Facts and Numbers

There are 16 international research centers within the Siberian Division of the Academy of Sciences, for example, the International Center of Catalysis, the International Tomography Center, the International Center for Humanistic and Biospheric Research, the International Center of Aerophysical Research.
There are 17,000 employees, including 84 members of the Russian Academy of Sciences, about 3,750 scientists with doctors' degrees in 37 scientific research and design institutes of the Scientific Center.
Approximately 20,000 people have graduated from Novosibirsk State University, one of Russia's three leading ones, since January 1958.
There are currently 4,000 students in the eight departments of Novosibirsk State University. Approximately 500 students graduate from both Physics and Mathematics departments of the university every year. About 200 of them have advanced knowledge in computer science.

The Historical and Geographical Roots of Akademgorodok

In Russian "gorodok" signifies a provincial town, and the capital city usually looks out at the provinces from on high. Akademgorodok, however, is a happy exception to this Russian tradition of the relationship between the center and a far away place. Leading visionaries, outstanding scholars willingly gave up their comfortable homes in Moscow, St. Petersburg, and Kiev for the small Siberian town yet to be built, in order to correct the historical and geographic injustice in the distribution of scientific power and resources. Russia is a huge country, the largest in the world by far, and science has existed in it only at several points. The visionaries took it upon themselves to build Akademgorodok-the Siberian city of science-according to a unique plan. Akademgorodok is 40 kilometers south of Novosibirsk, an industrial center on the Trans-Siberian railroad, with a modern airport nearby.

Akademgorodok was to become the "brain" of Siberia, a huge expanse of land usually associated with poorly developed space, immense natural wealth, and a harsh climate. The scientists challenged the provincial poverty of ideas and a cultural lag. In all areas they strived to establish the highest quality, from research to the very style of life.

The date of its birth is May 18, 1957-when the government passed a resolution "On the Creation of the Siberian Branch of the Academy of Sciences." The authors of the idea-and the initiators of realization-were academicians Mikhail Lavrentev, Sergei Sobolev, and Sergei Khristianovich. But the city remembers and honors all of its founding fathers. The streets and institutes carry their names, scientific prizes and scholarships have been established in their honor, and academic lectures, conferences, and symposia are named to commemorate their legacy.

In the fifth decade of its existence the City of Science still believes in the ideals of its creators: interdisciplinary research, openness, faith in youth, and preservation of a park-like campus. The experience of the great founders will also show the path out of the present difficult time of economic uncertainty in Russia today. But the most scientific city in the world continues to produce leading research.

The Most Scientific Street in the World

Research institutes run the whole length of Lavrentev Prospect, and residents of Akademgorodok smile knowingly: long ago the street was listed in the Guinness Book of World Records as the most scientific street in the world. From the very beginning the city was intended to be an interdisciplinary research center. Cooperation between biologists and chemists, geologists and mathematicians, inorganic chemists and electrical engineers, etc., would result in new themes and new instruments of study. One such example is synchrotron radiation, a byproduct of fundamental research in the Budker Institute of Nuclear Physics. Synchrotron radiation is tens, even hundreds of times harder than X-rays. The demand for this universal research method will grow, since the circle of users has long ago expanded far beyond Akademgorodok. The Budker Institute has now established an international center of synchrotron radiation.

As not much can be done these days without computers, at least in the sciences, this has grown into an important field of research in its own right. There are hundreds of skilled programmers in the three dozen institutes of Akademgorodok, and not only do they in-house software development for the research projects their teams are working on; some of the software products developed in the institutes are successfully marketed elsewhere.

Rapid development of contacts with foreign research partners is another important aspect of life in Akademgorodok. Within the Siberian Division of the Academy of Sciences, there are now sixteen international research centers. The International Center of Catalysis is located at the Boreskov Institute of Catalysis. It has strong ties with universities, institutes, and firms in Great Britain, Italy, the United States, India, Bulgaria, and Hungary. The International Tomography Center is the result of the joint effort of leading specialists in radiospectroscopy in the Institute of Chemical Kinetics and Combustion and on the mathematical apparatus of tomography in the Institute of Mathematics. The International Center for Humanistic and Biospheric Research is based on the Institute of Archeology and Ethnography, and the Institute of Cytology and Genetics. A part of the Institute of Theoretical and Applied Mechanics is the International Center of Aerophysical Research. Many foreign companies have their representatives, partners and development divisions in Akademgorodok. For example, Oracle, Sun Microsystems and Hewlett Packard are among them.

Today in 37 scientific research and design institutes of the Novosibirsk Scientific Center-centered in Akademgorodok-there are roughly 17,000 employees, including 84 members of the Russian Academy of Sciences, about 3,750 scientists with doctors' degrees. This is significant scientific potential that has preserved its capability for serious work in spite of the economic crisis.

The Meaning of Life is in its Continuation

The university has always been an essential component of Akademgorodok. It was created even before many of Akademgorodok's institutes. The foundations of buildings had just been laid, but the local scientific schools were already producing remarkable results in high-energy physics, genetics, chemical catalysis, and mathematics. A government resolution formally established Novosibirsk State University, one of Russia's three leading universities, in January 1958, and since then the university has produced approximately 20,000 specialists.

A fundamental principle is that "scientists must teach," and so many of the professors are at the same time leading researchers in the institutes of Akademgorodok. This brilliant galaxy of teachers attracted hundreds of talented students to Akademgorodok. There are currently 4,000 students in the eight departments. Another principle is that the best way to train young people is to have them do real work as early as possible. This is why almost all of the students have considerable practical experience by the time they graduate. All the students are required to learn computer usage skills, while many of them can develop the software they need for their research applications.

Akademgorodok has two special schools to identify and train talented young students: the College of Informatics and the well-known School of Physics Mathematics. Over the years roughly 10,000 people graduated who had come from all ends of Siberia, and even Central Asia and the Far East. Seventy to eighty percent of its graduates enter the University each year. About twenty-five years ago, reporters asked Mikhail A. Lavrentev what he considered the most important of his accomplishments. An outstanding mathematician and specialist in mechanics, the chairman of the Siberian Division answered, "The Club of Young Engineers of the Physics Mathematics School" because "they will be here after we have left."

A Home with Windows on the Forest

The unconditional charm of the City of Science extends to a non-urban relationship with nature. From every window one sees trees and flowers along the roads and pedestrian thoroughfares-pine, birch, apple, ash, and lilac. Akademgorodok was and remains the unique "green" example in Siberian urban planning: not one pine or birch tree was cut down needlessly. There is a legendary detail: the Academy forbids the booms of tower cranes to rotate full circle to avoid damaging any trees.

With diligence the residents have planted fir, spruce, linden, cedar and larch, even jasmine and honeysuckle. And on the outskirts of the city is the Siberian Botanical Garden, with over 500 species, sorts and hybrids that one often forgets at these high latitudes-even when they are flowering.

Indeed, communion with nature is a yearlong blessing. According to seasonal preferences, the residents are cross-country skiers or sailors, mushroom pickers and gardeners, gatherers of wild herbs and fishermen. There is a special rural harmony with nature that makes Akademgorodok such an attractive place to live and work. But monotony of rural life does not threaten the residents. Akademgorodok is open to the whole world-and is interesting to the world. It is sufficient to glance at the guest books of two wonderful museums-the geological and the historical-ethnographic-full of the names of scholars, politicians, public servants, journalists, and of course artists, musicians and writers from all over the globe.