Russian Soil Research Articles

Mapping of Agate-like Soil Cover Structures Based on a Multitemporal Soil Line Using Neural Network Filtering of Remote Sensing Data

The present study focuses on analysis of the soil cover structure (SCS, SCSs), which is the most detailed level of soil organization in space. The detail in which complex SCS can be studied is often insufficient, since until now it has not been possible to map it over large areas at scales larger than 1:10,000. To increase the detail in which SCS can be studied, the methods of identifying the bare soil surface (BSS) and averaging its multitemporal spectral characteristics were used, which opens up new possibilities for mapping complex SCS over large areas. New SCSs of leached chernozems (Luvic Chernic Phaeozem) were discovered, which can produce patterns on satellite images similar to sections of Timan agate—agate-like soil cover structures (ASCS, ASCSs). ASCSs are formed on Quaternary sediments of varying thickness from 0.3 to 6 m, underlain by carbonate and red sediments of the Permian period. The ASCS pattern is formed by ring-shaped stripes (rings) of different colors and brightness, which are determined by the carbonate and red-colored inclusions involved in the arable horizon. Eight soil varieties were identified to describe ASCSs during the study. According to the WRB, there are six main soil types, and according to the classification of Russian soils in 1977, there are four types. ASCSs were identified over large areas and soil maps of ASCSs were constructed using multitemporal spectral characteristics of the BSS in the form of multitemporal soil line coefficients. Neural networks were used to identify BSS on big remote sensing data. ASCSs have contrasting soil properties and contrasting fertility (productivity of agricultural crops). ASCS maps can serve as the basis for task maps of precision farming systems. Perhaps ASCSs are unique objects for the area of chernozem distribution, where in one soil profile there are rocks with an age from the first thousand years (Quaternary) to 250 million years (Permian). Chernozems are fertile, studied, mercilessly exploited, but sometimes they are simply beautiful—agate-like.

The Bruce-Mengden and Cornelis Cruys Maps of the Lower Don (1696-1705): An Inflection Point in the Practice of Russian Cartography?

Maps of the lower Don and Azov region produced by James Bruce and Cornelis Cruys in connection with Peter I’s 1696 Azov campaign appear to mark the point at which cartographic work undertaken on Russian territory by specialists in Russian service began moving beyond the traditional chertezh mapping model and embraced the principles of the new Western European geodesic cartography. This was becoming possible through greater familiarization with Copernican cosmography and higher mathematics, the importation of new instruments of observation, and the establishment of new centers of calculation on Russian soil. The adoption of the new geodesic cartography served the Petrine imperial project—not only in supporting communications and logistics on the empire’s frontiers, but in winning European acknowledgment of Russian Imperial sovereignty. The process of adoption also illustrates the manner in which a network of collaborating scholars in Russia and abroad was quickly assembled.

Resignation: Expressive Semantic Evolution of a Borrowing and a Precedent Name

This article explores the narrowly used borrowing from French, résignation (with Russian graphic variants rezinyatsiya and rezignatsiya), which paradoxically combines features of exoticism, neologism, and archaism in contemporary Russian. The evolution of this lexeme, denoting a particular psychological state, is traced on Russian soil — from its introduction into the Russian in the late 18th century via German transit, spurred by the popularity of Schiller’s eponymous elegy among the progressive Russian intelligentsia, to its attainment of the status of a precedent name and its additional semantic nuances and connotations in the works of I. S. Turgenev and other domestic writers. The article analyzes possible reasons for the decline of this lexeme, which failed to enter active usage and instead receded into passive vocabulary: the lack of a uniform Cyrillic spelling variant, the absence of a productive word formation family, an aura of elitism, and associative links to roots in Russian words such as rezat’ (to cut) and rezkiy (sharp), resulting in a phonetic disadvantage compared to Russian synonyms like pokornost’ (submission) and smireniye (humility).

Soil maps of cities for the unified digital model of the soil cover of Russia

The soil cover of cities and towns within their administrative boundaries is composed of soils, more or less modified by the urban environment along with native, agricultural soils and non-soils. For preserving this diversity when introducing these new objects to the unified digital model of the soil cover of Russia, soil maps of 10 “test” cities have been compiled. The cities are located in several natural zones, and are intermediate in terms of their population. Mapping was performed by means of detailed purposeful deciphering, data on mapping units on the original soil map, and recent systematics of urban soils and their dependence on the urban environment. The approaches applied were supported by the experience in soil mapping of St-Petersburg, Moscow, Volgograd and few other cities. Soils were qualified in the system of Russian soil classification, and their areas, along with those of non-soils, were regarded as units in the theory of soil cover patterns. In all cities investigated, soil associations comprised urban soils per se, transitional soils including agro-soils and conventionally native ones; their ratios in the soil cover depend on both historical-socio-economical reasons and the natural enviroment.

СЕРГЕЙ СЕМЁНОВИЧ НЕУСТРУЕВ. ЖИЗНЬ, ДЕЯТЕЛЬНОСТЬ И НАУЧНЫЙ ВКЛАД В РАЗВИТИЕ ГЕНЕТИЧЕСКОГО ПОЧВОВЕДЕНИЯ: К 150-ЛЕТИЮ СО ДНЯ РОЖДЕНИЯ

The article tells about the life and scientific achievements of this scientist. The major stages of S.S. Neustruev’s work are given: a theorist of soil science from Dokuchaev’s school, a famous geologist and one of the most talented physical geographers. His unique capacities for synthesis, a special ceaseless role of soil-geographical, cadastral and geological researches conducted by him are shown. S.S. Neustruev’s scientific views about the joint development of geomorphology and soil, their interconnections have developed approaches to develop regional Russian and global soil classifications and to study ecological and biosphere soil functions. New facts of his life and scientific activity are presented. He was a Russian soil scientist, geographer, naturalist, graduate from Moscow University, researcher of Central Asia, the South- East of the Russian Plain, and the Volga region. Being professor of the Geographical Institute in Petrograd (1918), he headed the first department of soil geography in Russia. He was the first to introduce the term “serozem” and establish the serozem type of soil formation in deserts and semi-deserts, and developed a classification of soils for a number of regions of Central Asia. He was Head of the Commission on Soil Genesis of the First All-Union Congress of Soil Scientists; Participant of the 1st International Congress of Soil Scientists in the USA (1927); Corresponding member of the Agricultural Academy (Czech Republic).

«Советское» Сергея Никольского

The paper is a reflection on the first part of duology (two inextricably linked parts of one work) entitled “Soviet” by the Russian social philosopher Sergei Nikolsky. In the second part of duology, Nikolsky offers a philosophical analysis of Soviet literature, or rather a philosophical and literary analysis of the idea of the “Soviet”. The first part is devoted to the historiosophy of the “Soviet”. Therefore, the author of the review, to illuminate the author’s intention, focuses on the first volume and mainly writes about the preconditions of the “Soviet” that Sergei Nikolsky discovers in Russian history. The uniqueness of the “So­viet” consists primarily in the unexpected vitality of the idea, the originality of the social practice corresponding to it and the specific creative totality. “So­viet” is not only Leninism and Stalinism, but a socio-political adaptation of Marxism to a special historically determined context, the “Russian soil”. This is also a political and philosophical project to reform personal social conscious­ness, to create a new person and to build a new world. The source of the “So­viet” were the leaders and the state apparatus, but it appeared first in the heads of Marxist-oriented intellectuals, and then produced by the people as a whole and existed thanks to them and deeply-rooted tradition. Sergei Nikolsky admits that the “Soviet” had both the humanistic and liberating potential of the philoso­phy of Karl Marx. Thus, the “Soviet” is the idea of the comprehensive develop­ment of man, the construction of a future brotherhood, as well as the heroism shown by the people during the Great War. The author of the paper also writes on the special tonality of the “Soviet”, finding it successful

Podzolic-brown soils of the Far East on the Soil map of Russian Federation, scale 1 : 2.5 M, and their correlation with soils in the Russian soil classification

Podzolic-brown forest soils on the Soil Map of Russian Federation, scale 1 : 2.5 M, are widespread on the plains and plateaus of the Far East, referred to the Eastern brown-forest-soil area in the scheme of soil-geographical zoning. There, in Primorye and Priamurye regions, they are confined to various parent rocks and to different climatic and biota conditions. In the Classification of Soils of Russia (2004, 2008), there are no direct analogues of podzolic-brown soils in the map legend. To name these soils in the Russian classification system, regional publications (N.A. Kreida, G.I. Ivanov, V.I. Roslikova et al., N.M. Kostenkov, E.A. Zharikova) were reviewed: morphological and physicochemical properties of podzolic-brown soils were assessed in terms of their compliance with the diagnostic criteria of their possible analogues in the Russian system. The comparison has shown that in Primorye, on stony-loamy-clayey derivates of hard rocks, podzolic-brown soils correspond to soddy-pale-eluvial-metamorphic soils with textural differentiation, on loamy-clayey lacustrine-alluvial and colluvial deposits – as dark-humus podbels. In the north, in Priamurye region, podzolic-brown gley soils have properties of both texture-differentiated soils with the BT diagnostic horizon and of soils with a specific cryogenic structure in the middle cryometamorphic horizon. In the ideology and nomenclature of the Russian classification system, the former are defined as mucky-podzolic gleyic soils, the latter soils, as depending on the intensity of surface gley and structure development, can be defined as cryometamorphic podzolized gleyzems, eluvial-metamorphic cryometamorphic gleyic soils, or gleyic svetlozems.

METHOD OF SUBSTANDARD PESTICIDES UTILIZATION

The article is devoted to topical issues of utilization of unusable pesticides buried and stored in toxic waste landfills on the territory of the Russian Federation.Aim and objectives are analysis of sub-standard pesticides handling in the Russian Federation and development of a method of their utilization to obtain components for chemical production.The materials for the study were unusable pesticides.The sources of information were official documents containing analytical information on the quality of the natural environment (Annual State Reports on the State of the Natural Envi-ronment in the Subjects of the Russian Federation) and generalized results of thesurvey of Russian soils for the content of pesticide residues in them (Yearbooks «State of Pesticide Contamination of Natural Environmental Objects of the Russian Federation»).The paper analyzes the amount of unusable pesticides currently stored in the Russian Federation on the basis of official data.The qualitative composition of pesticides requiring utilization and stored in warehouses and landfills of the Russian Federation is considered.The principal scheme of utilization of unusable pesticides with obtaining components for chemical production, which can be used as secondary raw materials, is proposed.

Map of the soil cover of the Olsky section of the Magadan Nature Reserve (Koni Peninsula)

The object of the study was the unexplored soil cover of the Olsky section of the Magadan Nature Reserve. For this purpose, a route survey was conducted of 12 of the most characteristic tracts of the site available for hiking. The research methods generally accepted in Russian soil science were used. 11 soil subtypes were identified for the first time within the boundaries of the site, among which the most common are soils of the alphegumus and humus–accumulative departments, developing on granitoid derivatives overlain from above by an Aeolian cover of volcanic ash with a thickness of up to 0.25 m. A soil map has been compiled on which 9 contours of soil cover structures are outlined, among which the most widely represented combinations of ochreous podburs with sod-podburs illuvial-ferruginous ochreous, dry peat-ochreous podzols with ochreous podzols and dry peat-lithozems humus-peat, as well as ochreous gleevate podzols. 11 soil subtypes were identified for the first time within the boundaries of the site, among which the most common are soils of the alphegumus and humus–accumulative departments developing on granitoid derivatives overlain from above by an Aeolian cover of volcanic ash with a thickness of up to 0.25 m.A soil map has been compiled on which 9 contours of soil cover structures are outlined, among which the most widely represented combinations of ochreous podburs with sod-podburs illuvial-ferruginous ochreous, dry peat-ochreous podzols with ochreous podzols and dry peat-lithozems humus-peat, as well as ochreous gleevate podzols. The conclusion is made about the overwhelming influence of Kamchatka volcanism on soil formation and soil cover of the research area. The obtained results can be used for environmental purposes to replenish information about the environmental components of one of the poorly studied sites of specially protected natural territories of the North of the Far East, as well as in domestic soil science to clarify the genetic features of the influence of Kamchatka volcanism on the land cover of the vast oceanic region of the Pacific Ocean.

TERF and Anti-trans Initiatives in Russia: Is There a Connection?

Trans-exclusive radical feminism (TERF) was imported onto the Russian soil around 2013, when trans people became more visible and I introduced transfeminism in a number of blog posts, which later were compiled into the first Russian-language book on transfeminism (Kirey-Sitnikova, 2016). In 2016, a large survey of feminists (n = 1364) revealed that 10.2% respondents identified as TERF and 4.4% as transfeminists (Kirey-Sitnikova, 2018). The TERF movement was shown to consist of individuals with higher income and educational level living in big cities, lesbians, and those more involved in feminist activism. Knowing a trans person was not a predictor of trans inclusion, many feminists joined the TERF movement after meeting a trans person supporting patriarchal gender norms (Kirey-Sitnikova, 2016). The most vigorous debates between these groups occurred on the Russian blogging platform “LiveJournal” (LJ) and consisted largely of translations and interpretations of texts by US feminists (Ibid.). As I described elsewhere, self-colonisation in the form of indiscriminate borrowing of terms and concepts from the Anglosphere is a prominent characteristic of all Russian progressive gender movements (Kirey-Sitnikova, 2020). After 2016, I moved on to other topics and did not follow these debates. This small contribution is aimed as an update on TERF from that time till now.

Exploring the Issue of Historical Knowledge Production Regarding the Caucasus Periphery of the Russian Empire (Based on the Research Practices of A. P. Berge)

This article conducts an analysis of the activities of the Russian Caucasus scholar A. P. Berge (1828‑1886) with the aim of investigating the process of shaping historical knowledge about the Caucasian periphery of the Russian Empire during the late imperial period. In the public consciousness of that time, the Caucasus was firmly associated with the “East,” allowing for the identification of certain aspects of the impact of the phenomenon of orientalism on the Russian soil. Based on discussions within the academic community regarding orientalism as a colonial discourse, the author, using the specific example of the researcher, demonstrates the influence of state power on the activities of scholars.
 A. P. Berge's research practices were adjusted in accordance with the demands of his time, and their outcomes aligned with the spirit of the era. Arriving in the Caucasus as a scholar of the East, with the intention of studying the local culture, he was compelled by political authority to reconsider his scholarly interests and engage in the process of shaping historical knowledge aimed at solving practical challenges faced by the local administration.
 Berge, a talented researcher and organizer of Caucasian history studies, recognized the significant role of science in the cultural integration of the Caucasian periphery of the Russian Empire and conscientiously fulfilled the tasks assigned to him by the authorities. His approach to the history of the Caucasus joining Russia was not idealized, and he maintained a pragmatic stance towards the unfolding events. It is noteworthy to highlight his positive contribution to the formation of the source base of Caucasian studies, as well as his genuine interest and sympathy for the region, alongside with the absence of overt imperialistic ambitions. A prevailing theme in his works is the notion of Russia's civilizing mission in the Caucasus, and the scholarly projects he pursued contributed to establishing the foundation for constructing a shared history, aiming at the internal consolidation of the Caucasian territories and their representation as an integral part of the Russian Empire.

Directions for improving of agricultural land use in Ukraine in conditions of global warming and consequences of the Russian’s military aggression

The article is devoted to the problematic aspects of agricultural land use in Ukraine. Analyzed influence on the use of agricultural land such factors as systems of farming, global warming, uneven precipitation distribution by months, deficit of humus in the soil and consequences of the impact on the soil of Russia’s military aggression. Considered such systems of farming as traditional, organic, No-Till and made conclusion about a harmfulness of traditional farming system on ecology. The main directions of organizational restructuring in crop production in the post-war period are studied. The following main directions have been identified: increasing the level of specialization of production in accordance with farm conditions by choosing crops that are best suited to the climate, soils and assets of the enterprise, as well as increasing the productivity of the use of these assets through the introduction of modern innovative technologies for the production of agricultural products, in particular, soil cultivation technologies. It was concluded that economic and ecological expediency will be the main factors that will determine the directions of organizational restructuring in the plant production of agricultural enterprises of Ukraine in the post-war period and will ensure the recovery and development of the domestic agricultural industry.

Heavy Metals in Urban Soils of the Volga Federal District: a Conjugate Analysis of Official Data

Based on a conjugated analysis of the official data of Roshydromet on the content of priority heavy metals (Cd, Pb, Zn, Cu, Ni) in the soils of 23 cities of the Volga Federal District, as well as Rosstat data on the socio-economic indicators of these settlements, the ecological and geochemical characteristics of urbanozems (Urbic Technosols) and with the help of multivariate statistical analyzes (cluster and factorial), possible relationships between soil pollution parameters and urban features of cities were revealed. For the soils of most cities in the region with average socioeconomic indicators, admissible levels of accumulation of Cd, Pb, Zn, and Cu have been established, which, in terms of concentrations, are close to the average abundance of urban soils in Russia. In small and medium-sized cities of the Republic of Bashkortostan, exceedances of APC Ni in soils are recorded, which reflects the presence of a regional geochemical anomaly of natural and anthropogenic nature in the eastern part of the Volga Federal District, but no correlations between nickel pollution and socio-economic indicators of settlements are revealed. The moderately hazardous level of complex pollution in urbanozems with dominant accumulation of Cd and significantly lower concentration ratios of other heavy metals (Belebey, Davlekanovo, Dzerzhinsk) shows no correlation with the demographic indicators of settlements. The more complex profile of soil pollution (Cd–Zn in Penza or Cu–Cd–Zn in Mednogorsk) shows lower values of the total fertility rate and higher values of the mortality rate (compared with the average regional indicators). In general, using the example of the cities of the Volga Federal District, it is shown that the gradients of increasing concentrations in soils of Cd, Pb, Zn, Cu and the total pollution index Zc are codirectional with an increase in the general mortality rate of the population.

Sphagnum Litter as the Most Important Genetic Horizon in the Profile of Peat Soils of Boreal Bogs

Peat soils of the taiga zone of West Siberia have historically been relatively poorly studied. In the diagnostics of peat soils, the question of the belonging of the sphagnum litter horizon to the soil profile, as well as the identification of its lower boundary, remains unresolved. In the WRB and Russian Soil Classification, sphagnum litter is considered as a vegetation cover, while in the Soviet classification it is considered as an integral part of the soil profile. The last point of view is also shared by the majority of Russian researchers. Using the material obtained in the study of peat soils in the basin of the river Kazym (subzone of the northern taiga, West Siberia), a comparative characteristic of the sphagnum litter horizon (0–20 cm) and the underlying peat horizon (20–50 cm) was carried out using three parameters: the botanical composition of peat, the degree of peat decomposition, and the color of the soil. All soils are differentiated into the litter horizon and the peat horizon by at least one parameter (5% of the profiles), but in 71% of cases, by three at once. The degree of profile differentiation into two horizons tends to increase in a series of soils formed, respectively, in oligotrophic pine-shrub-sphagnum, oligotrophic complex ridge-hollow, and mesotrophic biogeocenoses. In the overwhelming majority of oligotrophic peat soils, the transition from the litter horizon to the peat horizon is gradual, which does not allow a reproducible assessment of the boundary position in the soil profile. It is proposed to establish a fixed border of the litter horizon at 20 cm from the surface of the bog, referring it to the surface horizon of peat soil.

The Bykasov Family in the Context of Political Investigation (Siberia, Late 16th Century)

This study of “words and deeds” as a type of crime began over a hundred years ago. This well-known formula proceeded from the public obligation of the population to protect the sovereign and their family from any evil intentions. This phenomenon began to develop on Russian soil as early as the mid-fifteenth century and is present in a wide range of documents: secured or affirmed deeds; the sovereign’s grants to Siberian foreigners; letters of commendation with a golden seal, issued to those who lived in the recently annexed territories with a predominantly non-Orthodox population, as well as territorial entities that were formally part of the Muscovite State; state oaths. It is believed that the cases of the sovereign’s “words and deeds” have been preserved since the seventeenth century, their mentions known since earlier times. However, the lists found in the materials of the Siberian Prikaz from the mandate letters of 1599 to the Tobolsk voivode stolnik S. F. Saburov about the investigation of the accusation of “words and deeds” of the Tobolsk children of the boyars Bykasov suggests that such materials from the sixteenth century are yet to be studied. However, to detect them, it is necessary to significantly expand the range of documents under consideration and not be limited, as before, only to the materials of the Razryad Prikaz. The materials analysed are the remains of the most ancient case identified on charges of sovereign’s “words and deeds”. The Bykasov family mentioned in it, served as the sovereign’s grooms in the tsar’s stables at least from the early sixteenth century. Andrei Timofeevich Bykasov was involved in the case of the Shuysky princes in 1586, for which all his relatives were exiled to Siberian cities. At the end of the Time of Troubles, A. T. Bykasov became a stable officer of the Stable Prikaz, which compensated him and his brothers for the trials that they had had to go through.

Filling Gaps in Earthworm Digital Diversity in Northern Eurasia from Russian-language Literature

Data availability for certain groups of organisms (ecosystem engineers, invasive or protected species, etc.) is important for monitoring and making predictions in changing environments. One of the most promising directions for research on the impact of changes is species distribution modelling. Such technologies are highly dependent on occurrence data of high quality (Van Eupen et al. 2021). Earthworms (order Crassiclitellata) are a key group of organisms (Lavelle 2014), but their distribution around the globe is underrepresented in digital resources. Dozens of earthworm species, both widespread and endemic, inhabit the territory of Northern Eurasia (Perel 1979), but extremely poor data on them is available through global biodiversity repositories (Cameron 2018). There are two main obstacles to data mobilisation. Firstly, studies of the diversity of earthworms in Northen Eurasia have a long history (since the end of the nineteenth century) and were conducted by several generations of Soviet and Russian researchers. Most of the collected data have been published in "grey literature", now stored only in a few libraries. Until recently, most of these remained largely undigitised, and some are probably irretrievably lost. The second problem is the difference in the taxonomic checklists used by Soviet and European researchers. Not all species and synonyms are included in the GBIF (Global Biodiversity Information Facility) Backbone Taxonomy. As a result, existing earthworm species distribution models (Phillips 2019) potentially miss a significant amount of data and may underestimate biodiversity, and predict distributions inaccurately. To fill this gap, we collected occurrence data from the Russian language literature (published by Soviet and Russian researchers) and digitised species checklists, keeping the original scientific names. To find relevant literature, we conducted a keyword search for "earthworms" and "Lumbricidae" through the Russian national scientific online library eLibrary and screened reference lists from the monographs of leading Soviet and Russian soil zoologist Tamara Perel (Vsevolodova-Perel 1997, Perel 1979). As a result, about 1,000 references were collected, of which 330 papers had titles indicating the potential to contain data on earthworm occurrences. Among these, 219 were found as PDF files or printed papers. For dataset compilation, 159 papers were used; the others had no exact location data or duplicated data contained in other papers. Most of the sources were peer-reviewed articles (Table 1). A reference list is available through Zenodo (Ivanova et al. 2023). The earliest publication we could find dates back to 1899, by Wilhelm Michaelsen. The most recent publication is 2023. About a third of the sources were written by systematists Iosif Malevich and Tamara Perel. Occurrence data were extracted and structured according to the Darwin Core standard (Wieczorek et al. 2012). During the data digitisation process, we tried to include as much primary information as possible. Only one tenth of the literature occurrences contained the geographic coordinates of locations provided by the authors. The remaining occurrences were manually georeferenced using the point-radius method (Wieczorek et al. 2010). The resulting occurrence dataset Earthworm occurrences from Russian-language literature (Shashkov et al. 2023) was published through the Global Biodiversity Information Facility portal. It contains 5304 occurrences of 117 species from 27 countries (Fig. 1). To improve the GBIF Backbone Taxonomy, we digitised two catalogues of earthworm species published for the USSR (Perel 1979) and Russian Federation (Vsevolodova-Perel 1997) by Tamara Perel. Based on these monographs, three checklist datasets were published through GBIF (Shashkov 2023b, 124 records; Shashkov 2023c, 87 records; Shashkov 2023a, 95 records). Now we work towards including these names in the GBIF Backbone so that all species names can be matched and recorded exactly as mentioned in papers published by Soviet and Russian researchers.

С. Джонсон в России: вопросы рецепции

The aim of the research is to assess the state of Johnson studies in Russian philology. The scientific novelty of the research lies in the following: the author believes that the history of reception of S. Johnson’s creative heritage on the Russian soil has not been adequately investigated. The paper traces the main stages of the translation and historical-literary reception of S. Johnson’s creative work in Russia. The periods of active scientific study of S. Johnson’s creative activities and personality from the mid-eighteenth century to the 2020s have been established. It is suggested that the joint activities of the British Slavist and bibliographer John Simon Gabriel Simmons (1915-2005) and the outstanding Russian literary historian Yuri Davidovich Levin (1920-2006) undertaken in the 1950s-1960s represent the initial and main stage of the bibliographic work on the search and attribution of the Russian translations of Johnson’s writings made in the XVIII century. The next, modern, stage of studying Johnson’s legacy in Russia covers the period from the late 1990s to the early 2020s. As a result, an assessment of the current state of Johnson studies has been given, the peculiarities of reception of Johnson’s heritage during different historical periods have been revealed, a conclusion about the relevant aspects of Johnson studies and the prospects for their development has been made.

Combining machine learning and environmental covariates for mapping of organic carbon in soils of Russia

Robust and detailed quantitative prediction of soil organic carbon (SOC) is of great significance to studying the carbon budget, soil management and decision-making. Spatial variations of SOC content were modelled using 863 soil profiles and a set of 22 environmental covariates representing relief, bioclimate variables and remote sensing data. The article provided the results of 3D modeling of SOC content in several soil layers (0–5, 5–15, 15–30, 30–60 and 60–100 cm) for the territory of the Russian Federation with 500 m spatial resolution. Machine learning framework was used, with random forest and spatial cross-validation techniques (150 km blocks) to handle the spatial autocorrelation of the training points. Compared with randomized cross-validation (R2 0.66, Concordance Correlation Coefficient (CCC) 0.79, RMSE 0.99 g/kg), using spatial cross-validation to predict the SOC content yielded less accurate results — R2 0.45, CCC 0.63, RMSE 1.41 g/kg. Regarding the importance of the variables, soil depth and temperature seasonality were major contributors to the SOC content prediction, followed by the EVI, 7 (MIR) MODIS band, and the topographic wetness index. The model was next evaluated with procedure so-called „area of applicability“ (AOA) of prediction model — the areas for which we cannot estimate prediction quality. AOA spatial distribution showed that the feature space not represented by training data is located in the mountain provinces. The proposed framework can be used for SOC modeling with a limited soil profile number, and it is provides a reproducible approach for long-term SOC monitoring.

Rendzinas of the Russian Northwest: Diversity, Genesis, and Ecosystem Functions: A Review

Rendzinas in the taiga zone are intrazonal soils; moreover, all of their processes occur in ways that are different from podzolic soil formation, which is typical for the zonal taiga boreal ecosystem. At the same time, the habitats of carbonate soils are known as places in which there is a concentration of biodiversity in the more southern regions, as they are drier, are insolated, and have a higher trophic state than zonal podzols. The biotopes on carbonate soils are becoming more southern and are dominated by nemoralis species of flora, including abundant calciphilous plant species. Carbonate soils regulate biogeochemical processes within their distribution and in the geochemically subordinate landscapes of Northwest Russia. They are associated with the existence of a number of specially protected natural areas, as well as the implementation of a number of important ecosystem services. Carbonate soils of the southern taiga are endangered and require special protection. The belt of the carbonate soils in the northwestern Russian and Baltic regions extends to Poland and is the basis for the formation of a special landscape–ecological framework with specific biodiverse, biogeochemical, and geographical characteristics. The intensive extraction of limestone from quarries leads to the destruction of rendzinas, which makes them increasingly rare and extremely vulnerable. The rate of recovery of rendzina soils after technogenic impacts is much slower than the regeneration of zonal podzols; therefore, they are an almost non-renewable resource. Thus, rendzinas are an important component of the Northwest Russian soil cover, where all factors of soil formation “refract” and acquire specificity, leading to radical changes not only in the soil-forming potential of the environment but in all of the components of terrestrial ecosystems. In other words, the island of alkaline rocks inherited from the ancient seas is currently pedogeochemically actualized in the soil cover of vast taiga areas.

Bibliophilism of the Nobility as an Element of the Cultural Environment of the Central Chernozem Region in the First Half of the 19th Century

Introduction. The article examines the issue of the development of book collecting as a special feature that is formed in the provincial Russian reader in the first half of the XIX century. An important part of the formation of reading culture in the provincial environment was the gradual transition from traditional values to new behavioral and spiritual practices. Materials and methods. An important part of the formation of the reading culture in the provincial environment was the gradual transition from traditional values to new behavioral and spiritual practices. Historical experience shows that in Russia, as in European countries, reading is an attribute of the life of modernized groups of the population. The dominant social structures in established societies, based on ingrained patterns of behavior, were closely associated with oral communication. And only in modernized communities does the need for the printed word appear as a universal source of information transmission. Results. Drawn into the processes of social and economic modernization ofRussia in the XVIII century, the nobility intensively assimilated European culture, including its information transmitter – the works of foreign writers. As a result, by the end of the century, reading becomes an important component of the lifestyle of the upper class. At the same time, the development of foreign literature contributed to the transfer of Western socio-economic and cultural ideas to the Russian soil, catalyzed theprocess of intellectual "Europeanization" of the upper class. Conclusion. The prevalence of Frenchlanguage literature during this period was characteristic of the majority of the nobility and testified to the active involvement of the upper class in the process of "gallomania". The high level of education of the owners allowed them to have rich collections of literature in foreign languages, expanding the horizons of bibliophiles. The main role here was played by the works of French enlighteners, who formed the freethinking views of landowners, educating the ideas of freedom and equality.