Presidential grants stimulate the growth of scientific schools

Nip it in the budNadezhda Volchkova, "Search"

Young Russian scientists applying for grants from the President of the Russian Federation in 2009 will have to undergo a serious selection: candidates of sciences have on average more than seven declared projects per grant, doctors have almost six. This year, a record number of applications have been submitted for the competition. These data were presented at the recently held first meeting of the updated Council on grants of the President of the Russian Federation for young Russian scientists and leading scientific schools.

According to the current regulation, every four years the composition of the council must change by at least a third, and the chairman and his deputies cannot hold their positions for more than two consecutive terms. After another rotation, the Grant Council was headed by Academician Igor Fedorov, Rector of Bauman Moscow State Technical University, who replaced Andrey Gaponov-Grekhov, Director of the Institute of Applied Physics of the Russian Academy of Sciences. Introducing the new members of the Council, Deputy Minister of Education and Science Alexander Khlunov expressed gratitude to the previous composition. He addressed separate words of gratitude to Academician A.Gaponov-Grekhov, who, according to the Deputy Minister, "from the first steps participated in building the current system of support for young scientists and leading scientific schools."

The decree of the Government of the Russian Federation on the new Grant Council has completed the documentation of innovations in this area, which this year turned out to be rich in. Mostly it was a change for the better. Recall that the amount of grants from the President of the Russian Federation for young scientists has increased fourfold. Now the young candidates of sciences who won the competition will receive 600 thousand rubles within two years, and doctors of sciences – one million rubles. However, the number of grants allocated has been reduced from 500 to 400 for candidates and from 100 to 60 for doctors of sciences. Another innovation: in order to carry out work on the grant, their recipients will, in fact, have to form a small scientific group. The candidate must involve at least one young scientist, student or graduate student in research "in priority areas of science, technology and engineering", and the doctor – at least three co-executors. "We very much hope that the teams formed during the implementation of these programs will become the embryos of new scientific schools," said Alexander Klimenko, Deputy head of the Federal Agency for Science and Innovation, who is also deputy chairman of the grant Council.

Which scientific schools will be born in 2009 will have to be decided by the new council, and in the shortest possible time. The process of registration of the listed innovations by decisions of the highest authorities has already postponed the timing of the competitive procedures. Usually competitions for presidential grants for young scientists are held at the beginning of the year, but today they have moved to the second half.

The Council has already approved the candidacies of the chairmen of expert commissions, who literally within a week should form groups of experts in their fields of sciences. By mid-September, the decisions of the expert commissions on the winners of the 2009 contests will be submitted for approval by the Grants Council. "If we maintain this busy schedule, taking into account the deadlines required for the publication of the results of the competition and the conclusion of agreements with grantees, we will be able to ensure the receipt of funds in October," Klimenko said. – There is little time left to complete the work, but from next year the competition will enter the regular mode."

The meeting also discussed the second direction of the work of the Council for Grants of the President of the Russian Federation – the support of leading scientific schools (VNSH). A.Khlunov stated that, despite the small amount of funds allocated for this, it is unproductive to abandon this form of stimulating the activity of scientists in a time of crisis. He noted that the status of a leading scientific school is highly valued in the scientific community, and called on scientific foundations and the Russian Academy of Sciences during their competitions, all other things being equal, to give preference to applications from the VNSH. At the same time, according to the deputy minister, even the most outstanding schools should not be awarded the title of winner for life, otherwise it will be difficult for new directions to make their way.

Portal "Eternal youth" http://vechnayamolodost.ru02.09.2009