By Alexander Yanshin,
Vice-President of the USSR Academy of Sciences,
Chairman of the Commission on Academician

   Vernadsky's Scientific Legacy

On March 12, 1988, the world scientific community will mark the 125th anniversary of the birth of Vladimir Vernadsky. More than 40 years have passed since this outstanding naturalist passed away, but his ideas, as vital today as in his lifetime, have been a source of inspiration for several generations of scientists. He is often called the Lomonosov of the 20th century on account of his profound contribution to geochemistry, cosmochemistry, biogeo-chemistry, genetic mineralogy, crystallography, soil science, hydrochemistry and meteoritics. His research broadened our knowledge about the biosphere. It was Vernadsky who predicted its inevitable transformation into the noösphere under the influence of scientific development and collective human activities. His ideas about evolution have lost none of their practical value to this very day. As a result, he is even closer to us than to his contemporaries who failed to appreciate the significance of his biospheric concept and many other ideas. His analysis of atomic power prospects bears out his phenomenal far-sightedness. The phenomenon of radioactivity was discovered at the turn of the century. Ten years later, in December 1910, Vernadsky made a report at the General Assembly of the Russian Academy of Sciences, in which he predicted that in a short while man would learn to control the disintegration rate which would give him an unprecedented source of power. Few people agreed with him then. He returned to the subject in 1922 and asked if mankind was ready for the inevitable and early advent of atomic energy and whether it will use this energy for its own good or for self-destruction.

He died on January 6, 1945, a few months before A-bombs hit Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Being a scientist, it was not difficult for him to grasp the true scope of the danger endemic to atomic weapons. But he believed in common sense and, therefore, not only predicted the early advent of the nuclear age, but even contributed to this. In 1911, he asked for an expedition to be organized to prospect for radioactive ores. In 1922, he founded Russia's first State Radium Institute. Under his direction, the Institute got itself involved in radium prospecting and comprehensive study of the phenomenon of radioactivity. Vernadsky deserves a great deal of credit for the construction and startup of the first Soviet cyclotron at the Institute in 1937. In 1939, when the Nazi threat became more ominous, Vernadsky and some other scientists appealed to the Presidium of the Soviet Academy of Sciences for the intensification of research into the atomic nucleus. As a result, several special laboratories under the general direction of Academician A. Ioffe were set up at the Academy's Physical Engineering Institute in Leningrad. One of the laboratories had on its staff Igor Kurchatov who drove the research effort to its practical form. But it is obvious that without Vernadsky's groundwork there would have been no Soviet A-bomb in 1946, the bomb that has cooled off the aggressive zeal of certain imperialist forces.

Although Vernadsky's name is associated with many important scientific breakthroughs, his most important discoveries have been made in the field of biospheric studies. "Biosphere" is a much-used word today. A special scientific council was set up at the Presidium of the Soviet Academy of Sciences in 1973 to handle all problems associated with the biosphere. [Academician Guri Marchuk, President of the Soviet Academy of Sciences, directs an academic program for ecological and biospheric studies.]  But it should not be forgotten that the very name "biosphere" was introduced by Vernadsky who, in 1926, published a monumental research paper under this name.  Some other works by Academician Vernadsky, published after his death, are also devoted to biospheric studies.

According to Vernadsky, the biosphere is the envelop of the planet, which sustains all life on Earth and is composed of the hydrosphere, lithosphere and lower atmosphere. He scrupulously calculated the mass of all living matter on the planet and how this figure had been changing in connection with vegetation spreading throughout the globe, the amount of solar energy consumed by vegetation and the amount wasted. He learned just how this vegetation utilized this energy to convert carbon dioxide, water and mineral salts into primary organic compounds from which rock and brown coal, combustible shale, oil and gas all originated. He analyzed in detail the effect of living matter on rock and mineral, how much they weather under its impact, and on the basis of these data built a theory of the evolution of the biosphere and its stages.

In his early research papers, dated to the end of the past century, he showed how the geological and geographic environments changed under the impact of anthropogenic activities. His conclusion was that human activities have a much stronger impact on nature than the heaviest natural process. Man's thoughtless actions, he warned, violate equilibriums that have developed in nature over millennia. The truth of his analysis is borne out by the aggravation of the ecological situation on the planet. But the Academician was convinced that science and intelligence combined would find the means to save the global biosphere and to guide its evolution in the desired direction. As a result, he argued, the biosphere will pass on to a qualitatively new stage of its development, which he conventionally called the noösphere (Gk. noös -- mind). His theories now underlie nature conservation measures in the USSR and the world over.

APN