TO RUSSIA WITH LOVE: A SCIENCE WRITER VENTURES FORTH

by Chad Boutin

It reminded me of Canada. Evergreen forests encroaching upon fields, the slant of light peculiar to Northern latitudes where summer is brief. But I was half a world away, in the Ural Mountains, nursing a jet-lag headache during a bus ride down a well-kept two-lane highway, en route to the riverside camp that would be our home for the next three weeks. A place where I would attempt to teach Russias best young researchers about a foreign concept: science writing.

A) Alexei Moshchevikin, a doctoral student at Petrozavodsk State University, delivers his research at the final conference. B) Chad Boutin leads a discussion with Russian graduate students, and, C) for purely linguistic purposes, leads the group through the finer points of Jimmy Buffetts lyrics.

Id only been at it myself for a few years, but I figured I wasnt the worst envoy for such a mission; after all, I had lived in Russia for several months and had meandered back toward the sciences after I discovered my long flirtation with the Russian language would ultimately not lead to marriage. As Russian scientists were facing equally dismal prospects for employment in their own chosen profession, I was curious about what would tempt them toward a life of academic hardship. Besides, I missed Georgian wine.

So, after a six-year hiatus, I again donned my ESL-teacher hat and took a summer job with the Civilian Research and Development Foundation (www.crdf.org), a nonprofit organization that promotes scientific and technical collaboration between the United States and countries of the former Soviet Union. This would be the second year for the camp, but the first to include a science communicator among its nine-member teaching staff.

Russia presents opportunities for wide-eyed culture shock on a daily basisits one of the reasons I keep going backand in this I was not disappointed. I tried to find out what had happened to the Russian science establishment, the one that had orbited Sputnik and Gagarin. Sure, the money may be gone, but departments continue on shoestring budgets and prepare students from their early years to participate in international conferences. That means learning enough English to make presentations to other scientists. It does not, however, mean that they are all ready to speak outside their technical vocabularies for the benefit of journalists, as I found when I introduced myself.

Hi, my names Chad, and back in the States, I write about science for the public. Does anyone do that in Russia? Polite silence.

The idea of communicating research to nonscientists sounded like the foreign idea it was to my students, primarily well-educated twentysomethings who had only vague memories of what life under communism meant. While the differences in their socioeconomic backgrounds were dramaticsome arrived with laptop computers and video cameras, others with only a gym bag full of threadbare clothesall had clearly adjusted to the realities of the new economy. (A lesson I gave on advertising techniques, intended to provide illustrations of how and how not to communicate news, proved unnecessarytheir savvy perceptions and offhand disdain of marketing tactics would have sent an advertising executive scampering.) Few, however, had read more than a handful of journalistic pieces on science, and none knew of a single reporter who was dedicated full-time to covering it.

Everyone respects the achievements of Russian scientists both during and before the Soviet period, said Evgenii Pokanevich, a graduate student in chemistry at the Far Eastern State University (DVGU) in Vladivostok. But while it was accepted that they were expanding our knowledge of the cosmos, their work was of course kept secret. Combine that with their focus on fundamental research rather than practical applications, and you can see why there is not much of a history of scientists talking to journalists.

That attitude continues today, though perhaps simply out of the pasts inertia. Many students agreed that the more idealistic students were attracted to research during the Soviet period, and that consequently older Russian scientists are the sort who still believe pure research is the scientists true métier, not the stuff that they might imagine in sensationalist headlines, all too common in Russia.

That is not to say we dont respect pure research or desire to do it ourselves, but economic realities are staring us in the face, said Evgenii. We have to approach work differently if we are going to do our jobs and not starve.

Russia presents opportunities for wide-eyed culture shock on a daily basis&

A scientist might earn the equivalent of about $50 per month in Russia, where one needs about $100-$150 to live. In school, it is even more difficult; many of the students I spoke with held down second (or third) jobs while in school to augment their meager stipends. One gave tennis lessons to wealthy New Russians; another sold cell phones. Evgenii told me that it was possible to earn enough as a scientist, but that it usually involved doing something outside the lab. Currently working in tech transfer, he has little time for research.

Without the strong government support that labs enjoyed during the Soviet period, we need other financial resources, Evgenii said. Private companies here might be willing to support us, but they need to know how our work will directly translate into profit. So we have to concentrate on applied research rather than fundamental science if we want to continue at all.

It became clear from other conversations that a dozen years of social upheaval had begun to attract a different sort of Russian to science than during the Soviet period, or perhaps it would be better to say that the environment encouraged different attitudes within young scientists than it once had. Another DVGU student described it in mixed terms.

Short Lecture Challenges Nobel Laureates STOCKHOLM, SwedenIt took them decades of hard work to win the Nobel Prize. Explaining their research in less than an hour was nearly as difficult. I wrote 10 books, said Vitaly L. Ginzburg, of Russia, after his Nobel lecture at Stockholm University. So for me to present everything in 45 minutes is very difficult. By tradition, the Nobel Prize winners must present their work to students in the Swedish capital before the Dec. 10 award ceremony. Hundreds of students packed the universitys Aula Magna auditorium, hoping to catch a glimpse of the work behind the most prestigious awards in science. I didnt get that much out of it. These things are too difficult, said Lukas Magnusson, a 21-year-old physics student. He said it was still worth going to the physics lecture just to see the laureatesGinzburg, Anthony J. Leggett of Great Britain, and Russian-American Alexei A. Abrikosov. Magnusson called them silent heroes, who might be known within their field but not to the general public. The Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences cited Abrikosov and Ginzburg for their theories about superconductivity, the ability of some materials to conduct electricity without resistance. Leggett was honored for explaining one kind of superfluity, a peculiar behavior shown by extremely cold liquid helium. He said he found it difficult to fit in all his slides, which included explanations of spontaneous broken spin-orbit symmetry and ferromagnetic analogies. It was perhaps a little more stressful than usual, he said at the news conference after the lecture. It obviously is very special and I tried to discipline myself in a way that I would not necessarily need to do on other occasions. Leggett will have to discipline himself even more on Wednesday, when hes been selected to deliver a two-minute speech at the Nobel banquet. Copyright © 2003, The Associated Press

The older generation is often so beaten down by the realities of life that they have little energy left, or they are not capable of changing with the times, said Alisa Semina, who studies genetics. Some, of course, have boundless energy, and those are the ones we gravitate towards. Most of my friends are excited about the change in emphasiswe really want to find knowledge that can help improve our lives directly, so applied research sounds like the best direction for us to go in, and talking about it to the press might help match research with funding sources.

After the course was over, I felt it had been as much a learning as a teaching experience, and healthy for all of us. Most of the students found it interesting to hear about their classmates research in terms they could easily understand. Several lessons were devoted to analyzing journalistic (as opposed to scientific) writing style, and then constructing a news release around its principles. After warming up to the idea, many were interested in writing press releases on their own departments research to send to newspapers, though a few were reluctant to give up their mentors attitudes about simplifying their work for nonspecialist audiences. Once I witnessed a lively debate about whether it was better to pursue pure research quietly or sell out by advertising their work to the marketeers. (The Russian penchant for philosophizing is not exaggerated, but is a topic for another article.)

What idealism does remain is more in the name of maintaining science itself. Science is still considered to be a worthy cause, something that could make their chaotic world better.

Everyone I work with wants Russian scientists to be as strong and productive as they were 20 years ago, Evgenii said. Russia remains a very traditional country, and science has become one of our traditions, something we are proud of. Thats one of the many reasons we work as hard as we dowe dont want to give up the ship.

Chad Boutin covers physical sciences, pharmacy, and veterinary medicine at Purdue University.