Nuclear Sphere Research Articles

International legal mechanisms of liability for nuclear damage

Based on the analysis of accidents in the nuclear sphere, many states have come to the conclusion of the need to develop international legal principles for the settlement of disputes related to accidents and the formation of a regime of responsibility for damage caused to the life and health of people and the environment. The unification of the efforts of many states to develop joint approaches to ensure the safe development of atomic energy allowed the creation of a complex international legal regime – “international nuclear law”. The aim of the work is determination of the international legal bases of responsibility for causing nuclear damage. The methodological basis of the study. The following methods of cognition were used in the research process: analysis and synthesis, generalization, dialectical, system-structural methods, formal-legal, legal-technical method. Results. Various international organizations play an important role in the formation of nuclear law: the IAEA, the Atomic Energy Agency of the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (NEA OECD), WNA and others. The documents issued by the IAEA serve as guidelines for the development and approval of laws and other regulatory acts related to the safe use of atomic energy in the countries of the world. Conventions on liability for nuclear damage were drafted in such a way that most of their provisions (especially the basic principles) were self-executing. Therefore, in principle, each participating state has the right to independently decide, on the basis of its constitutional or legal system, which approach it will use to bring its legislation in accordance with this or that convention: direct application of the provisions of the convention or preparation based on the text of the convention of the national law on nuclear liability. Conclusions. Currently, in the issue of liability for nuclear damage, countries can be divided into two groups: one group – those that have adopted a special regime in the field of nuclear liability either by joining international conventions or by adopting national legislation; another group – countries that do not have such a special regime.

Принципы динамики детской языковой картины мира

Introduction. In line with the anthropocentric approach, the desire to create a model of an individual linguistic worldview becomes possible thanks to concepts as basic structures for accumulating knowledge about the world. Such a result can be achieved by studying the children's language picture of the world, which will explain the structure of the language picture of the adult world, and not vice versa, as it seemed before. Materials and Methods. The research is based on the analysis of texts of a junior schoolboy using methods of observation, comparison, generalization of analysis and synthesis, interpretation of the data obtained empirically. Analysis. The works of Russian researchers describe fragments of the linguistic picture of the world of people of different professions who speak different languages. This article presents the author's point of view on the model of a fragment of the children's language picture of the world of a junior schoolboy. Predicates denoting mental activity as one of the numerous and leading groups of verbs in speech at this age are taken as a nuclear sphere of analysis. The principles of the dynamics of the image of the world, reflected in the language of the child, are revealed. The ontological principle is that the assimilation of the native language occurs through the assimilation of various models of structural schemes of sentences and their variants. The cognitive principle – proposition is a special stacked structure of knowledge storage, which is implemented and fixed by the structural scheme of the sentence. The communicative principle – speech acts expressed by the structural scheme of the sentence, implement the intentions of a native speaker. Thus, the structural schemes of sentences are the signifiers of syntactic concepts, and intentions and propositions are their signified. In a word, the syntactically represented concept controls the content of the sentence's structural scheme and the type of speech act, highlighting its individual cognitive features. Results. We have studied the connections of the cognitive basis of the concept with semantics and pragmatics, cause-and-effect relationships of actualization of ideas about mental activity by a younger student. Thus, the principles of the dynamics of the linguistic picture of the world form an initial position of objective reality conceptualization.

Imperfect bipolarity: The ‘third power’ factor in Soviet-American relations in the nuclear field (1958–1968)

30 years after the end of the Cold War, bipolar structure still dominates in the nuclear sphere, although certain nuclear powers are closing the gap with Russia and the United States in terms of strategic arsenals and the system of world politics in general is moving towards polycentrism. At the same time, as US-Russian relations continue to deteriorate against the backdrop of the ‘Ukrainian crisis’, the prospects for strategic dialogue after the expiration of the Treaty on Measures for the Further Reduction and Limitation of Strategic Offensive Arms (New START) are becoming increasingly vague. The absence of a new agreement in this field threatens to throw international relations back to the beginning of the Cold War, with all the ensuing consequences. To avoid such a scenario, not only the leaders of Russia and the United States should demonstrate political will, but other nuclear powers should also be included in the negotiation process, particularly China. In this regard, the history of the Cold War can provide valuable lessons. The author argues that bipolarity (even at its apex in the late 1950s — early 1970s) had never been an exclusive characteristic of international relations. On the basis of a number of historical cases, the paper demonstrates that during this period the superpowers constantly had to reckon with the ‘third power’ factor. The latter did not only influence the logic and dynamics of Soviet-American relations, but also to a large extent predetermined the direction and nature of their military development and planning. Indeed, it was the ‘third power’ factor, namely China, along with the achievement of strategic parity between the superpowers that became one of the main impulses to the establishment of the non-proliferation regime. In conclusion, the author focuses on yet another important lesson from the Cold War: the experience of arms control negotiations during that period suggests that the meetings of politicians should be preceded by joint brainstorming sessions with scholars from interested countries. In the current situation, representatives of the academic community should take the lead so that by the time the political climate eventually changes, there would already be coherent and viable options for nuclear arms control adapted to new realities.

STATE MECHANISM OF UNITED STATES IN THE FIGHT AGAINST NUCLEAR TERRORISM

Topicality of the theme is determined by the aggravation of the problems of ensuring security and physical protection by states in the nuclear sphere, which require additional legal regulation. The aim of the work is to study the experience of building the architecture of the US state mechanism in the fight against acts of nuclear terrorism. Special attention is paid to the analysis of these threats, taking into account the well-established US point of view that nuclear weapons in the possession of hostile states and terrorists represent one of the most serious national security problems. An analysis of the functioning of the state mechanism made it possible to single out a method of organisational and legal counteraction to nuclear terrorism that deserves attention and consideration, based on determining the dynamic range of protective measures taken by the state against threats of a nuclear attack, their coordination, identifying duplicating functions and gaps in activities to integrate the efforts taken into a single architecture of the national response. As a result of the generalisation, the author found that a complex centralised and flexible system of coordination of state bodies provides a response to a wide range of nuclear and radiological threats. Foreign experience in organising the fight against acts of nuclear terrorism deserves attention and serious research for its possible consideration in improving similar Russian systems and legal regulation of the activities of state bodies in this area.

SEMANTIC FIELD: VARIANITY, FUNCTIONALITY, PROJECTION

Using the term semantic field in the work, we consider it as a symbolic model of the organization of the sector of extralinguistic reality, which has a complex structure, the core of which is a concept, around the nuclear sphere – a set of concepts similar to the synonymous core and actualized in micro- and macro-contexts, and the periphery - interpretations of these texts and concepts. In a broad sense, semantic fields make up a picture of the world, but have blurred boundaries. This means that in the process of the development of linguistic culture, there is a continuous interpenetration and mutual influence of conceptual fields opposed in meaning. We introduce the lexeme suit into the semantic field “suit”, which has a multidimensional structure, since its elements illustrate not only linguistic means, but also cultural extralinguistic choices. Therefore, we insist on linguistic and extralinguistic factors that create the filling of the named field. We consider the linguistic parameters that regulate the allocation and description of a specific semantic field and declare it as follows: the formation of SP takes place around a defined integral meaning, taking into account objective external factors and the real capabilities of the researcher; the composition of SP includes those lexemes in the semantic structure of which there is a sema, which received the status of integral for the studied verbal group; the semantic structure of the constituents of the field is qualified based on the dictionary definition; according to the position of the integral semantic component in the content of the lexical unit, its place in the SP structure is determined - in the nuclear, central or peripheral part. Extralinguistic factors include: 1) social roles that determine the specificity of the semantic field of costume; 2) human habits; 3) wealth / poverty; 4) the person’s age; 5) the cultural stratum to which a person belongs, perhaps some fashion trend; 6) season, time of day, area, place of event; 7) author’s speech: the filling of the semantic field “costume” depends on linguistic and extra-linguistic factors, among which is the image of the author, because it is through him, through the choice of language means, that we have different semantic fields in artistic texts; 8) fashion.

The possibilities of Russia-Vietnam cooperation in the fuel and energy sphere

The author has made an attempt to show a great potential of Russia-Vietnam cooperation in the fuel and energy sphere basing on the identification of the emerging trends and needs of Vietnamese economy and Russian possibilities.
 In particular, the article shows the state and perspectives of hydrocarbon and energy sectors of the Vietnam national economy. It demonstrates that: the decline in oil production due to the exhaustion of existing oil fields in Vietnam and the inability to meet the growing demand for gas on its own show the necessity of the increase in hydrocarbon import; instability and high cost of energy production relied on renewable energy sources want to increase the capacity of traditional types of energy. The obstacles are such factors as a significant growth of the world prices, and increasing dependance on LNG suppliers, as well as the climate agenda.
 To settle the problems, Russia being the leader at the world energy and fuels can contribute significantly to Vietnams energy security. Besides, Moscow maintaining leading positions in construction and exploitation of advanced NPPs could make for Hanois return to the national nuclear program. Enhancing cooperation in the hydrocarbon supplies sphere, the implementation of large-scale projects in the nuclear sphere meets both Russias and Vietnams national interests.

Multiagent System for Monitoring, Analysis and Classification of Data from Procurement Services

The article describes the method for automatization of procurement notices (tenders) monitoring, analysis and classification. This method is aimed at simplification and reduction of labor costs for search, gathering and subsequent analysis of tenders, as public procurement has become one of the major sources of new projects. The method describes a multi-agent system for automated extraction, processing, classification, storage and visualization of procurement notices data. Agents use open-source and SSPL-based solutions. Having keywords, publication date and other requirements as input, the program returns collection and visualization of tenders from five marketplaces as output. Output is given in Excel table, index in Elasticsearch database and visualization in Kibana (maps and plots) and Neo4j (graphs), thus providing a user with an instrument for automated extraction and analysis of tender data. Classification is carried out via machine learning technologies provided by Python scikit-learn module. Classification model has shown an efficiency of 80-85%. The article describes the method itself, the method performance on tenders related to decommissioning in nuclear sphere, and prospects of method.

PROBLEMS OF EU-CHINA RELATIONS IN SOLVING THE IRANIAN NUCLEAR PROGRAM'S ISSUE

It is proven in the paper that the chosen topic is relevant due to the impact of China and the EU on the negotiations about the regulation of the Iranian nuclear program’s issue. In the article, it is done a comparative analysis of the policy of the EU and China regarding the regulation of the Iranian nuclear program’s problem. It is also mentioned in the paper that since the time of the US presidential administration of Donald Trump, the EU and China have been seen as valuable actors in resolving the Iranian nuclear program’s issue. For this reason, the main purpose of the work is a review of the influence that China’s and EU’s policies regarding the development of the nuclear program of the Islamic Republic of Iran (IRI) exert on European security. The history of China-Iran relations in the nuclear sphere and the important role of China in the development of the Iranian nuclear program is mentioned in the paper. It is also noted that the fact that the EU countries are partners or allies of the United States, which is the main rival of the IRI, has complicated the dialogue between the European Union and Iran. It is shown in the paper that during Mahmud Ahmadinejad’s presidency, the Iranian nuclear program was not controlled by the international community, and because of that China supported sanctions of the UN Security Council against Iran. As it is mentioned in the article, until the end of the 2000s, the EU, as well as the People’s Republic of China (PRC), did not support the US policy toward Iran. The Iranian-Chinese relations in the nuclear field were studied. It is mentioned that despite the fact that China is interested in exporting Iranian energy resources, Beijing will never accept Iran’s possession of nuclear weapons. It is assumed that the fact that China does not support the nuclear weapons status of Iran gives it the opportunity to cooperate with the EU in case Iran decides to acquire nuclear weapons. It is noticed that China had a major impact on the negotiations related to signing the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), i. e. the nuclear agreement with Iran. The further actions of the EU and the PRC after the dissolution of the JCPOA are mentioned in the paper. The scenarios of further development of the situation around the Iranian nuclear program were reviewed. As a result of the research, it is concluded that China and the EU have played a significant role in achieving the JCPOA and conducting diplomatic negotiations with Iran. The strengthening of Beijing’s role as a key partner of Teheran and the decrease of the EU’s impact on Iran’s foreign policy were mentioned in the paper.

How Does Israel’s Nuclear Posture Work? The Case of Saddam Hussein, 1978–1991

This article explores the role played by Israel’s unique nuclear posture in the Arab-Israeli inter-state conflict over the past five decades since Israel became an undeclared nuclear state. It is the first attempt of its kind to conduct an historical analysis that aims at exploring both the Israeli and the Arab side, as it pertains to the effects of Israel’s nuclear deterrence. It is argued that over the years Israel adopted a multi-layered deterrence model: overt conventional and covert nuclear deterrence. The conventional deterrence was meant to dissuade Arab countries from threatening Israel’s strategic interests, while the nuclear deterrence was meant to forestall threats to the state’s intrinsic interests. The empirical research on Israel’s nuclear deterrence from the perspective of the deterred country – Iraq under Saddam – substantiated this study’s main thesis, namely that Israeli nuclear deterrence played a central role in the decision-making processes of various Arab national leaders, despite the policy of opacity that Israel adopted in the nuclear sphere. The Saddam Hussein documents reveal the “smoking gun” – extensive evidence that the Iraqi leader perceived Israel’s nuclear capability as the greatest obstacle to Iraq and to the other Arab countries interested in continuing the war against Israel.

Nuclear Materials Ownership in the Russian Federation

In response to the challenges of the epoch, “nuclear” laws currently regulate safety issues related to handling of nuclear materials, nuclear facilities operation, related transactions, nuclear waste processing and disposal, state control over the nuclear energy use, and international cooperation in the nuclear sphere. One of the most important institutions of the “nuclear” regulation system in Russian law is the institution of ownership of nuclear materials, understood by the modern legislator as materials containing, or capable of reproducing, fissile (fissionable) nuclear substances. Consolidating the rules of nuclear materials ownership, the legislator further formulates requirements for nuclear materials control and accounting, transactions procedure, and safe operation of nuclear facilities, as well as introduces liability for violation of such requirements. Today, many aspects related to the legal status of nuclear materials owners and the notion of handling nuclear materials deserve a deep legal analysis, since the current legal regulation has gaps and contradictions. The legal writing method used to word such norms, structures, and basic notions must meet the criteria of clarity, unambiguous interpretation, and absence of regulatory gaps, that is why the system of legal regulation of the institution of nuclear materials ownership needs further improvement.

Право собственности на ядерные материалы в Российской Федерации

In response to the challenges of the epoch, “nuclear” laws currently regulate safety issues related to handling of nuclear materials, nuclear facilities operation, related transactions, nuclear waste processing and disposal, state control over the nuclear energy use, and international cooperation in the nuclear sphere. One of the most important institutions of the “nuclear” regulation system in Russian law is the institution of ownership of nuclear materials, understood by the modern legislator as materials containing, or capable of reproducing, fissile (fissionable) nuclear substances. Consolidating the rules of nuclear materials ownership, the legislator further formulates requirements for nuclear materials control and accounting, transactions procedure, and safe operation of nuclear facilities, as well as introduces liability for violation of such requirements. Today, many aspects related to the legal status of nuclear materials owners and the notion of handling nuclear materials deserve a deep legal analysis, since the current legal regulation has gaps and contradictions. The legal writing method used to word such norms, structures, and basic notions must meet the criteria of clarity, unambiguous interpretation, and absence of regulatory gaps, that is why the system of legal regulation of the institution of nuclear materials ownership needs further improvement.

Modern Transatlantic Relations: Key Challenges for US and Russian Interests

In his presentation, the speaker focuses on the problems in relations between the United States and its European NATO allies. Firstly, he talks about the withdrawal of the US troops from Afghanistan, that Sergey M. Rogov considers the first serious defeat of the Western countries since the foundation of NATO. At the same time, he notes the significant military and economic contribution of the U.S. allies to the operation in Afghanistan, and the fact that the US did not take into account the opinion of its allies as well as the issues that may await European countries and the alliance as a whole in this regard. Second, the speaker notes the huge difference in military spending and military capabilities between the United States and the European allies, and concludes that NATO countries will continue to be militarily dependent on the United States. In nuclear sphere, despite the approval of the START III extension by the Biden administration, European countries did not actively resist the collapse of the INF Treaty and the U.S. withdrawal from the Open Skies Treaty. The forthcoming deployment of American missiles in Poland and the Baltic states will further exacerbate of the NATO-Russia crisis. J. Biden's support for the sole purpose concept, which to certain extent implies no first use of nuclear weapons, jeopardizes the U.S. security obligations towards its European allies. Fourth, there is the problem of "new" NATO members, which make minimal contribution to common security, but require economic support and protection from possible Russian aggression. In conclusion, the problem of the U.S.-China confrontation is considered, where the US is actively seeking to involve European countries.

Nitric oxide signaling in the plant nucleus: the function of nitric oxide in chromatin modulation and transcription.

Nitric oxide (NO) is involved in a vast number of physiologically important processes in plants, such as organ development, stress resistance, and immunity. Transduction of NO bioactivity is generally achieved by post-translational modification of proteins, with S-nitrosation of cysteine residues as the predominant form. While traditionally the subcellular location of the factors involved was of lesser importance, recent studies identified the connection between NO and transcriptional activity and thereby raised the question about the route of NO into the nuclear sphere. Identification of NO-affected transcription factors and chromatin-modifying histone deacetylases implicated the important role of NO signaling in the plant nucleus as a regulator of epigenetic mechanisms and gene transcription. Here, we discuss the relationship between NO and its directly regulated protein targets in the nuclear environment, focusing on S-nitrosated chromatin modulators and transcription factors.

Nuclear Education in Russia and Abroad

The education of a future nuclear professional provides the basic competencies that will influence the performance of a future specialist throughout his or her future professional career. The article discusses the best practices and main trends in higher education that have developed in the field of nuclear technologies in Russia and abroad. The analysis is based on the materials prepared by various international organizations and professional communities, and the experience of the MEPhI. The article discusses such issues as interaction between state, nuclear industry and higher education institution; the quality of nuclear education (four basic principles of training nuclear specialists in MEPhI), the transition to two-tier system in nuclear education; the international cooperation in nuclear sphere; export of nuclear education; and vocational guidance for school students.

Fundamentals of Nuclear Safety State Management in Ukraine

The object of the research is the relationships ensuring nuclear safety in Ukraine. The methodological basis of this study is modern general scientific methods and techniques of cognition, scientific theories about the state and law, the organization of public administration, development in the field of philosophy of law, public administration, administrative law and process, sociology. The work uses dialectical, structural-functional, historical, comparative-legal, system-structural and other methods. The purpose of this research is to characterize the measures provided by the national legislation of Ukraine for ensuring nuclear safety, which are carried out by authorized state bodies and officials. To achieve this purpose, the following tasks are set: to define the content of the concepts of ‘national security’ and ‘nuclear safety’, elements of the mechanism of management in the nuclear sphere; to allocate legal bases for ensuring nuclear safety and authorized entities; to carry out an analysis of the control system for nuclear safety in Ukraine; to characterize the research activity and international cooperation of Ukraine in the nuclear sphere; to characterize administrative services in the nuclear sphere; to investigate the activities of the governing body on the management of nuclear power plants in Ukraine – the State Enterprise National Nuclear Energy Generating Company ‘Energoatom’

The Aviation Paradox: Why We Can \u2018Know\u2019 Jetliners But Not Reactors

Publics and policymakers increasingly have to contend with the risks of complex, safety-critical technologies, such as airframes and reactors. As such, ‘technological risk’ has become an important object of modern governance, with state regulators as core agents, and ‘reliability assessment’ as the most essential metric. The Science and Technology Studies (STS) literature casts doubt on whether or not we should place our faith in these assessments because predictively calculating the ultra-high reliability required of such systems poses seemingly insurmountable epistemological problems. This paper argues that these misgivings are warranted in the nuclear sphere, despite evidence from the aviation sphere suggesting that such calculations can be accurate. It explains why regulatory calculations that predict the reliability of new airframes cannot work in principle, and then it explains why those calculations work in practice. It then builds on this explanation to argue that the means by which engineers manage reliability in aviation is highly domain-specific, and to suggest how a more nuanced understanding of jetliners could inform debates about nuclear energy.

Extensive nuclear sphere generation in the human Alzheimer's brain

Nuclear spheres are protein aggregates consisting of FE65, TIP60, BLM, and other yet unknown proteins. Generation of these structures in the cellular nucleus is putatively modulated by the amyloid precursor protein (APP), either by its cleavage or its phosphorylation. Nuclear spheres were preferentially studied in cell culture models and their existence in the human brain had not been known. Existence of nuclear spheres in the human brain was studied using immunohistochemistry. Cell culture experiments were used to study regulative mechanisms of nuclear sphere generation. The comparison of human frontal cortex brain samples from Alzheimer's disease (AD) patients to age-matched controls revealed a dramatically and highly significant enrichment of nuclear spheres in the AD brain. Costaining demonstrated that neurons are distinctly affected by nuclear spheres, but astrocytes never are. Nuclear spheres were predominantly found in neurons that were negative for threonine 668 residue in APP phosphorylation. Cell culture experiments revealed that JNK3-mediated APP phosphorylation reduces the amount of sphere-positive cells. The study suggests that nuclear spheres are a new APP-derived central hallmark of AD, which might be of crucial relevance for the molecular mechanisms in neurodegeneration.

Membrane tethering of APP c-terminal fragments is a prerequisite for T668 phosphorylation preventing nuclear sphere generation

A central molecular hallmark of Alzheimer's disease (AD) is the β- and γ-secretase-mediated cleavage of the amyloid precursor protein (APP), which causes the generation of different c-terminal fragments like C99, AICD57, or AICD50 that fully or in part contain the APP transmembrane domain. In this study, we demonstrate that membrane-tethered C99 is phosphorylated by JNK3A at residue T668 (APP695 numbering) to a higher extent than AICD57, whereas AICD50 is not capable of being phosphorylated. The modification decreases the turnover of APP, while the blockade of APP cleavage increases APP phosphorylation. Generation of nuclear spheres, complexes consisting of the translocated AICD, FE65 and other proteins, is significantly reduced as soon as APP c-terminal fragments are accessible for phosphorylation. This APP modification, which we identified as significantly reduced in high plaque-load areas of the human brain, is linearly dependent on the level of APP expression. Accordingly, we show that APP abundance is likewise capable of modulating nuclear sphere generation. Thus, the precise and complex regulation of APP phosphorylation, abundance, and cleavage impacts the generation of nuclear spheres, which are under discussion of being of relevance in neurodegeneration and dementia. Future pharmacological manipulation of nuclear sphere generation may be a promising approach for AD treatment.

Nuclear spheres modulate the expression of BEST1 and GADD45G

Nuclear spheres are composed of FE65, TIP60, BLM and other yet unknown proteins. The amyloid precursor protein plays a central role for the generation of these highly toxic aggregates in the nucleus of cells. Thus, nuclear spheres might play a crucial role in Alzheimer's disease (AD). However, studies are hampered by the elevated cell death, once spheres are generated. In this work, we established for the first time a stable nuclear sphere model based on the inductive expression of FE65 and TIP60 following Doxycycline stimulation. We studied hitherto controversially discussed target genes, give clues for the reason of controversy, and moreover report new highly reliable targets bestrophin 1 and growth arrest and DNA-damage-inducible protein gamma. qPCR studies further revealed that the regulation of these targets strongly depends on the generation of nuclear spheres, but not on the induction of FE65 or TIP60 alone. As the bestrophin 1 ion channel was recently described to be involved in the abnormal release of GABA, our study might reveal the missing link between AD associated neurotransmitter changes and the amyloid precursor protein.

On forecasting the relations between the People’s Republic of China and the United States

The article discusses the prospects of relations between China and the United States compared to the relations that have taken place between the superpowers of the United States and the Soviet Union. A comparison of relations between the two pairs of superpowers is made in the article based on the following parameters: the interaction of the superpowers in economic and financial sectors, the struggle for the world’s mineral resources, relations in the strategic nuclear sphere, naval rivalry, relationship in the land theaters, and conflicts in cyberspace.