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Press Service of the Association

Press Service of the Association

Hunt, Richman, Petrillo Sign the Code

THIS article may not disclose much in the way of late news to the average JOURNAL reader, but it does serve as caption and explanation for the cover picture.* Through the usual channels of press, wire and radio news services, citizens throughout the United States have already had opportunity to learn the facts and form their own opinions of what was represented when the presidents of the American Association of School Administrators, the Music Educators National Conference and the American Federation of

La Lettre da la France Combattante. News of Fighting France. Volume Two. 1942–43

Journal Article La Lettre da la France Combattante. News of Fighting France. Volume Two. 1942–43 Get access La Lettre da la France Combattante. News of Fighting France. Volume Two. 1942–43. 1943. (London: Press Service, Free French Headquarters. 814′​′×514′​′⁠. 254 pp. Illus. 8s.) International Affairs Review Supplement, Volume 19, Issue 13, September 1943, Pages 691–692, https://doi.org/10.1093/ia/19.13.691c Published: 01 September 1943

Molybdenum and Tungsten in the Caucasus

IT is announced by “Russia Today” Press Service that large molybdenum and tungsten works have been opened recently in Kabardino-Balkaria, in the Caucasian mountains. The plant is situated at the foot of Mount Tyrny-Auz. Soviet geologists began to prospect for ores on this mountain in 1934. At an altitude of 9,850 ft. they discovered large deposits of rich molybdenum and tungsten ores. Owing to the situation of the Tyrny-Auz deposits, however, the extraction of the ores has presented a difficult problem, and local weather is severe. Everything about the workings is mechanized. The ore, which is extracted by means of electric drills, is brought away from the face by electric trains, sent to the surface by conveyer belt and lowered to the works at the foot of the mountain by cable hoists. The ore mine has four electric power stations and a central air-compressing station. There is an electric sub-station underground. The nearest centre to the new works is Nalchik, capital of Kabardino-Balkaria.

Soviet Agriculture

IT is stated by ‘Russia Today Press Service that the average annual grain crop in the U.S.S.R. for 1937, 1938 and 1939, notwithstanding the severe droughts in the two latter years, amounted to more than 100 million tons, exceeding the 1913 harvest, the best in pre-revolutionary Russia, by one third. The grain crop of 1940 amounted approximately to 1121 million tons. There are 243,000 collective farms in the Soviet Union, embracing 18,800,000 peasant households, or 94 per cent of the total number of peasant households in the country. The Soviet Government has handed over to the collective farms for their free use in perpetuity 940 million acres of land, which represents an average of 50 acres per household. It is estimated that Soviet agriculture employs more than half a million tractors, nearly 170,000 harvester-combines and 200,000 lorries.

Development of Moscow

A BOOKLET recently issued in Moscow entitled "Moscow in Figures" (London: Russia To-day Press Service) shows the development of the Soviet capital in recent years. According to the figures given, during the last thirteen years the population of Moscow has more than doubled, at present, numbering 4,137,000. Moscow is now the third largest city in the world. The number of workers and employees in the factories and institutions of Moscow in 1939 reached 2,300,000, as against 600,000 in 1913. In 1938 there were 117,200 births in Moscow. The city has 175 scientific research institutions in which 9,000 scientific workers are engaged. The higher educational institutions of Moscow have 95,000 students. During the last four years 350 new schools have been built. The number of pupils at present attending the Moscow schools is 608,300.

Extension of Electric Power Supplies in U.S.S.R.

ACCORDING to “Russia Today” Press Service, the Commissariat of Power Stations of the U.S.S.R. is expending a sum of 1,056 million roubles on this purpose in the present year, when 882,000 kw. will be added to the capacity of the generating plants of the Union. The capacity of the power stations in the Ukraine has been augmented considerably, a notable addition being a 100,000 kw. turbine to the Zuyev Station, which is one of the largest in the U.S.S.R. Two large turbines have been added to the Moscow power system and three new heat and power stations are in course of construction in that city. The power system of the Urals has been augmented by a 50,000 lav. generator at the Central Urals Station near Sverdlovsk, which brings the capacity of this station up to 150,000 kw. A heat and power plant was recently put into operation at the Kamensk Aluminium Works in the Urals. Work on a large scale is also proceeding on hydro-electric power plants. This includes work on the world's largest power project, the Kuibyshev Hydro-Electric Centre (on the Samara Bend of the Volga), the power plant of which when completed will have a generating capacity of 3·4 million kw., and the hydro-electric power stations at Uglich and Rybinsk, two further links in the chain of the Greater Volga Project. The Uglich and Rybinsk stations will have a combined capacity of 440,000 kw. Construction is in progress on the first underground hydro-electric power station beyond the Arctic Circle, in the district of Kandalaksha, in the Murmansk Province. This station, which will have a capacity of 150,000 kw., will be the third power plant in the Soviet Far North. To provide power for the growing non-ferrous metal industry in the Altai Mountains, building has commenced for a generating station of 240,000 kw. capacity on the River Irtysh in Kazakhstan.

Sternberg Astronomical Institute

ACCORDING to “Russia Today” Press Service, buildings for the Sternberg Astronomical Institute of Moscow will be commenced early next year in the vicinity of Butovo Station, one of the highest points on the outskirts of Moscow. The observatory, laboratory, mechanical workshops and blocks of flats to house the staff of the Institute will occupy a site of 14l acres. The main part of the Institute's building will contain accommodation for research workers, lecture rooms, a library for 100,000 volumes and a storehouse for the 60,000 photographic negatives taken by the Observatory and by the Southern Astronomical Station in Tajikistan. Underground in the same block will be situated the time service with its astronomical clocks, and a gravimetric laboratory. A tower, to be erected over the main body of the building, is to be used for solar work. The removal of the Institute from Moscow is necessitated by the increasing vibration caused by traffic and the reflection of the city's electric lights in the sky, which interfere with astronomical observations.

Education in the U.S.S.R

ACCORDING to the Soviet Union Year Book Press Service the educational services budget this year shows an increase of more than thirty per cent compared with that of last year (13,916 million roubles), and 3,613 new schools are to be built to provide accommodation for more than a million pupils, namely, 663,740 in rural areas, 518,950 in urban areas, and 35,000 children of railway workers scattered throughout the country. Special schools for railway workers' children already accommodate more than a million. The total urban schools attendance is 8,800,000, the rural schools 21,200,000. The accommodation to be provided by the new schools will therefore increase the capacity of the present urban schools by 6 per cent and that of the other schools by 3 per cent.

Staff and Student Stipends in Soviet Universities

ACCORDING to the Soviet Union Year Book Press Service, on November 12 the Soviet Government published a decree changing the regulations governing the payment of the academic staff at the higher educational institutions (universities) of the U.S.S.R. and increasing the stipends granted to students at these institutions. Under the new regulations, the academic staff will be paid on a staff salary basis, instead of on the old system of payment according to the number of hours worked. They will be able to hold a staff position at one higher educational institution only, though at liberty to engage in work at other higher educational or research institutions if they so desire. The salary rates for the upper staff are: directors of chairs at universities, 1,100-1,500 roubles per month (about £42-56), in accordance with length of service ; professors, 1,000-1,300 roubles per month ; senior lecturers, 700-900 roubles per month. Apart from their salaries, the members of staffs have the advantages of many social services, such as free medical treatment and free school and university education for their children. The new rates of State stipends granted to students at the universities are as follows: students taking a five-year course receive 130 roubles per month for the first year, 150 roubles per month for the second year, 175 roubles per month for the third and fourth years, and 200 roubles per month for the fifth year. Students taking a four-year course receive the same amounts for the first, second and third years, and 200 roubles per month for the fourth year. Students at the teachers' training colleges receive 130 roubles per month for the first year and 150 roubles per month for the second year. Stipends for postgraduate research students will be increased to 400 roubles per month. The number of higher educational institutions in the U.S.S.R. in 1936 was 700, and the number of students in them in the educational year 1936-37 was 542,000.

North Pole Station

NEWS from the Soviet North Pole Expedition is given by the Soviet Union Year Book Press Service. It would appear that the floating station is drifting southward towards north-east Greenland. This was to be expected from what is known of the general trend of Arctic currents. Under wind action there are easterly or westerly deviations from this main, direction. The drift to the south has averaged 2 · 35 miles a day since the establishment of the station, and the speed is increasing as the East Greenland Current is approached. During the first month the drift to the south was 84 miles and during the fourth month it was 95 miles. A sounding in the vicinity of the Pole showed a depth of 2,346 fathoms, and it is unlikely that much greater depths occur in the Arctic Sea. The intermediate warm layer of water which Nansen discovered north of Spitsbergen and explained as being saline Atlantic water has been found near the Pole at depths between 12 and 30 fathoms. At a depth of 36 fathoms the water temperature was found to be almost zero, with a steady fall with increasing depth to –0·67 ° C. at the bottom. It is of interest to note that the inner parts of the Arctic Sea in the vicinity of the Pole are rich in plankton and have much larger animal life. The floes are even and flat. The smooth floes were, of course, reported by Peary, and did much to facilitate his march to the Pole.

Seventeenth International Geological Congress

THE seventeenth International Geological Congress is being held in Moscow on July 20-30, as noted in NATURE of January 23, p. 143. Many tours for the delegates have been arranged ; for this purpose guidebooks have been prepared giving detailed descriptions of the routes, all the interesting outcrops of mineral strata, the deposits of useful minerals, etc., with maps, plans and sectional drawings. Every delegate has a set of twenty-eight guide-books, and a newly issued geological map of the Soviet Union ; each tour is being conducted by a Soviet geologist. According to a report issued by the Soviet Union Year Book Press Service, 403 foreign delegates, representing forty-six different countries, are attending the Congress ; they include 139 from the United States, 50 from Great Britain, 33 from France, 20 from Japan and Manchukuo, 13 each from Germany and South Africa, and 11 from Sweden. Of Soviet geologists, 1,600 have intimated their desire to be present, but as many of them are at present engaged in field work, not all of them will be able to attend. The delegates will spend two days in Leningrad, where a session of the Congress will be held, and visits will be paid to the geological museums of the Mining Institute, the Central Institute of Scientific Research, the Arctic Institute, to give representatives of foreign countries an opportunity of becoming acquainted with the general characteristics of the mineral resources of the Soviet Union. In Moscow, the Congress will hold its sessions at the Observatory, where the institutes of the Academy of Sciences of the U.S.S.R. have also arranged an exhibition of collections relating to mineralogy, geochemistry and useful minerals ; and the Palæontological Institute is showing its collection of Perm vertebrates of the North Dvina Gallery. Among the subjects coming up for discussion at the Congress are: problems of oil and world oil resources ; geology of coal deposits ; the Pre-Cambrian system and its useful minerals ; the Perm system and its stratigraphical arrangement ; the inter-connexion of tectonic processes, magmatic formations and ore deposits ; tectonic and geo-chemical problems of Asia ; deposits of rare elements ; geophysical methods in geology ; geology of the Arctic and Antarctic.

Central Asiatic Gold Mines of the Bronze Age

THE sources from which prehistoric peoples ob tained their minerals and other raw materials of industry afford valuable clues to their intercourse and cultural and economic contacts. A new source of gold in Central Asia is reported in the announce ment of a discovery of prehistoric workings at Kazakhstan by a Russian expedition sent out by the Soviet Government (Soviet Union Year Book Press Service). The mines had been worked by a large number of workmen who used some implements of bronze, but for the most part of stone and the bones of animals. There were no traces of iron. Near the shafts were primitive ore-crushing plants, consisting of stone slabs and hammers. Two skeletons of these bronze age miners were found, who had met their death by a fall of the roof. On one of the skeletons was a necklace of glass and clay beads and in one hand was a bronze chisel and in the other a stone hammer. They were not Mongolian, as was indicated by their skulls. The mines were 0-75 m. wide and 20-25 m. deep. They were connected by underground passages 100-150 m. long. These passages had natural ventilation, and for illumination it is probable that fat in shallow bowls was employed. Some of these bowls have been found. Stone cross pieces were used as props. Polished slabs and triangles of stone have been found which appear to have been used on the steppes of Kazakhstan as sign-posts to guide caravans on their way to the mines. The slabs were orientated and polished on the eastern side. The Soviet Government is sending out another expedition this year to explore the mines further, and to work the ore which was left unextracted by the ancient miners.

Heat and Power Station in Northern Russsia

ACCORDING to the Soviet Union Year Book Press Service, Grand Buildings, Trafalgar Square, W.C.2, plans have been completed for the building of a large heat and power station about twenty miles from Kotlas, a busy town in the northern province of the U.S.S.R. It will be built in virgin forest, near the site where building work is now proceeding in connexion with cellulose, chemical and wood-working enterprises for the Soviet timber and paper industry. This year the first section of the station with a capacity of 24,000 kW. will be brought into operation. It will have an annual output of 1.2 million tons of steam. Fuel will be provided by gas generated by pitch, a by-product from the local timber and chemical industries. Four boilers will produce 60-80 tons of steam per hour, at a pressure of 35 atmospheres,, the steam passing into turbines of 12,000 kW. each. These boilers are fitted with special fuel jets for the new form of fuel. The turbines can run at various steam pressures, depending on the requirements of production.

Social Services in the Soviet Plan for 1937

ACCOBDING to the Soviet Union Year Book Press Service, the provisions of the 1937 Plan for the national economy of the U.S.S.R. in regard to the cultural and social services include the following: Science. 924-2 million roubles (about £93 million) for the maintenance of scientific institutions in 1937, as against 797-5 million roubles (£80 million) in 1936. Out of this sum, 245 million roubles (about £25 million) will be expended on general capital construction for the needs of science, to include an expenditure of 40 million roubles (£4 million) on putting up new buildings to house the institutions of the AU-Union Academy of Sciences, and 25 million roubles (about £3 million) for the building of the All-Union Institute of Experimental Medicine. Health Protection. A sum of 7,528-1 million roubles (£753 million) for health protection in 1937, as against 5,803-5 million roubles in 1936. This sum includes an expenditure of 1,000 million roubles on buildings. The number of hospital beds in 1937 will be increased to 619,800, as against 564,000 in 1936; maternity beds to 11,078, as against 6,000 in 1936.

Experiments in Resuscitation

A REPORT by the Soviet Union Year Book Press Service relates that ten years ago Dr. Sergei Briuk-honenko carried out the following experiment. He removed the head of a dog and attached to it an apparatus which he called the autojector for artificial circulation of the blood, with the result that the severed head was kept alive for six months, reacting to all stimuli. Some years later, Dr. Briukhonenko succeeded in resuscitating a whole animal. A dog had its thorax opened and the action of the heart stopped. Death set in, but the animal was revived by the autojector. In 1936 the Institute of Experimental Physiology and Therapy was created to assist Dr. Briukhonenko in his researches. The result has been that not only has resuscitation been effected so long as half an hour after death, but also life has been maintained so that dogs which were put to death in various ways in August and September 1936 and then resuscitated are still alive and in excellent condition.

Soviet Medical Films

ACCORDING to the Soviet Union Year Book Press service, moving pictures are being used in the U.S.S.R. for the treatment of nervous and mental diseases. Prof. Sukharebsky, of the Yakovenko Psychiatric Hospital in Moscow, has obtained remarkable success by showing epileptic patients films depicting calm lakes, picturesque landscapes, etc. He has also obtained good results by the use of a film in which he hypnotizes alcoholic addicts. A plan for a series of 102 short medical films has recently been approved by the Film Committee appointed by the Commissar of Health. The series includes brain operations and diseases of the spinal cord and brain. Other films are designed to assist surgeons to carry out rapid field operations in time of war. A film entitled “A Sick and a Healthy Heart” will be made under the direction of the heart specialist Prof. Zelenin, and another will deal with the development of the child between the ages of one month and two years. The last of the series will be a film entitled “Twenty Years of Soviet Medicine”.

Soviet Arctic Exploration

IN continuance of its plans of Arctic exploration, the Soviet Government, according to the Soviet Union Year Book Press Service, is planning to dispatch ninety-five Arctic expeditions this year. Besides new geological prospecting work, topographical surveys in high latitudes will be combined with hydrographical work in the Kara and Laptev Seas. The northern rivers will also be studied with the view of improving transport. Research is also-in hand on the problem of the northward extension of agriculture. Last year's work led to the discovery of coal deposits in the Chukchee peninsula, and these are now being worked.

Genetic Theory and Practice in the U.S.S.R.

A REPORT of the fourth session of the Lenin Academy of Agricultural Sciences, which was held in Moscow in December last, has been received from the Soviet Union Year Book Press Service, 623-4 Grand Buildings, Trafalgar Square, London. Apart from seventy-one special papers, there was a general debate on the present position of research in genetics. This apparently took the form of an attack on modern genetic theory by experts who have been engaged in the study of practical problems unrelated to genetics. The grounds of the attack were ostensibly twofold. First, geneticists like Muller and Vavilov were said to have neglected the Marxian principle of the unity of theory and practice in failing to keep their work in touch with the needs of farmers. Secondly, the primary assumptions of genetics were held to be invalid. Presumably, in the absence of other evidence, the second contention was deduced from the first. The attack was reinforced by pointing to work like that of Michurin and Lysenko which, unhampered by academic prejudice, has yielded results of immense practical value by methods of trial and error.

International Congress of Genetics and the U.S.S.R.

THE next International Congress of Genetics was to have been held at Moscow in August next, the preparations for it being in the hands of Russian geneticists. A wireless message from Moscow to the New York Times, which was published in Science of December 18, stated that the Congress had been cancelled by the Soviet Government; that genetics had been attacked as of no practical value by T. D. Lysenko, who is known for his work in the vernalization of wheat and other crops; that Prof. N. I. Vavilov, the distinguished head of the plant-breeding services in the U.S.S.R., had been arrested; and that Prof. S. G. Levit, who is director of the Maxim Gorky Medico-Genetical Institute and was general secretary of the Organization Committee for the International Congress of Genetics, had been heavily attacked in the Communist party press for allowing a member of his staff to publish a paper in which it is concluded that the Buryats of Siberia have a mental age of twelve years. Prof. Vavilov has since sent to the New York Times a message, a copy of which has been sent to us by the Soviet Union Year Book Press Service, denying the story of his arrest and pointing out the large growth which has taken place in the Institute of Plant Breeding under his direction during the Soviet regime. According to a report circulated by Science Service, of Washington, D.C., Prof. H. B. Ward, permanent secretary of the American Association, has received a message from the U.S.S.R. indicating that the Congress of Genetics has been postponed but not cancelled. As the titles of papers for the Congress were to have been sent in soon, it is clear that a more definite announcement regarding the postponement is desirable, since many geneticists were already making arrangements to attend. These Congresses have been held every five years, the last being at Ithaca, New York, in 1932. No adequate grounds for a postponement have yet appeared.