The directions of Ukrainian scholarship

The media are very chary about scholarship and scholars. The impression is that the entire life of our society hangs from a political string, while everything, including scholarship, is something second-rate and minor, with no direct bearing on the life of our country, its requirements, its people, and their development. But in the following interview with The Day Borys Paton, the president of the National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine, says otherwise.

How would you assess the scholarly achievements of Ukraine’s academic institutions? Do these results correspond to the former Soviet or current international levels of strategic research?

I would not distinguish between the former Soviet, as you put it, and international level of research. The exact and natural sciences were developing in the USSR at a very rapid rate. I am not only talking about so-called classified or defense-related subjects but also fundamental research whose practical relevance was revealed many years later.

One of the facts that prove this was the recent awarding of the Nobel Prize to the prominent Russian physicist Zhores Alfiorov for his work on semiconductor heterostructures. In 1996 the International Computer Society posthumously conferred its highest title, Pioneer of Computer Engineering, to the outstanding Ukrainian cyberneticist Viktor Hlushkov.

I will give you another example. The scientific basis of electroslag melting and special metallurgy in general was laid in the 1960s by none other than our Ukrainian scientists. And it is not their fault that electric furnaces produce 30 percent of the world’s overall metal output, while in Ukraine it is only about one percent.

As for today’s research results, I can assert that the scientists at the National Academy of Sciences have managed to preserve several individual directions and maintain quite a high level. Believe me, this is not self-praise. For example, since Ukraine became independent, we have made ground-breaking discoveries in molecular physiology, cryobiology, and cryogenic medicine. The work of our mathematicians and theoretical mechanics specialists has also won worldwide acclaim. To a large extent, the research that the academy is doing in super low temperature physics, including nuclear magnetism, quantum effect kinetics, and decameter radio astronomy, is determining international standards in these fields.

The National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine remains the world’s key center of materials studies. Among the latest achievements of our scientists in this field is the invention of the world’s first polymatrix composite based on the refractory metals chromium and vanadium, the discovery of a way to grow super pure large diamond monocrystals, and an entirely new method of obtaining intercalation nanocomposites. Also competitive on the world market is the technology that was developed by the academy for manufacturing titanium ingots and high- purity alloys based on this metal.

There are also certain achievements in the field of social sciences and the humanities. A sizable contribution has been made to the theoretical validation and informational and analytical explanation of sociopolitical and socioeconomic changes, the study of contemporary social transformations, and the development of the groundwork for the state’s investment-structure, innovative, ethno-national, demographic, and humanitarian policies.

Fundamental works have been published on the history of Ukraine and Ukrainian culture. Ukraine’s first electronic lexicographical system has also been created.

In the past few years the academy’s scientists have been awarded a number of prestigious international prizes and awards, which clearly attest to the international level of their achievements. For example, Platon Kostiuk was awarded the Galvani Gold Medal and Prize for his ground- breaking work in the field of neurosciences, and Viktor Bariakhtar received the Bogoliubov Prize from the Dubno-based Amalgamated Institute of Nuclear Research for his outstanding achievements in the field of theoretical physics. Volodymyr Drinfeld was awarded the Fields Medal, the world’s highest honor in mathematics. Yaroslav Yatskiv and Elmar Petrov received the Rene Descartes European Prize and the Alexander von Humboldt Prize (Germany), respectively. In 2007 Oleksandr Huz was awarded the Pascal Medal, the European Academy of Sciences’ highest award.

A lot of our scientists have been elected members of foreign academies, prestigious research associations, governing bodies of international scientific organizations, and editorial boards of universally known scholarly journals.

Another important factor is participation of the academy’s institutes in high-profile international projects. For example, physicists from Kharkiv and Kyiv are conducting unique research to create the world’s most powerful linear accelerator, the so-called Super Collider, at the European Center for Nuclear Research (CERN). Research carried out with the aid of the world’s largest UTR-2 radio telescope is also an integral and, to a large extent, decisive part of international geospace exploration projects. I should also mention the participation of our scientists in a strategic international thermonuclear synthesis project and a number of projects being carried out at the International Institute of Applied Systemic Analysis, which are very important for Ukraine.

What criteria are used for assessing research results? What is the evaluation scale?

I have already partially answered your question. In my view, research assessment criteria should above all include recognition of the importance of research results for scientific and social development by the scientific community itself, by scientists who work in a certain or related field of knowledge. This recognition can be expressed in such different forms and over such a long period of time that, if I may say so, it is pointless to speak about an evaluation scale. Moreover, I don’t think we should absolutize such criteria as the citation index of an author’s publications, the impact factor of the journals in which these articles have been published, etc.

An important criterion, above all for applied results, is also their practical implementation in fundamentally new products, manufacturing technologies, and in the field of specific goods and services. But in this case, too, as historical experience shows, the time interval between the achievement and the implementation of a result can be very long because of certain objective and subjective circumstances.

What areas of scientific research are most important for Ukrainian society today? To what extent can this research rely on human and material resources?

These areas comprise, first of all, the development of nanotechnologies in the next few decades. According to many forecasts, nanotechnologies are going to be one of the chief motive forces of a new scientific and technological revolution in the 21st century. They allow controlled manipulations with matter at the level of one billionth of a meter, which in fact means being able to control physical, chemical, and biological processes at the atomic and molecular levels. This allows the creation of fundamentally new materials, instruments, medicines, and methods of treatment.

It is very important for Ukraine to have all the prerequisites to become an active participant in the global development of nanotechnologies. This was confirmed recently by an international conference hosted by the National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine on “Nano-Dimensional Systems: Composition, Properties, and Technologies.” It is important to note that as far as human resources are concerned, the pre-conference public lectures that were given by leading national and foreign scientists for students and young academics interested in the technologies behind the creation and practical application of nanomaterials drew an audience of about 500 people.

I will mention briefly a few other, no less crucial, areas, such as certain sectors of modern biology and biotechnology, which are of paramount importance to agriculture, public health and the environment, informatics, energy and energy conservation, and the assessment and extension of the service life of major technical facilities and structures.

An undeniable priority of our National Academy of Sciences is the entire sphere of social and humanitarian sciences, first and foremost disciplines that promote the socioeconomic, political, and cultural development of present-day Ukrainian society.

Undoubtedly, scholarship is international in nature. So we do not need to embrace absolutely all areas of scholarly research; at any rate, this is impossible. It is very important to single out the spheres where the academy’s researchers will make the most notable contribution to the development of scholarship and the solution of Ukraine’s most sensitive problems.

I would also like to note that beginning in 2000, the National Academy of Sciences has been drafting and implementing target-oriented research programs and innovative scientific and technological projects in all top-priority areas. This allows us to secure, on a competitive basis, the necessary financial and logistical resources. The academy is now spending about a third of its overall budget on this. Modern research equipment is also being furnished for these studies on a priority basis. Thanks to the government’s support, the academy can now purchase this kind of equipment from well-established foreign companies.

We are also going to fully develop so-called target-oriented fundamental research. This will enable us to selectively establish the scientific background of entirely new equipment and technologies without diminishing in any way the role and importance of fundamental research as such.

But there is no doubt that the further intensification of top-priority research efforts will require an essential increase in human and material resources.

What contribution has the National Academy of Sciences made to computer technology in the past few years?

Our cyberneticists have made quite a sizable contribution to devising fundamentally new approaches to the architecture of computing systems and the further development of management theory. Important results have been achieved in the field of intellectual informational technologies and systems.

Ukraine has created the world’s first laser optical-inversion-based information accumulator with optical cylinders. The Hlushkov Institute of Cybernetics recently commissioned Ukraine’s first supercomputer, which is used to solve highly complex problems of super-high computing dimensions.

But, to be frank, I must say that in many respects the development of informatics does not meet the modern international level and the practical requirements of our country.

What is the main obstacle for scholars and scientists? Funds or, to be more exact, their absence?

In the past few years overall state budget expenditures on the National Academy of Sciences have been steadily increasing. This increase was about 29 percent this year compared to 2006 in terms of planned targets, and in real terms it is a little more than 23 percent compared to last year.

But you should take into account the fact that the vast majority of this increase is used for raising salaries in accordance with the rise of the minimum wage and utility fees, so-called indexing (inflation protection). Then we spend the rest on target-oriented and competition-based research.

On the whole, the academy spends 69 percent of state budget funds on salaries and fringe benefits. Naturally, there is a dire shortage of budgetary funds for procuring research instruments, materials, chemicals, and foreign scientific periodicals, paying for access to electronic resources of modern scientific and technological information, and covering the costs of our scientists’ trips abroad to participate in various symposia.

The academy’s institutes are making strenuous efforts to attract extra-budgetary earnings by commercializing its research results: working under contract with national and foreign clients, and selling licenses, finished scientific and technological products, etc. This is very important and necessary, but it cannot solve the whole problem.

Since 1991 the overall budget devoted to research in GDP terms has shrunk almost by half in Ukraine, dropping to about 1 percent in 2006. Compare this to about 2 percent in the European Union, 2.7 percent in the US, 2.9 in South Korea, and about 4 in Sweden. Kazakhstan is planning to increase its funding 25 times in the next 5 years and bring its share in the GDP up to 5 percent.

How much does a senior scholarly associate or research department head of the Academy of Sciences of Ukraine earn on average?

As of 2006, the average salary of academic associates was about 1,400 hryvnias a month, just a little more than the average wage in this country - 1,041 hryvnias, according to the State Committee for Statistics.

Last summer the Cabinet of Ministers approved a new and, I would say, more encouraging system of remuneration for the academy’s institutions. The basic salary of a senior scholarly associate and a research department head is roughly 1,976 and 2,111 hryvnias, respectively. But factoring in additional money for scholarly degree, title, and seniority benefits, their overall monthly pay is 3,189 and 3,969 hryvnias, respectively.

Is it true what the media claims that most talented young Ukrainian academics are working abroad today? What is the approximate percentage?

At the beginning of 2007, the total number of employees in our research institutions was a little more than 39,000, including 17,000 scholarly associates. Among them are 2,500 doctors and 8,000 candidates of sciences. Every year about 100 employees of the academy defend their doctor’s degrees and 400 defend candidate’s degrees. I am citing these figures to emphasize that, in spite of all the difficulties of the past few years, the National Academy of Sciences has managed to preserve and in some new areas even to reinforce its research staff.

It is a gross exaggeration to say that most talented and young Ukrainian academics are working at foreign research centers. Our information is that in the past 15 years 600 employees of the academy’s institutions have permanently left Ukraine. These are people of various scientific levels and all ages. There are 105 doctors and 327 candidates of sciences among those who emigrated, which obviously accounts for about 7 percent of the current number of top-ranking research associates. The number of our associates who immigrate has dropped more than 10 times in the past few years, since the beginning of that 15-year period. For example, only seven of our associates went abroad in 2006 for permanent residence.

On the other hand, a great number of our scholars, about 400 a year, go to foreign research centers for advanced studies or temporary employment. In many cases, this is arranged under certain cooperation agreements or as part of joint scholarly projects. We should only welcome this. I hope we will soon be able to create adequate conditions in our institutes for foreign researchers.

What is the average age of scholars who are engaged in research?

This is a very pressing and, I would say, critical problem for the academy and Ukrainian science and scholarship as a whole. It also exists in Russia and other ex-Soviet countries. To one degree or another, this problem has begun emerging in many developed countries throughout the world. Young people are not exactly bursting to take up research.

In spite of all the efforts we are making to fill our research institutions with talented young people, so far we have failed to halt the aging process. Today the average age is about 50 for all our associates, 53 for candidates, and 62 for doctors of science. The proportion of scholarly associates who are 35 and younger is about 18 percent - too few, of course.

The problem is not only and not so much the low pay for graduate students and young specialists as the absence of real opportunities to solve the housing problem. In my view, the only solution is for the state to allot enough funds for the academy to build or acquire apartments for young researchers.

On the occasion of Academician Borys Paton’s birthday, The Day extends its best wishes to him for good health, inspiration, interesting ideas, and their brilliant implementation.