Latvia's Scientists at Work

Through the Soviet system Latvian scientists realised a dream they always had—the establishment of their own Academy of Sciences. Such an academy was set up in the republic in the first year after the war and today embraces fourteen research institutes.

In recent years Latvia's scientists have devised apparatus for the peaceful utilisation of atomic energy and instruments for control and automation of production processes. Instruments employing radioactive isotopes have been installed at a number of industrial establishments.

The results of this work have been demonstrated at international exhibitions in Switzerland, Czechoslovakia and China.

Latvian scientists have made investigations in the field of magnetic hydrodynamics and introduced improvements into high-speed electronic computers. They have worked out new technological processes, among them methods of hydrolysing wood to obtain sugars and fodder yeasts.

They have made an important contribution to the chemical and drug industries by synthesising valuable new drugs (among them anti-tubercular and anti-cancer drugs) which are finding successful application.

At the Institute of Organic Synthesis of the Latvian Academy of Sciences a group working under Academician S. Giller has mastered the technology of making Tio Teff, the most effective of the chemical drugs used to treat certain forms of cancer.

Tests have shown that Tio Teff brings about a general improvement in the patient's condition, reduces pain, and resolves tumours. The drug is used chiefly after operations, in treating neglected cases of cancer, and in combination with other methods of treatment.

During the current seven-year period Latvian scientists will pay particular attention to investigations in the physical sciences, to problems of utilising atomic energy for peaceful purposes, to semi-conductors, and to automation in industry.

Describing new studies and discoveries by workers in his laboratory. Y. Krumin, head of the radio physics laboratory of the Institute of Physics, one of the largest in the republic, says:

"Achievements in science and engineering are unthinkable today without radio electronics. Our laboratory does research of a scientific and applied nature in this field. E. Greenburg, for instance, has made a valuable contribution to the theory of radio engineering with his new method of single-step designing of weak-current electric circuits."

Radio electronics is coming to be used more and more in medicine; for instance, for artificial inhibition of the processes taking place in the cortex. A human being can be put to sleep under the influence of the impulses of electric currents. There are various so-called "electro-sleep" instruments used to generate such impulses.

A. Apsit, Honoured Worker in Science and Engineering of the Latvian S.S.R., and his co-workers at the Institute of Physics A. Vitolin and A. Bute, have designed a new transistor model of an "electro-sleep" device which is small in size, battery-operated, and perfectly harmless. The apparatus is now being employed in investigations at the Institute of Experimental Medicine of the Latvian Academy of Sciences.

The radio physics laboratory is also investigating ferrite techniques. R. Kalnin is studying the properties of coils with ferrite cores. His research indicates ways of manufacturing high-quality coils with minimum expen-diture of material.

Research workers at the laboratory are now engaged in designing a small-size memory device with ferrite cores for the Institute's electronic computers. Since transistors are used in the amplifiers, the memory unit will contain only some fifty electron tubes compared with the 800 tubes in old-type units.

A group headed by F. Eremin, Candidate of Technical Science, is studying certain problems of information theory. Their work has led to the building of a special apparatus to detect the movement of air in closed rooms, for instance, when objects fall, when fire appears or there is a wind. With the help of a relay the apparatus sets in motion a signal mechanism.

Another group is working on a problem that could be termed "quantum radio physics". The group is studying the interactions between radio waves and the molecules and atoms of substances.

A particularly wide study is being made of the absorption and emission of high-frequency and super high-frequency radio waves by various crystals and gases. These investigations will enable scientists to learn new facts concerning the structure of the world of molecules and atoms around us.

New oscillators and amplifiers of super-high frequencies have been built on the basis of these investigations. Extremely sensitive devices for the analysis of substances also stem from this research.

Radio physicists are studying nuclear resonance—that is the interaction of radio waves and atomic nuclei. This research makes it possible to build instruments capable of measuring and stabilising magnetic fields with a precision hitherto unknown (up to 0.001 per cent and higher). Two research workers, A. Ginsburg and V. Zeigur, have already made such an instrument.

In future, research in the field of quantum radio physics is to be conducted on a still broader scale.

In addition to nuclear resonance a study will be made of another type of inter-action between radio waves and substances: electronic resonance—that is the action of radio waves on electrons.

The radio physics laboratory plans to concentrate primarily on research into the effects of radioactive radiation on ferro-magnetic bodies and transistors. Nuclear and electronic resonance techniques will play a lead-ing role in these investigations.

In accordance with a recent decision of the Soviet Government an atomic reactor is to be built in Latvia. It will go into operation next year.

The decision is important not only to Latvian science. Countries like Italy, Austria, Portugal, Spain and Greece, to say nothing of the South American countries or the countries of Asia and Africa, do not have atomic reactors.

In the Soviet Union they are being built in several of the Union Republics, among them Byelorussia, Uzbekistan and Georgia. Other republics will help Latvia to build her reactor by providing equipment and nuclear fuel. The Latvian reactor will be available to scientists of Estonia and Lithuania.

Physicists are now working on new designs for high-speed electronic computers to control production processes, conveyors and machines. Robots are to be built in the near future capable of performing various operations, for example, in rooms contaminated by radioactive or chemical substances.

Work is proceeding in close collaboration with the Academies of Sciences of Byelorussia, Lithuania and Estonia and the Academy of Sciences of the U.S.S.R. to develop a single power system for the north-western part of the Soviet Union.

The research conducted by biochemists, agrochemists, biophysicists and microbiologists is also of great importance. Of especial prominence is the study of trace elements of copper, manganese, zinc, and molybdenum, which are nutritionally important to plants, animals and human beings because they stimulate the activity of enzymes, hormones and vitamins.

The Institute of Biology of the Latvian Academy of Sciences has been commissioned to co-ordinate research on these problems with all other institutes in the country working along the same lines.

Latvian scientists also plan to work on problems connected with the widescale application of trace elements in agriculture.

The Institute of Organic Synthesis will continue its study of the synthesis of drugs used in the treatment of high blood pressure, malignant tumours and cardiovascular diseases and drugs used to stimulate the growth of farm animals.

Within the next few years Latvian scholars will complete a two-volume grammar of modern literary Lettish, a dictionary in several volumes, a dialect atlas of the Lettish language, and a history cf Latvian literature in six volumes.

"Latvia—Our Dream is Coming True" was published by Soviet Booklets, London, England, in December, 1959,
as part of the series "THE FIFTEEN SOVIET SOCIALIST REPUBLICS OF TODAY AND TOMMORROW."
We do not endorse the Soviet account of historical events or their circumstances contained therein as factual.
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