Russia's top ten technology advances in 2020
Russian President Vladimir Putin proposed declaring 2021 the Year of Science and Technology. This is not accidental - despite the Western sanctions and the pandemic, the innovation-based economy is increasingly taking the lead in Russia. What are the main science and technology successes of Russian scientists and industry in 2020?
After the events of 2014, many experts predicted a "technological isolation" of the Russian economy. That belief was based on the classic opposition of two economic models: protectionism and free trade. The usual assertion of supporters of free trade is that protectionism and the closure of the national market lead to the decay of the economy, while freedom of trade, on the contrary, leads to the prosperity of the country.
It was in that logic that the developed countries of the West wanted to “colonize” Russia in the early 1990s. Then the country was offered to "quietly pump oil and natural gas", and everything that is even marginally technological and innovative - to buy abroad. The strategy followed the logic of the 19th century English economist David Ricardo who on the example of "exchanging English wool for Portuguese wine" proved that it was better for Portugal to grow grapes, and England - to raise sheep, so that those goods would be o exchange in a free trade process at a mutual profit.
Exactly the same scheme was proposed after the collapse of the deeply "protectionist" USSR and Russia, i.e. let everyone do what they do best: the US will make computers and airplanes, and Russia will just pump oil. The Russians were convinced, "Stop thinking about the high technology you inherited from the USSR, you will make a lot more money if you just focus exclusively on oil production!"
However, in the real world, the "wool for wine" idea quickly turns into into "glass beads in exchange for land." One country (a colony) is becoming increasingly dependent on the world leader (metropole). After that, the colony lags behind in the civilization race, often forever. All that was proven by another economic genius, Daniel List of Austria.
In 2014, the following scenario was expected from Russia: an agony in the grip of Western technology sanctions, and then - surrender of all political and economic independence.
Now, in 2020, it became clear that the scenario for the technological isolation of Russia did not work. Robust Russian protectionism and self-reliance have proven stronger than the free trade primacy that the United States was trying to abuse. The year 2020 became a showcase of the technological advances that grew from the efforts of previous years if not decades. So, here are the Russia's ten main science and technology breakthroughs in the outgoing year:
1. The first place should be given, undoubtedly, to the Russian vaccine against the new coronavirus "Sputnik V". The vaccine was urgently developed within just a few months. That was the result of the titanic work of previous years at the National Research Center for Epidemiology and Microbiology named after N.F. Gamaleya. For several years, the Center has been working on the creation of a vaccine against MERS (Middle East Respiratory Syndrome Virus). The work was essential for the development of a vaccine against coronavirus. Several more COVID-19 vaccines from other Russian research centers are on the way.
2. Towards the end of the year, a new domestic MS-21 airliner took off. For the first time ever with a new completely domestic engine PD-14. That was indeed a technological breakthrough. There are fewer countries that have an ability to manufacture such aircraft engines in the world than countries capable of putting a man into space.
3. The unique floating nuclear power station “Mikhail Lomonosov” was put into operation. It is supplying the first electricity and heat to the city of Pevek in the Russian Arctic territory of Chukotka. Such floating nuclear power plants are a real salvation for the remote coastal regions of the country, a major technological achievement - and a valuable export product for the world.
4. In space, the achievement of Russian technologies was the first X-ray survey of the cosmic sky that was carried out by the Russian space observatory "Spektr-RG" ("Spectrum-RG"). We now know almost ten more times X-ray sources at four times the resolution than on the until now best in the world celestial map from the German orbiting observatory ROSAT obtained in 1990.
5. The first flight of the new Russian Il-114-300 aircraft. It will become one of the main tools providing connecting the country's regions. Russian airlines need hundreds of such machines. A new generation engine was created for the aircraft.
6. The first entirely Russian-built Aframax-class supertanker was put into operation.
7. The heavy-duty rocket "Angara-A5" successfully completed its second test launch. This means that Russia has acquired a capability of launching its own lunar, and perhaps even the Martian program, as only rockets of this class ensure the delivery of adequate payloads into orbit.
8. A Russian nuclear reactor of new generation VVER-1200 was put into operation for the first time in a foreign country, at the Belarusian nuclear power plant BELAES. This means further expansion of the Russian nuclear industry, and a confirmation of the safety and reliability of its technologies.
9. For the first time ever, the scientists of the Kurchatov Institute teaming with specialists from the Moscow State University and the National Nuclear Research University have registered solar neutrinos, i.e. particles formed inside the Sun in the course of a complex thermonuclear CNO cycle in which carbon, nitrogen and oxygen interconvert into each other, consuming hydrogen and "creating" helium in the process.
10. Scientists from the Russian University of Chemical Technology (RCTU) together with colleagues from the Nizhny Novgorod State Technical University, presented a new technology that allows to obtain pure ammonia using membrane purification and modern absorbents. Thus, the maxim that fundamental and applied science interact with each other, giving rise to new technological realities, was once again confirmed.
The old process of producing ammonia, the so-called Haber process which has been feeding the entire humanity for over a century, providing about 2/3 of the necessary nitrogen for growing agricultural plants, may soon become a part of history. The process has remained practically unchanged since the beginning of the 20th century, and its main "Achilles' heel" was the enormous consumption of heat and electric power. The "green revolution" in agriculture is above all about reducing the expenditure of energy at all its stages, from fertilizers and pesticides to harvesting. Now, a method of producing ammonia with energy consumption by an order of magnitude less than before has been invented.
Where should Russia go next?
I would like to believe that the country, albeit with difficulty, was able to find its way to the future.
Moreover, a road different from the recipes of the free-trader Ricardo. according to whose precepts many African countries are forced to live today, each of which was contracted to produce their own monoculture - be it cocoa, coffee, diamonds, copper or bauxite. Such countries do not have their own national economic policy, there is no independent economy, and even more so, there is no technological progress.
All those victims of free trade have become nothing but cogs in the global division of labor. In the old days, at banquets in the castles of English feudal lords, such poor relatives were called "sitting below the salt". A salt shaker usually closed the set of prestigious dishes served to the important guests at the beginning of the table, while at the end of the table only leftovers fell to those "sitting below the salt".
In 2020, Russia not only showed, but also proved that it will not "sit below the salt". The country has regained its technological leadership and is no longer going to "exchange oil for glass beads" of the Western high technologies.
Photo: Press Service of SSK "Zvezda"/ TASS
Text: Alexey Anpilogov (www.vz.ru)