Those who don't remember their kinship

At the Institute of Physical Chemistry and Electrochemistry named after . A . N. _ Frumkin RAS ( IPHE RAS ) happened something as if from another era . However , who knows _ - eras , they unfortunately sometimes , _ , . come back The article “About people and non-humans in science” [1] talks about an amazing person who recently died in the USA at the age of - 92 Professor Vladimir Sergeevich Bagotsky . He led the development of batteries for launching the first satellite and other spacecraft he , for this work he was awarded various state awards , then for more than worked 30 years at the Institute of Electrochemistry Academy of Sciences of the USSR / RAS ( now this institute is the part of Institute of Physical Chemistry and Electrochemistry ), and in old age he moved to daughters in the USA , where until his last days he continued to work on a textbook and monographs .

The same the note [1] reports a monstrous episode that occurred after death scientist - that the . of deputy the The director of the Institute of Physical Chemistry and Economics according to the regime” ordered to be removed from the wall the obituary , considering that “ “who emigrated from the USSR” was not worthy of the memory of his colleagues .

We asked several clarifying questions to one of the authors of the note , Galina Aleksandrovna Tsirlina , a former employee of the Institute of Electrochemistry named after . A . N. _ Frumkina .

— you still Do to consider IFHE be “your” institute ?

— To some extent, because people who are close to me professionally and humanly work there.

— But you did not witness the events described in your note?

— I learned about these events from a network link. It was sent by colleagues with whom, after the death of Vladimir Sergeevich, we discussed the obvious actions in such sad cases - necrologies, the format of a memorial special issue. The savagery with the obituary was committed the next morning after I arrived at the institute to visit Bagotsky’s closest students...

— That is, “nothing foreshadowed ” ? And this action administration of the IFHE was for you unexpected ?

- In such an obscene form - certainly unexpected, I just didn’t have enough imagination to imagine what the “regime” could come to. But in fact, this is a natural development of the general line of the institute’s leadership. Let me remind you of another episode related to the Institute of Physics and Chemistry - there was a note about it in TRV several years ago [2]. There they discussed a calendar published for the anniversary of the institute, all in portraits of outstanding scientists of the united Institute of Physical Chemistry, among whom there were many current “part-time academicians”, but for some reason a number of iconic figures of Russian physical chemistry were missing. Even Veniamin Grigoryevich Levich was not there! - the creator of our unique (now defunct) theoretical department. I then scolded TRV for the superficial style of this article and said that I should have gone to the institute, talked to people, made serious material about the loss of historical memory...

- Well, that you would done have , who was you stopping ?

I don't like newspapers. However, now the chaos is such that there is no time for these nuances. We finally need to say publicly in plain text how things stand. The country once, before the era of the fight against cosmopolitanism, had a large and effective scientific field - physical chemistry. Now the last representative of that cohort has left, having also suffered through the roof from this very struggle. In essence, there is little physical chemistry left on our territory - although, of course, vacancies in the Russian Academy of Sciences in this discipline are regularly announced and filled by someone, often by completely “non-physical” chemists. And where, it would seem, if not in the last specialized institute, to carefully preserve the little that remains... But with such an attitude towards the roots, it will definitely not be possible to preserve anything. Even if V.S. Bagotsky, who spent his whole life solving actual applied problems in Russia, is registered as an “emigrant” and for this reason is deprived of the right to our memory, then it’s simply scary to imagine what this administration thinks about V.G. Levich and other wonderful employees of the institute, who previously realized their right to live and work in a free world.

— But surely in the Institute of Physical Chemistry and Economics there are people who more than once share the administration’s roots attitude towards the и memory and of outstanding scientists of the past generation ?

- Of course there are, and I really hope that they will finally begin to speak out publicly. Moreover, there is even a museum there - the memorial office of Alexander Naumovich Frumkin. I don’t really like the concept of the exhibition of this museum, but, of course, its keeper, Evgenia Ivanovna Khrushcheva, does a lot to preserve various texts and photographs.

However, the problem is not limited to the museum business. Our roots are primarily classical works that have not lost their relevance. This is science on a large foundation, and not material science - the classics here never become outdated. In this regard, I cannot resist quoting a recent letter from a German colleague, who once again received from us scans of old articles from yellowed Russian physicochemical journals: “You should try to get the Russian publishing houses (or the Academy of Science??) to fund a complete scanning of the old issues of Elektrokhimija and also Zh Fiz Khim, at least! In 20 years, the old paper issues will not be readable anymore, I fear. May be you (I mean Russia) can acquire funds from the UNESCO. These journals belong to the WORLD HERITAGE OF SCIENCE! He writes correctly, yes. I especially like “??”. Do you happen to have influence on UNESCO?

- Unfortunately _ _ no . What on your own about ?

— We scan everything we can on our own. It is precisely because the cathedral website contains an ever-growing collection of works by Frumkin and Levich, and also has a section about the former theoretical department of the Institute of Electrochemistry, that I can assess the degree of demand for old works - they have been requested approximately once a week for many years, all new and new people. But such a collection needs to be maintained by a large institute, not a small department. First of all, this concerns the unique journal Acta Physicochimica URSS (translated version of the “Journal of Physical Chemistry”) - it was closed in 1947 as “cosmopolitan”... However, as we see from current events at IFChE, the general line of the institute’s leadership is directed in exactly the opposite direction side.

— Well maybe not , the entire leadership , but only the deputy . director regime _ ?

- Oh, I doubt it. If so, then at the academic council, at which employees directly condemned the “regime” episode, the management could at least apologize. As far as I know, instead the deputy. Director for Science Vladimir Nikolaevich Andreev there even tried to justify the actions of the Deputy Director for the Armashov regime. But the director, Aslan Yusupovich Tsivadze, apparently simply was not there, and it seems that he does not consider all this an emergency. I bitterly remember a verse from a song dedicated to Bagotsky’s last anniversary:

“ the time , By he became our _ student _

Esperanto an spoke He without accent ,

Administrators and girls at the dance

he Therefore was considered " a foreigner .

He was born and graduated from high school in Switzerland, spoke Russian all his life with a slight accent, but this did not stop the satellite from being launched. They joked like that more than 20 years ago, and it couldn’t have occurred to me that this joke would materialize in such an underhanded form as it does now...

1. M.V. Feigelman, G.A. Tsirlina, “About people and non-humans in science”, www.polit.ru/article/2012/11/29/bagotsky/
2. Academicians instead of graduate students, TrV-science No. 9 (28) from 06.12.09