Forms of development of academic research in Yakutia in 1947-1991.

Suleymanov Aleksandr Albertovich ORCID: 0000-0001-8746-258X PhD in History Senior Researcher, Institute for Humanities Research and Indigenous Studies of the North of Siberian branch of the Russian Academy of Sciences 677027, Russia, Republic of Sakha (Yakutia), Yakutsk, Petrovsky str., 1, room 403 alexas1306@gmail.com Other publications by this author

Introduction. In 2024, an important date for our country is celebrated – 300 years since the founding of the National Academy of Sciences. In this regard, the appeal to a wide range of issues related to the understanding of the historical experience of the activity of this scientific center, including in the critically important northern regions for the modern development of Russia, is being updated. The purpose of this article is to create a dynamic picture of the development of the forms of research of the Academy of Sciences of the USSR in Yakutia in 1947-1991. The chosen period is connected, on the one hand, with the organization of the Yakut base of the USSR Academy of Sciences, on the other – with the reorganization of the USSR Academy of Sciences into the Russian Academy of Sciences (RAS) and the subsequent forced reformatting of the activities of the leading scientific center of our country.

The relevance of addressing this issue is also due to the current historiographical situation. By now, a fairly solid range of works has been published, within the framework of which, including in connection with important anniversaries, interim results of the activities of various academic structures of Yakutia have been summarized ^{[1; 2; 19, etc.]}, pages of the life of leading scientists have been reconstructed ^{[18; 30; 31, etc.]}, performed attempts to generalize the directions and results of the work of the USSR Academy of Sciences ^{[16; 20; 21, etc.]}. However, none of them set out the task of tracing the development of forms of organization of academic research in the region during the above-mentioned time interval.

Materials and methods. The research is based on the involvement of documents from the archives of the Yakut Scientific Center of the Siberian Branch of the Russian Academy of Sciences, the Archive of the P.I. Melnikov Institute of Permafrost Science of the Siberian Branch of the Russian Academy of Sciences, the Current Archive of the Yu.G. Shafer Institute of Cosmophysical Research and Aeronomy of the Siberian Branch of the Russian Academy of Sciences (Yakutsk), the Scientific Archive of the Siberian Branch of the Russian Academy of Sciences (Novosibirsk), the Archive of the Russian Academy of Sciences sciences and the Russian State Archive of Economics (Moscow), as well as information gathered in the published scientific literature. When processing the accumulated materials, special historical methods of scientific cognition were used (the principle of historicism, historical-typological, historical-comparative and historical-genetic methods, etc.).

Results and discussion. Since the first years of the National Academy of Sciences, scientists have focused on the vast territories of Yakutia and the peoples inhabiting it. For example, the research of the First and Second Kamchatka expeditions was carried out here. At the end of the XVIII century, members of the Northeast expedition of I.I. Billings worked in the lower reaches of the Kolyma. In the century before last, research was carried out in Yakutia by members of the F.P. Wrangel – P.F. expedition. Anjou 1820-1824, the Lena Polar Expedition 1882-1884, the expedition of A.A. Bunge to the Novosibirsk Islands 1885-1886, the expedition of E.V. Toll 1893, the Siberian expedition 1894-1896, etc. It was with the research in Yakutia that the most tragic pages were associated in the activities of the Russian Polar Expedition of 1902-1903, which was very ambitious in terms of the tasks set and the results achieved ^{[32, pp. 41-211]}.

The largest research initiative of its time was the research of the Yakut Complex Expedition of the USSR Academy of Sciences in 1925-1930, in which 246 scientific and technical workers took part. The leading members of the expedition included leading scientists of the Soviet Union. Her detachments surveyed the Aldan, Bulunsky, Verkhoyansky, Vilyuysky, Kolyma, Olekminsky and Yakut districts. The scientists spent 391 months in the field and traveled over 130 thousand kilometers ^{[17, pp. 66-103]}.

In 1938-1939, the work of the Yakut Expedition of the Council for the Study of Productive Forces of the USSR Academy of Sciences (SOPS) began in the region. In March 1941, in Moscow, the SOPS, together with the Council of People's Commissars of the Yakut ASSR, organized an All-Union conference on the development of the productive forces of Yakutia, which was attended by 9 academicians, 3 corresponding members of the USSR Academy of Sciences and 12 doctors of Sciences ^{[7, L. 13-14]}. In the same year, the first permanent academic institution in the region was organized – the Yakutsk Permafrost Research Station of the V.A. Obruchev Institute of Permafrost Studies of the USSR Academy of Sciences (YANIMS INMERO) ^{[18, l. 23]}. The Great Patriotic War prevented the further development of academic science in Yakutia.

After its completion in August 1946, the Council of Ministers of the JASSR petitioned the Council of Ministers of the USSR and the Presidium of the Academy of Sciences of the USSR on the need to create in order to "systematically study the nature and natural resources of the territory of the Yakut ASSR, the history, language and culture of the peoples inhabiting it, ... the unification and coordination of scientific works" ^{[2, p. 5-6]} in the Republic of Yakutsk the scientific research base of the USSR Academy of Sciences (YANIB). In September 1946, the first secretary of the Yakut Regional Committee of the CPSU(b). I.E. Vinokurov sent a letter to the President of the USSR Academy of Sciences, Academician A.N. Vavilov, in which arguments were presented justifying the expediency and timeliness of the appearance of the YANIB, as well as proposals regarding the goals and objectives of its work. On April 28, 1947, after a letter from A.N. Vavilov, the Council of Ministers of the USSR adopted a resolution on the organization of the Yakut Scientific Research Base of the USSR Academy of Sciences ^{[2, p. 6]}. Two years later, in accordance with the decree of the Presidium of the USSR Academy of Sciences "On the establishment of a single name for branches and research bases of the USSR Academy of Sciences - Branches of the Academy of Sciences", YANIB was reorganized into the Yakut Branch (YAF) of the USSR Academy of Sciences ^{[6, L. 83-95; 98-102]}.

The first academic institute in Yakutia, which still existed as part of the YANIB, the Institute of Language, Literature and History (IYALI), gradually began to complement new institutes in the structure of the YAF of the USSR Academy of Sciences: biology (1952), geology (1957), cosmophysical research and aeronomy (ICFIA, 1962), physical and technical problems of the North (IFTPS, 1970), mining of the North (IGDS, 1980), economics of integrated development of natural resources of the North (IECOPRS, 1986). Along with the named research structures of the Yakut branch of the SB Academy of Sciences of the USSR in Yakutia during the Soviet period, there was another institute that was part of the USSR Academy of Sciences, the Institute of Permafrost Studies of the SB Academy of Sciences of the USSR, established in 1960. It was based on the mentioned JANIMS INMERO.

Despite the noted development of the network of institutes, in general, the expeditionary form of work of the National Academy of Sciences in Yakutia, which has long been the basis for scientific study of the region, remained relevant during the period under review. For example, the 50s of the twentieth century were marked by the Yakut complex expedition of the SOPS of the USSR Academy of Sciences (1950-1955) and the Yakut complex expedition of the YAF of the USSR Academy of Sciences (1956-1958), the most important results of which were the scientific substantiation of the possibility of developing the coal and iron ore industry in the south of Yakutia, and diamond mining in its western part ^{[15, pp. 6-12]}.

AND in 1959, the largely exemplary Yukaghir complex expedition was organized, which shed light on many issues of the genesis of one of the oldest ethnic groups in the North-East of Siberia. In 1964, the annual work of the fundamental Prilensky archaeological expedition began, the most resonant discovery of which was the identification of the ancient man's site in the middle reaches of the Lena River. Since the late 1960s, work has been underway to collect field material for compiling a linguistic atlas of dialects and dialects of the Yakut language. In the 1980s, with the active participation of the IYALI, the III and IV comprehensive folklore expeditions were organized by the USSR Academy of Sciences, which made it possible to record unique samples of oral folk art of the indigenous ethnic groups of Yakutia, mostly lost now by their representatives. The expeditionary work of the IECOPRS staff in the Sakkyrsky district of Yakutia in 1989, among other things, contributed to the creation of the first national administrative region in the Soviet Union – Eveno-Bytantaysky, etc. ^{[29, pp. 48-248]}.

Without the expeditionary work of specialists from the Institute of Biology in various parts of Yakutia, it would hardly have been possible to create the "Red Book of Plants of Yakutia" (1981), the "Red Book of the YASSR" (1987), soil maps, vegetation maps of the republic, plant zoning of forestry, the development of the biochemical direction, including the identification of biochemical mechanisms of adaptation of animals and plants to cold climate, accumulation of a bank of long-term data characterizing the diversity of taiga–alasian ecosystems, organization of the first reserves in the region - Olekminsky (1984) and Ust-Lensky (1985), development in the late 1980s of the concept of creating a network of specially protected natural territories, etc. ^{[2, pp. 36-49]}.

An important role in the development of the tin mining industry in Yakutia, which gained allied importance during the period under review, was the holding of the North-Eastern Complex Expedition of the USSR Academy of Sciences 1959-1962, the key role in the organization of which was played by the staff of the Institute of Geology. The study by geologists during the expedition work of the Polousny, Sette-Daban, Ulakhan-Sis ridges, the Selennyakh ridge, the basins of the Aldan, Bolshaya Kuonamka, Vilyu, Daldyn, Derbek, Indigirka, Kolyma, Lena, Olenek, Yana and many other geographical objects revealed the structure of the unique geological structures of the Siberian Platform and Verkhoyano-Kolyma a folded area containing a diverse complex of mineral deposits, primarily diamonds, gold, tin and hydrocarbon raw materials, to determine the patterns of their placement, to establish prospects for coal mining, diamond, platinum, oil and gas, to make more precise the directions of the search for these resources ^{[8, l. 1-142; 9, l. 1-132; 10, l. 1-53; 11, l. 1-158; 12, l. 1-114]}. Employees of the Institute of Geology have discovered a number of mineral deposits, including the first oil and gas condensate field in Yakutia – Srednebotuobinskoye. Their recommendations also contributed to the discovery of a number of gold-bearing (Sarylakh, Nezhdaninskoye, Kuchus, Badran) and tin ore (Deputatskoye, Lonesome, Churpunya) deposits. Geologists have drawn up a scheme of metallogenic zoning of Yakutia for rare elements. In addition, a set of information related to seismic activity was obtained, which contributed, among other things, to the prediction of earthquakes. Paleontologists of the Institute for the first time in our country described in detail and comprehensively fossil animals, including mammoths and woolly rhinoceroses, etc. ^{[31, pp. 3-13]}.

Large-scale expeditionary work in the 1950s and 1980s was launched by Yakut geocryologists. During this period, such major expeditions took place, among others: Expedition No. 1 INMERO (1952-1953), Verkhoyanskaya (1958-1959), Vilyuyskaya (1958-1960), Ust-Vilyuyskaya (1960-1963), Udokan (1961-1965), Severnaya (1962-1963), Central Yakut (1965-1967), Soviet-Mongolian (1967-1983), Severo-Yeniseiskaya (1970-1974), Baikal-Amur (1975-1983), Severnaya (Arctic) (1981-1985). During the implementation of these and other more local research initiatives, researchers have accumulated a significant amount of information characterizing the structure, composition and temperature regime of permafrost rocks in various natural and geographical conditions, the depth of seasonal thawing of permafrost, glacial processes and phenomena, the role of climatic factors in the formation of various types of sediments, the rate of destruction of icy marine Beregov et al. Along with this, information was obtained that directly contributed to the transport, industrial and agricultural development of the region, including recommendations on the optimal location of infrastructure facilities, increasing the duration of field development using thermal melioration within the boundaries of highly acidic rocks, exploitation by economic entities of subsurface and permafrost waters, leveling the effects of thermokarst and degradation of permafrost, etc. ^{[2, p. 65; 3, l. 20-371; 4, l. 7-12; 5, l. 5-11; 26, l. 32-34; 27, l. 2-10; 28, l. 1-38]}.

The staff of other academic institutes of Yakutia also relied on expeditionary research in their work. In particular, in 1977, IFTPS specialists as part of the Polymer detachment conducted field work to study the properties of polymer materials when exposed to conditions of various climatic zones. In this regard, the research covered, among others, the Mirninsky, Bulunsky and Oymyakonsky districts of Yakutia, as well as, for example, the Batumi district of the Adjara ASSR and the Tashkent district of the Uzbek USSR – a scale difficult to imagine by the standards of modern Russian science. In the same year, members of the Geophysics-77 detachment worked in Oleneksky, Leninsky (Nyurbinsky), Mirninsky, Vilyuysky, Verkhnevilyuysky, Namsky, Kobyai, Verkhoyansky, Gorny, Ordzhonikidzevsky (Khangalassky) and Tomponsky districts of Yakutia. In addition, research in the regions of the republic and other regions of the USSR in 1977 was carried out by members of the detachments "Sibirsky", "Technologist", "Gorny", "Nugget" and "Miner" ^{[13, L. 1-114]}.

ICFIA employees conducted expeditionary research almost every year. For example, in 1982, the Oreol expeditionary detachment monitored radio communications in the Arkhangelsk region, the Meridian detachment conducted simultaneous broadband recording of signals of various frequencies on the Yakutsk – Tiksi highway ^{[23, L. 31]}. In 1985, members of the Ionospheric detachment performed measurements of ionospheric parameters in Sangary and Tommot settlements ^{[24, L. 42]}. The following year, the Meridian-87 experiment was carried out on the synchronous registration of various types of signals on the Yakutsk – Zhigansk highway along the Lena River, while simultaneously conducting research on the registration of fast and slow variations of the geomagnetic field "Sakkyrsky detachment", etc. ^{[25, L. 31]}.

At the same time, a distinctive feature of the period under review was the development of a stationary form of organization of academic research. Thus, Yakut geocryologists alone created more than 50 scientific hospitals during 1958-1988, including about 20 with a round-the-clock observation cycle ^{[2, p. 66]}. In particular, surveys at these hospitals have made it possible to significantly increase the norms of permissible loads on permafrost during the construction of buildings and structures, develop and implement more cost-effective methods of sinking piles into permafrost, calculations of the bearing capacity of pile foundations, the warm effect of plumbing and sewerage on the ground ^{[22, L. 14]}, mechanisms for increasing the effectiveness of irrigation of meadows in the arid climate of central Yakutia, etc. ^{[2, pp. 72-73]}.

The hospital network was organized by the Institute of Biology. In particular, in 1970, the Nizhnekolymsky hospital in the village of Pokhodsk began operation, created for the purpose of conducting comprehensive soil and botanical research in the tundra zone, in 1974 - the Nyurbinsky hospital, aimed at creating highly productive meadow lands, in 1976 – the Yediai field base in Ordzhonikidze district for acclimatization of yak and the experimental base of the forest laboratory in the village of Delgai, Olekminsky district, for the development of the theoretical foundations of reforestation in south Yakutia ^{[14, pp. 37-48]}. The work of Yakut zoologists at the Zhirkovo (mouth of the Berezovka River), Lampiske (mouth of the Lampushka River), Kele (central Verkhoyansk) hospitals was of great importance for ecological, population and ecosystem studies ^{[2, p. 49]}.

By the beginning of the 1980s, the structure of the ICFIA had: a comprehensive installation of wide atmospheric showers in c. Oktemtsy, the Tiksi Polar Cosmophysics Laboratory, the Zhigansk complex geophysical station, stratospheric, geomagnetic and ionospheric stations near Yakutsk, radio polygons in Magan and Oibenkel settlements (25 km south of the capital of the republic), an optical polygon in the village of Maymaga (Namsky district) ^{[23, L. 31]}. In 1986, radiometric stations were opened in Jarjan and on the island of Sagylakh-Ary ^{[25, l. 32]}. Work was carried out periodically on Kotelny Island. The creation and development of a meridional chain of stations (Yakutsk – Zhigansk – Tiksi – Kotelny) made it possible for ICFIA specialists to create a foundation for the study of near-Earth space ^{[2, p. 84]}.

The experimental and design work of the Yakut cosmophysicists made it possible to use the equipment they developed on the Kosmos-6 satellite, from which the effects of the thermonuclear explosion of the United States in the Pacific Ocean were analyzed. In addition, in the period from 1956 to 1986, the researchers' equipment was on board 13 Soviet rockets, during the flight of which measurements of the intensity of ionizing radiation were carried out. Thanks to the research of IFTPS specialists, original thermal and sound-proof building structures made of light and cheap materials were created, the scientific foundations for the development of gas hydrate deposits were formulated, recommendations on the technology of electric welding at temperatures up to -60 °C were prepared, and methods for intensifying oil and gas production by acoustic exposure appeared. Research in the field of nanotechnology has received serious development at IFTPS. In particular, the scientists determined the mechanical characteristics of elements made of nanoconstructed steel, the use of which made it possible to increase the maximum permissible load on products by more than 1.5 times, even when operating at low temperatures. The unique technologies developed at the Institute made it possible to increase the strength and reliability of machines and structures, reduce material and labor costs, and found practical application in the work of machine-building giants (in particular, Uralmash and Belaz), etc. Devices, units, installations, technologies and recommendations developed by IGDS employees have been used at mining enterprises, which have significantly improved the efficiency of their activities. In particular, the technology of coal mining developed at IGDS made it possible to double labor productivity at the Dzhebariki-Khaya mine, new type drilling columns and drill bits were successfully tested, a dust suppression prefix was introduced at Yakutzolota and Severovostokzoloto enterprises during drilling operations and much more ^{[2, pp. 80-104]}.

Conclusion. Thus, during the period under review, the forms of organization of academic research in Yakutia were characterized by significant development. The expedition surveys of the staff of the USSR Academy of Sciences were continued, which were carried out with greater intensity than before. An important place was occupied by stationary research, which unfolded on a network of hospitals in various parts of Yakutia. In addition, experimental and design work carried out in academic institutions established in the region was characterized by a number of achievements. This state of affairs has allowed the academic center to conduct a complex of largely unique research focused not only on obtaining fundamental, but also applied, of serious practical importance, results.