Professor Severinov: "Half of the mega-grants are won by scientists living in the West"

In an interview with Novye Izvestia, the scientist says that half of the grants were received by representatives of the Russian scientific diaspora.

Yelena Ivanova, Natalia Seibil

- Are scientists really sent to Russia en masse?

- I think it is very important to define the terms. What does "massively" mean? In the cartoon about a monkey and a parrot, the monkey thought that "a bunch" is when there are more than three. When Arkady (Dvorkovich) speaks "in large numbers", he does not speak about specific numbers and generally appeals to what is happening at Skoltech. But firstly, Skoltech is a special case, and secondly, the number of applications for professorships from foreigners from the first world countries and from representatives of the scientific diaspora, compared to the early days of close interaction with MIT, has greatly decreased.

There is a fairly successful mega-grant program. It has been operating for almost ten years and every year it allows several dozen major scientists to organize laboratories and maintain these laboratories for three to five years, sometimes being present in Russia for no more than four months a year. About half of the winners of the megagrant competition are representatives of the Russian scientific diaspora. Some laboratories continue to exist after the end of support for the mega-grant. There are a dozen mirror laboratories, when the head simultaneously manages a laboratory abroad and in Russia, usually spending most of the time abroad. In addition to these examples, in my opinion, there is no question of any serious return. At least in my field - life sciences.

- Why?

- The reason here is not so much political problems, but the fact that the conditions for engaging in science in Russia today are not competitive in comparison with what Europe, America, China and Japan can offer. We are talking not only and not so much about salaries, but namely that there are no conditions for creativity (science is a creative occupation) and competition on an equal footing with leading laboratories abroad in Russia. Here, both senseless bureaucracy, and poor administration, and the inability to receive the necessary reagents and materials on time, but what can I say, even sending a biological sample abroad (or receiving such a package from abroad) turns into a whole event, and modern science is very highly dependent on the ability to quickly and frequently exchange materials with colleagues.

- Who is returning to Russia?

- A person who has the opportunity of a successful career in the West is likely to go to Russia, especially when it comes to full return, in the most exceptional cases, or his / her choice will be dictated by personal rather than professional considerations, i.e., will be irrational from the point of view of a scientific career. On the other hand, short-term return / shift work can help improve the financial situation and gain access to local workforce.

- Do many university graduates planning to pursue science try to find work abroad?

- In my field, most university graduates who want to do science try to enter Western postgraduate studies right away, and not defend their dissertations in Russia. For all the problems of the Russian education system, several universities (Moscow, Novosibirsk, St. Petersburg, Phystech, to a lesser extent Nizhny Novgorod) traditionally provide a decent education at the bachelor's level. Everything that is higher - magistracy, graduate school - is very sad with rare exceptions. A guy or a girl who is thinking about a successful and interesting scientific career, upon receiving a "bachelor" or "specialist" in one of these universities, will most likely try to enroll in graduate school in the West, thus integrating into international science as soon as possible and a normal, understandable , transparent career ladder. A person who decided to graduate from graduate school here shoots himself in the foot, because from the point of view of scientific performance, and this is important for future career growth, four years spent in Russia are not equal to four years spent in America, Germany or anywhere else. still. That is, in general, admission to the Russian postgraduate study for a scientific career is not the most profitable decision, if it is not some specific case of working with a strong scientific leader, well integrated into the world scientific community, which of course exists here. Or, if we are talking about one of the few new modern postgraduate programs of the Skoltech type, an integral part of which is academic exchange with the best universities in the world.

Read about the problem of brain drain in the analyst of Novye Izvestia "Rumors of a massive return of Russian scientists turned out to be exaggerated".