Big Molecular Toys
This team from Moscow, Russia is into making large scale molecular biology stuff as real world object toys, mainly made of plastic, but sometimes they are soft too.
It’s so geeky these days to go and buy yourself a 20 inch highly-detailed swine flu virus molecule or DNA helix made of plush for Valentine’s day or some other date like that instead the boring plush puppy and stuff.
Oil Stones: A Soviet City in the Middle of the Sea
In 1940s and 1950s, right after the World War 2 Russia had to recover from the consequences of the Nazi invasion. Lots had to be done and as we know to complete something you need to have enough energy. And energy at that times as well as it is much likely now meant oil.
At that times the known oil reserves differed from what people in Russia know about it now. The main places to drill for oil was Southern Russia on contrary to frozen Northern Siberian regions as it’s for now. And the gemstone of the Soviet Oil production was Caspian sea region, mainly the territories that are an independent state of Aizerbajan now.
So after a massive attack of oil thirsty state the lands of this previously oil-saturated region little by little got exhausted of the black mineral treasure and the need for new sources of it arouse. Now it’s not clear who was that this genius who first came up with an idea of getting the oil right from the sea bottom where it was still plenty of it and for this purpose to build a real city 42 km (25 miles) off the coast right in the middle of the sea, but what we know is that this idea came into play and by some crazy chance it got support from that times Soviet leaders who leveraged it with the all support the biggest (by the territory) state could offer at that time. What this meant is that in a matter of just a few month a real town was built right in the middle of the nowhere on giant steel blocks coming from the sea bottom, from as deep as hundreds of feet down. And they called it “Oil Stones”.
The Most Northern Institute
The Murmansk Marine Biological Institute – one of the most northern academic institutes in the world where fundamental and scientific engineering problems of the modern marine biology, oceanography and ecology are solved.
Puschino Astronomical observatory
The first initiative to create big radio telescopes in the USSR is dated 1951. They were intended to observe the sun radiation and radiation of other space sources on centimeter and millimeter waves. (more…)
Life-giving leeches
The reporting from the leech farm. The unique pictures of a leech birth in the natural environment and in captivity. (more…)
Drifting Stations: North Pole 3
The Soviet Union made a great contribution to exploring different regions, some of them were absolutely deserted, others were very dangerous or their maintenance in a normal state was a crucial thing and some of them were totally out-of-reach. And North Pole is not an exception. For the first time ever, the idea of floating on the huge ice-box, which spit off from the main arctic ice body, and exploring different nature phenomena along with making calculations of what had to be the default nature conditions was put forward by Norwegian arctic research worker Fridtjof Nansen (the recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize in 1922) and then taken up by many Russian scientists.
Looking Into the Skies
Nowadays many people believe that the Soviet Union was the first in the field of space exploration. However, only few know that USSR also had great achievements in another close field – astronomy. During a long time the world’s biggest telescope called The Big Azimuth Telescope or the BAT was located in this country. Moreover, it was constructed exclusively using Soviet technologies and developments, which demonstrated the country’s leadership in the field of optical instruments.
Photo credits:1
(more…)
Worlds First Space Blogger
The online blog of astronaut Maksim Suraev is an event of international and spacewide standing. For the first time in history, Russian cosmonaut will be posting news and different interesting stories with lots of photos straight from the outer space.
Space things
As Russia is being the first country to cross the threshold of space, it has lots of so-called “Space cities”. Usually, they are situated in some cities where the great Soviet and Russian cosmonauts were born and all the things from astronauts’ food to the models of most renowned space shuttles are displayed there.
Coalmine Insight
There were lots of articles about some plants and factories, but unfortunately most of them were deserted and abandoned. Today we will bring you an insight into the equally time-worn and moth-eaten plant but just with one little difference. It is not abandoned. At least not to the death.
Loading ...