotten.
Rosalind Franklin
helped discover the structure of the DNA molecule
If you know anything about the natural sciences, you've most likely heard the names Francis Crick and James Watson, the scientists who received the Nobel Prize for discovering the structure of the DNA molecule. In fact, their story is not so simple: perhaps Crick and Watson simply used the research of their colleague Rosalind Franklin and took credit for her achievements. When Franklin was 33, she came to the conclusion that DNA consists of two strands and a phosphate backbone. Franklin confirmed her discovery with x-rays. It is believed that Franklin's colleague showed her research and photographs to Crick and Watson, who used her findings for their own work. Moreover, Watson persuaded Franklin to publish her research, but after he published his. Her work no longer looked like a discovery, but a confirmation of what Watson and Crick had written. Scientists received the Nobel Prize, and the name Franklin was forgotten.
Alfred Russell Wallace
helped create the theory of evolution
The theory of evolution is primarily associated with the name of Charles Darwin and his book “The Origin of Species.” But there is another scientist who played an equally important role in the study of evolution. Alfred Russell Wallace was a British explorer who, independently of Darwin, came up with the theories of evolution and natural selection. Having made a number of observations on a Malaysian expedition in the mid-19th century, Wallace wrote them down and sent them to Darwin for his opinion. Wallace's work inspired Darwin's new ideas about evolution, and they published a joint paper, followed by Darwin's own in 1858. Wallace experienced financial difficulties almost his entire life. He traveled a lot (for example, in the Amazon region and the Far East) and financed his expeditions by selling the animals, insects and plants he collected. After losing most of his money in failed ventures, Wallace made money only through scientific publications.
Cecilia Payne-Gaposhkina
discovered the composition of stars and the Sun
Cecilia Payne is a female scientist whose discoveries were discredited by her superiors. In her youth, Payne received a scholarship and studied botany, physics and chemistry at Cambridge University. Unfortunately, Payne's education yielded little: Cambridge did not grant degrees to women at that time. Payne became interested in astronomy and eventually moved to the Radcliffe Institute, where she became the first woman to receive a doctorate in astronomy.
Payne's greatest contribution to astronomy was her understanding of the elements that make up stars. Her male colleagues did not take her research seriously. Astronomer Henry Norris Russell, who reviewed Payne's work, convinced her not to publish her study. Russell's argument was that Payne's work was contrary to the knowledge of the time - and therefore would not have been accepted by the scientific community. Four years later, Russell changed his mind: he published his own article in which he described what the Sun is made of. Russell's findings were very similar to Payne's - and he received credit for all the work she did. In a cruel irony, Payne even received the Henry Norris Russell Award in 1976 for her achievements in astronomy.
Peter Bergmann
helped in the development of a unified field theory
The greatest physicist of the 20th century, Albert Einstein, in the last years of his life trusted all his calculations to younger scientists, his assistants. Einstein's assistants met with him every morning, got his opinions on various issues, and then spent the rest of the day doing research. The next day, Einstein looked at their calculations, evaluated them, gave advice - and the work continued. Einstein's most famous assistant was the physicist Peter Bergmann. Bergmann was born in 1915, the same year that Einstein completed his work on the theory of relativity. Bergmann was interested in science from childhood, and in the late 1930s he became Einstein's protégé. The physicist helped Einstein develop a unified field theory.
When Einstein created a new theory of gravity in 1915 (and the theory of relativity explained gravity in a new way), he realized that the properties of space-time cannot be separated from the gravitational field. He tried to combine the physics existing at that time with the physics of the gravitational field. Despite the fact that he never succeeded, the calculations of Einstein and Bergmann turned out to be very important for physics of the 20th century. We now know that there are other forces that are equally important for the behavior of particles, and their properties are not only electromagnetic and gravitational. One way or another, most of the calculations were done by Bergmann. He published several books on the theory of relativity, and after Einstein's death he continued to study gravity.
Milton Humason
helped create Hubble's Law
Milton Humason was an assistant to Edwin Hubble, the astronomer for whom the world's most famous space telescope is named. Humason dropped out of school and took a job as a loader. He carried materials for the construction of the Mount Wilson Observatory in California. After construction was completed, Humason went to work as a cleaner at the observatory. At the same time, Humason worked part-time at night, helping astronomers. He was finally hired on in 1919. By pure chance, Humason was not the man who discovered Pluto. 11 years before Clyde Tombaugh, considered the discoverer of Pluto, Humason took a series of photographs that showed Pluto for the first time. It is believed that he did not notice the dwarf planet because it was obscured by a defect in the photographs. Humason has been called a "forgotten hero" who helped create Hubble's Law, which describes the movement of galaxies in the Universe.
Howard Florey and Ernst Chain
discovered the medical properties of penicillin
Alexander Fleming is considered the scientist who discovered penicillin. In fact, Fleming simply discovered the substance - but did not know what to do with it. Fleming discovered penicillin almost by accident in 1928. The culture containing penicillin was too unstable, the antibiotic could not be isolated in its pure form, and Fleming and his colleagues abandoned the study.
The people who made penicillin into a drug that changed medicine were Howard Florey and Ernst Chain. In 1939, they conducted a series of experiments on culture (in other words, mold) Fleming and were able to make a medicine out of it. Scientists chose penicillin for experiments for two reasons: Cheyne was attracted by the instability of the substance, and Flory was interested in the fact that it was the only substance that could overcome staphylococcus. In fairness, although Fleming’s name is well known, Florey and Chain are also not forgotten by history: the three of them, together with Fleming, received the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine in 1945 “for the discovery of penicillin and its healing effects in various infectious diseases.”
Nettie Stevens
discovered the difference between female and male sets of chromosomes
By the beginning of the 20th century, biologists and philosophers had proposed many theories about how a person's sex is determined. Some said that this was influenced by external factors during pregnancy, others that it was hereditary. We now know that a person's sex depends on the 23rd pair of chromosomes, X and Y. Most textbooks say that Thomas Morgan discovered them. In fact, the discovery was made by a female scientist, Nettie Stevens. She became a victim of what is called the “Matilda effect” - when the achievements of female scientists are hidden or denied.
Stevens studied sex determination in fruit flies and concluded that it depends on the X and Y chromosomes. Although many write that Stevens worked with Morgan, she carried out almost all of her observations on her own. Morgan received the Nobel Prize for all the work done by Stevens. He later published in the journal Science, in which he said that Stevens acted in the study simply as a laboratory assistant and could not be called a real scientist. Moreover, it was Nettie Stevens who began the research - and even brought fruit flies to Morgan's laboratory.
Lise Meitner
helped discover nuclear fission
Lise Meitner's research in nuclear physics led to the discovery of nuclear fission - the fact that the nucleus of an atom can split in two. This discovery, in turn, became the foundation for the creation of the atomic bomb. In 1907, the Austrian Meitner graduated from the University of Vienna and moved to Berlin, where she began working with the chemist Otto Hahn. After the Nazis annexed Austria in 1938, the Jewish Meitner was forced to leave for Stockholm. There she continued to work with Gan, secretly meeting with him and corresponding with him.
Hahn carried out experiments that proved nuclear fission, but could not come up with any explanation for what he found - Meitner did it for him. But Gan published the study without mentioning her as a co-author. Some historians of science believe that Meitner understood why he did this - he could not afford it in Nazi Germany. Not only nationality, but also Meitner’s gender played a role: scientists on the Nobel committee refused to recognize the merits of a female scientist. Hahn received the Nobel Prize in 1944 for his discovery of nuclear fission alone, without Meitner. However, her contemporaries and colleagues said that Meitner's work was very important for this discovery. But because her name was not included in Hahn's study - and she did not receive the Nobel Prize - no one knew Meitner's name for many years.
Physics
Andrey Geim. Photo: ITAR-TASS/ Stanislav Krasilnikov
In the new millennium, the Nobel Prize in Physics went to Russian-speaking scientists three times, although only in 2010 - for a discovery made in the 21st century. MIPT graduates Andrey Game And Konstantin Novoselov In the laboratory of the University of Manchester, for the first time, they were able to obtain a stable two-dimensional carbon crystal - graphene. It is a very thin - one atom thick - carbon film, which, due to its structure, has many interesting properties: remarkable conductivity, transparency, flexibility, and very high strength. New and new areas of application are constantly being found for graphene, for example in microelectronics: flexible displays, electrodes and solar panels are created from it.
Mikhail Lukin. Photo: ITAR-TASS/ Denis Vyshinsky
Another graduate of MIPT, and now a professor of physics at Harvard University Mikhail Lukin , did the seemingly impossible: he stopped the light. To do this, the scientist used supercooled rubidium vapor and two lasers: the control one made the medium conductive to light, and the second served as a source of a short light pulse. When the control laser was turned off, the particles of the light pulse stopped leaving the medium, as if stopping in it. This experiment was a real breakthrough towards the creation of quantum computers - a completely new type of machine that can perform a colossal number of operations in parallel. The scientist continued his research in this area, and in 2012, his group at Harvard created the longest-lived qubit at that time, the smallest element for storing information in a quantum computer. And in 2013, Lukin for the first time obtained photonic matter - a kind of substance, only consisting not of atoms, but of particles of light, photons. It is also planned to be used for quantum computing.
Yuri Oganesyan (center) with Georgy Flerov and Konstantin Petrzhak. Photo from the JINR electronic archive
Russian scientists in the 21st century have significantly expanded the periodic table. For example, in January 2016, elements with numbers 113, 115, 117 and 118 were added to it, three of which were first obtained at the Joint Institute for Nuclear Research (JINR) in Dubna under the leadership of an academician of the Russian Academy of Sciences Yuri Oganesyan . He also has the honor of discovering a number of other superheavy elements and their synthesis reactions: elements heavier than uranium do not exist in nature - they are too unstable, so they are created artificially in accelerators. In addition, Oganesyan experimentally confirmed that for superheavy elements there is a so-called “island of stability.” All these elements decay very quickly, but first theoretically and then experimentally it was shown that among them there should be some whose lifetime significantly exceeds the lifetime of their neighbors in the table.
Chemistry
Artem Oganov. Photo from personal archive
Chemist Artem Oganov , head of laboratories in the USA, China and Russia, and now also a professor at the Skolkovo Institute of Science and Technology, created an algorithm that allows you to use a computer to search for substances with predetermined properties, even impossible from the point of view of classical chemistry. The method developed by Oganov formed the basis of the USPEX program (which reads like the Russian word for “success”), which is widely used throughout the world (“Attic” in detail). With its help, new magnets and substances that could exist in extreme conditions, such as high pressure, were discovered. It is assumed that such conditions may well exist on other planets, which means that the substances predicted by Oganov are there.
Valery Fokin. Biopharmaceutical cluster "Northern"
However, it is necessary not only to model substances with predetermined properties, but also to create them in practice. To achieve this, a new paradigm was introduced in chemistry in 1997, the so-called click chemistry. The word “click” imitates the sound of a latch, because the new term was introduced for reactions that must, under any conditions, connect small components into the desired molecule. At first, scientists were distrustful of the existence of a miracle reaction, but in 2002 Valery Fokin , a graduate of Nizhny Novgorod State University named after Lobachevsky, now working at the Scripps Institute in California, discovered such a “molecular latch”: it consists of an azide and an alkyne and works in the presence of copper in water with ascorbic acid. Using this simple reaction, completely different compounds can be combined with each other: proteins, dyes, inorganic molecules. Such “click” synthesis of substances with previously known properties is primarily necessary when creating new drugs.
Biology
Evgeny Kunin. Photo from the scientist’s personal archive
However, to treat a disease, sometimes it is necessary not only to neutralize a virus or bacteria, but also to correct one’s own genes. No, this is not the plot of a science fiction film: scientists have already developed several systems of “molecular scissors” capable of editing the genome (more about the amazing technology in the Attic article). The most promising among them is the CRISPR/Cas9 system, which is based on the mechanism of protection against viruses that exists in bacteria and archaea. One of the key researchers of this system is our former compatriot Evgeniy Kunin , who has been working at the US National Center for Biotechnology Information for many years. In addition to CRISPR systems, the scientist is interested in many issues of genetics, evolutionary and computational biology, so it is not for nothing that his H-index (the citation index of a scientist’s articles, reflecting how much his research is in demand) has exceeded 130 - this is an absolute record among all Russian-speaking scientists.
Vyacheslav Epstein. Photo by Northwestern University
However, the danger today is posed not only by genome breakdowns, but also by the most common microbes. The fact is that over the past 30 years not a single new type of antibiotic has been created, and bacteria are gradually becoming immune to old ones. Fortunately for humanity, in January 2015, a group of scientists from Northeastern University in the United States announced the creation of a completely new antimicrobial agent. To do this, scientists turned to the study of soil bacteria, which were previously considered impossible to grow in laboratory conditions. To get around this obstacle, an employee of Northeastern University, a graduate of Moscow State University Vyacheslav Epshtein together with a colleague, he developed a special chip for growing unruly bacteria right on the ocean floor - in this cunning way, the scientist circumvented the problem of the increased “capriciousness” of bacteria that did not want to grow in a Petri dish. This technique formed the basis of a large study, the result of which was the antibiotic teixobactin, which can cope with both tuberculosis and Staphylococcus aureus.
Mathematics
Grigory Perelman. Photo: George M. Bergman - Mathematisches Institut Oberwolfach (MFO)
Even people very far from science have probably heard about mathematics from St. Petersburg Grigory Perelman . In 2002–2003, he published three papers proving the Poincaré conjecture. This hypothesis belongs to a branch of mathematics called topology and explains the most general properties of space. In 2006, the proof was accepted by the mathematical community, and the Poincaré conjecture thus became the first to be solved among the so-called seven millennium problems. These include classical mathematical problems for which proofs have not been found for many years. For his proof, Perelman was awarded the Fields Medal, often called the Nobel Prize for mathematicians, as well as the Clay Mathematics Institute's Millennium Problem Solving Prize. The scientist refused all awards, which attracted the attention of a public far from mathematics.
Stanislav Smirnov. Photo: ITAR-TASS/ Yuri Belinsky
Working at the University of Geneva Stanislav Smirnov in 2010 he also won the Fields Medal. His most prestigious award in the mathematical world came from his proof of the conformal invariance of two-dimensional percolation and the Ising model in statistical physics, a thing with an unpronounceable name used by theorists to describe the magnetization of a material and used in the development of quantum computers.
Andrey Okunkov. Photo: Radio Liberty
Perelman and Smirnov are representatives of the Leningrad Mathematical School, graduates of the well-known 239th school and the Faculty of Mathematics and Mechanics of St. Petersburg State University. But there were also Muscovites among the mathematical Nobel Prize nominees, for example, a professor at Columbia University who worked in the USA for many years and a graduate of Moscow State University Andrey Okunkov . He received the Fields Medal in 2006, at the same time as Perelman, for his achievements connecting probability theory, representation theory, and algebraic geometry. In practice, Okunkov’s work over the years has found application both in statistical physics to describe the surfaces of crystals, and in string theory, a field of physics that tries to combine the principles of quantum mechanics and the theory of relativity.
Story
Peter Turchin. Photo: Stevens University of Technology
He proposed a new theory at the intersection of mathematics and the humanities Petr Turchin . It is surprising that Turchin himself is not a mathematician or a historian: he is a biologist who studied at Moscow State University and now works at the University of Connecticut and studies populations. Population biology processes develop over a long period of time, and their description and analysis often require the construction of mathematical models. But modeling can also be used to better understand social and historical phenomena in human society. This is exactly what Turchin did in 2003, calling the new approach cliodynamics (on behalf of the muse of history Clio). Using this method, Turchin himself established “secular” demographic cycles.
Linguistics
Andrey Zaliznyak. Photo: Mitrius/wikimedia
Every year in Novgorod, as well as in some other ancient Russian cities, such as Moscow, Pskov, Ryazan and even Vologda, more and more birch bark letters are found, the age of which dates back to the 11th-15th centuries. In them you can find personal and official correspondence, children's exercises, drawings, jokes, and even love letters - “The Attic” is about the funniest ancient Russian inscriptions. The living language of letters helps researchers understand the Novgorod dialect, as well as the life of ordinary people and the history of Rus'. The most famous researcher of birch bark documents is, of course, Academician of the Russian Academy of Sciences Andrey Zaliznyak : It’s not without reason that his annual lectures, dedicated to newly found letters and deciphering old ones, are filled with people.
Climatology
Vasily Titov. Photo from noaa.gov
On the morning of December 26, 2004, the day of the tragic tsunami in Indonesia, which, according to various estimates, killed 200-300 thousand people, a graduate of NSU, working at the Tsunami Research Center at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration in Seattle (USA), Vasily Titov woke up famous. And this is not just a figure of speech: having learned about the strongest earthquake that occurred in the Indian Ocean, the scientist, before going to bed, decided to run a tsunami wave forecasting program on his computer and posted its results online. His forecast turned out to be very accurate, but, unfortunately, it was made too late and therefore could not prevent human casualties. Now the tsunami forecasting program MOST, developed by Titov, is used in many countries around the world.
Astronomy
Konstantin Batygin. Photo from caltech.edu
In January 2016, the world was shocked by another piece of news: in our native solar system. One of the authors of the discovery was born in Russia Konstantin Batygin from the University of California. Having studied the motion of six cosmic bodies located beyond the orbit of Neptune, the last of the currently recognized planets, scientists have used calculations to show that at a distance seven times greater than the distance from Neptune to the Sun, there should be another planet orbiting the Sun. Its size, according to scientists, is 10 times the diameter of the Earth. However, in order to be completely convinced of the existence of the distant giant, it is still necessary to see it with a telescope.
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