Announcement of the issue

New wine? Old wineskins? (pages 1-3)
On September 3, 2012, Vedomosti published an article “Bet on new content,” written by the rector of the Skolkovo Moscow School of Management Andrei Volkov and the Minister of Education and Science of the Russian Federation Dmitry Livanov . Our newspaper turned to a number of scientists working at universities in Moscow, St. Petersburg and Yekaterinburg with a request to comment on the main theses of this article. Commentaries were made by: Anton Konushin, Viktor Vasiliev, Mikhail Sokolov, Sergey Lando, Yuri Averbukh, Alexander Fillipov.

September has already arrived...
Let's talk about the problems of education - pp. 1-3, 6-7, 9-10

How can we reorganize the RFBR?
Open letter from members of the Foundation Council - page 4

S.P. Cap
Outstanding popularizer of science - page 5

Have you eaten too much henbane?
An expert is imprisoned for his professionalism - page 8

The sky in X-rays
History of science from Pavel Amnuel - page 11

Unpredictable past
in the true story of Lev Klein - page 12

No records expected
Interview with the famous gerontologist - page 13

Uncharted Area
Names, numbers and quality of football players - pp. 14-15

RFBR: more openness, less bureaucracy (page 4)
Dmitry Dyakonov, Oleg Melnik
In July 2012, the Bureau of the RFBR Council addressed all members of the Council with a request to make proposals for improving the work of the RFBR. The two new members of the Council decided to combine their proposals and sign them jointly. Proposals were sent on August 8, 2012 to the Bureau. They are a continuation and development of two letters signed by thousands of scientists in the spring of 2012. They were also actively discussed on the website of the Society of Scientific Workers (SSR).

The obvious - the incredible about Kapitsa (p. 5)
Marina Astvatsaturyan, Yuri Vinogradov
For many people in our country, Sergei Kapitsa has been a symbol of science for decades. It is not for nothing that he regularly appeared on the lists of the most famous scientists, ahead of even Nobel laureates. We are publishing memoirs about a famous (maybe even our most famous) popularizer of science.

Two key system (page 6-7)
Iryna Yakutenko
A new Public Council has been formed under the Ministry of Education and Science. The first meeting took place. Many participants in the meeting expressed cautious optimism following its results. Perhaps, in fact, it will be possible to somehow influence the decisions of the ministry.

“You, Darling, look good in all your outfits...” (p. 7)
Olga Zakutnyaya
The list of the most important scientific discoveries of 2012 will certainly include the discovery of the amazing properties of the galaxy cluster SPT_CL J2344-4243, called Phoenix. The long-awaited “cooling flow” has been reliably detected in it. Gas flows into the center of the cluster, resulting in a colossal rate of star formation in the central galaxy.

Lay down poppy straws (page 8)
Sergey Belkov, Igor Zelenin
On August 20, the Zyuzinsky Court of Moscow authorized the arrest of Olga Zelenina, an expert at the Penza Research Institute of Agriculture, on charges of aiding and abetting drug smuggling on an especially large scale. In essence, the expert is accused of not matching what law enforcement officials wanted to hear. This jeopardizes the very institution of independent expertise. We are publishing a comment from our columnist, as well as a comment from Olga Zelenina’s husband.

Burrow songs (page 10)
Natalia Reznik
The article describes the meaning of the love songs of one of the frog species. It turns out that you can extract much more meaning from them than from a banal serenade.

Quick access to the scientific picture of the world (page 10)
Sergey Popov
The scientific picture of the world is becoming more and more complex, and it is becoming increasingly difficult for a non-specialist to understand it. Apparently, some new mechanism is needed for popularization and, in general, for conveying information about the results of scientific research to non-specialists, especially if they need it for business. Maybe new information technologies will allow you to achieve success?

Window Wide Open (page 11)
Pavel Amnuel
This year marks 50 years of X-ray astronomy. In 1962, even before satellites, during rocket experiments, the first X-ray source outside the solar system was discovered. Now X-ray astronomy is a huge field of modern science, armed with space observatories worth several billion dollars. Some stages of the long journey are described in the article.

Trypillian mirror (p. 12)
Lev Klein
Problems in communication between scientists and television journalists exist not only in our country. They also exist in Ukraine. The author talks about what he had to face.

No records expected (page 13)
Alexey Levin
Scientists are able to significantly extend the life of mice. This is probably a kind of compensation to the mouse people for everything that they have to endure from scientists. Can we expect that these successes will be transferred to humans in the near future? The famous scientist Andrzej Bartke answered the questions .

Quantitative quality assessment (pp. 14-15)
Ilya Mirmov
Attempts at scientific analysis of various aspects of sports competitions, preparation and composition of teams, etc. are constantly being undertaken. Here are the results of another one related to football.

AUTHOR'S COLUMNS:

Terrain feature (page 13)
Irina Levontina

Reading holiday (page 14)
Rebekah Frumkina

Fried Truths (page 15)
Iryna Yakutenko