Memory of M. A. Roitberg

The day before the closing of the school of molecular and theoretical biology (SMTB-2017), on August 16, Mikhail Abramovich Roitberg died during a difficult operation to remove a cancer tumor. He had a tremendous influence on the development of SMTB and was a close friend and mentor of many of our employees and schoolchildren, served them as an example to follow. The same age as my parents, Mikhail Abramovich knew me from birth, and later, during the joint scientific work and teaching at several schools, became my closest friend.

In 2005, I lost a place in graduate school and, having settled in Pushchino, wandered on the winter Pushchinsky school (ZPSh) on the opening day. Mikhail Abramovich's welcoming reception resulted in three of my courses urgently inserted into the schedule. Having unconditionally believing in me and providing me with the site for experimental teaching, he radically influenced my life trajectory - he gave me the opportunity to realize the need for work with schoolchildren.

In the same way, Mikhail Abramovich influenced many people, providing them with the possibility of self -realization in science and education, finding an unlimited amount of time and effort to help others. As the director of the ZPS, a participant in the Krasnoyarsk Summer School (KLS) and other projects, he touched the life trajectory of thousands of schoolchildren and many hundreds of employees. He was the best teacher of mathematics, from whom I had a chance to study and with whom I had the honor of working. Constantly experimenting in the field of education, he sought to fix his teaching experience so that his skills could be used by others.

Possessing unlimited performance and vital energy, Roitberg was engaged in an unthinkable amount of different things. He gladly agreed to participate in the organization of SMTB, which arose in our joint work on the project “Days of Science” with the “dynasty”, he helped with administrative issues; Subsequently, from 2012 to 2016, he headed the mathematical department of SMTB. He proposed the idea of ​​rotations to simplify the task of choosing laboratories on SMTB, without even knowing that such an approach is practiced in graduate schools in the United States. A couple of weeks before the first SMTB at one of our many walks in Pushchino, I once again consulted with Mikhail Abramovich. I was worried that the format we planned could not be suitable. The fact is that scientists invited to school had never worked with schoolchildren before and could not find a common language with them, and the proposed projects could be too complicated. “Fedka,” he told me, “understand, you have a huge margin of safety at the school,” “referring to a large number of adult employees who can catch or help in sagging laboratories and courses. I relaxed, and he, of course, was right.

Behind the huge number of cases that Mikhail Abramovich pulled, it seemed that he had the most unlimited margin of safety. He worked at the limit of strength, not really thinking about his condition and never complaining about poor health or fatigue. He believed that people should strive to maximize happiness, promoted the Kaif and Drive model on ZPSh and other schools. He found a reason for laughter, even when he talked about the disease that caused his death, he kept a cheerful spirit until the last minute before the operation, in the usual manner he supported the people around him.

Do not find words to describe how much to me and many other people who had the opportunity to work side by side with Mikhail Abramovich will miss him. In 2012, parodying a popular statement in the United States, I drew a poster: “What Woup Roytberg Do?” - And he hung it in the room of the headquarters of SMTB, mainly as a joke, but also partially in the edification of himself and other young organizers, they say, it is useful to mentally turn to intuition, experience and mind of Mikhail Abramovich in search of a solution to difficult problems. No longer having the opportunity to consult directly, many of us will continue to mentally ask ourselves, and what Roitberg would do in one or another situation, and thus find a solution to the problem or just once again fix the difference in views.

Fedor Kondrashov ,
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