MSU Interfacult Project: Human Institute
Vsevolod TKACHUK: "To study a person, it is necessary to unite the efforts of all scientists"Many experts associate the current economic crisis with a change in the technological structure of society, as it happened during the development of large-scale machine production or microelectronics.
What will become the basis of the next way of life is definitely difficult to say yet. But there are suggestions that it will be a synthesis of technologies for the study of man, – new areas of medicine, biology, etc. Supporting this direction,
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Vsevolod Tkachuk, Dean of the Faculty of Fundamental Medicine of Lomonosov Moscow State University, Academician of the Russian Academy of Sciences and the Russian Academy of Medical Sciences, Deputy Chairman of the Scientific Council of the Institute of Man
Vsevolod Arsenyevich, tell us about the initiative to create a Human Institute at Moscow State University.– This idea belongs to the rector of the university.
And from my point of view, it is very correct, caused by the understanding that the issues of the quality of human life, his health, the prospects for the development of society, and so on – are not solved by just one scientific discipline or some branch of science. All these problems require a comprehensive approach. Therefore, it was decided to combine the efforts of all faculties and institutes of Moscow State University, which are directly or indirectly engaged in the study of man. There are issues related to human health that are solved by doctors. In turn, chemists develop new methods for assessing the quality of water, air, diagnosis of diseases, etc. Physicists create devices, many of which are also directly related to human activity, to his health, to his life. Psychologists are engaged in human mental health, social psychology. The problem is that all these specialists work in their own narrow field and do not know what their colleagues are doing. This system needs to be changed.
Was the Human Institute created as a structural subdivision of the university?– No, the institutions that are being created with their accounting departments, offices, staffs, buildings and so on are already enough in Russia and in the world.
We have more of a virtual education, an intellectual club. While it has not yet fully earned, organizational issues are being resolved.
The significance of the Human Institution can be illustrated by the following example. In Japan, from the middle to the end of the twentieth century, the life expectancy of the population has increased by 20 years and is now 82.5 years (for comparison, in Russia – 60 years for men and 70 for women). Due to what it was possible to achieve such a result? A special study was conducted in Japan – this is a complex, but solvable problem, in which doctors, statisticians, mathematicians and other scientists who studied hundreds of thousands of people participated. It turned out that out of these 20 added years, 10 years were contributed by clean ecology (a special policy was implemented to protect the environment), 6 years were given success in medicine, 3 years – by getting rid of bad habits, and another year was added by universal higher education. It turned out that people with higher education live a year longer than people without higher education.
Have you already identified the priority areas of the Institute's work?– Priority areas are still being discussed.
One of the approved ones is the study of genetic defects fixed in the Russian population. We are constantly under the influence of cosmic radiation, carcinogens, all kinds of chemicals, toxic poisons, etc. As a result, genetic defects accumulate in the population, which are transmitted from generation to generation. Different ethnic groups have different degrees of certain genetic modifications. Many of them appeared as adaptive – during periods of some kind of human evolution. For example, people died in places where there was no salt (from lack of it), and then they had those genetic changes that contribute to the retention of salt in the body. And now, when salt has appeared on everyone's table, people with such genetic characteristics get hypertension, because salt is poorly excreted. You need to know this background. The Americans studied their population and found out with what defects the development of certain diseases is possible, what recommendations are possible with such genetic defects in terms of physical activity, nutrition, and residence. No such comprehensive studies have been conducted in Russia. It is quite possible to accomplish this task by the forces of Moscow University. And Viktor Antonovich has already appealed to the government, received financial support for conducting post-genomic studies of the Russian population.
Has this project already started?- Yes.
Three new laboratories have been created at the Medical and Chemical Faculties, as well as at the Institute of Mathematical Problems of Complex Systems. In these studies, it is necessary to use a super-calculator to identify, based on the analysis of thousands of genes, those genetic changes that will allow predicting the development of a particular disease in a given person or in a certain population of people.
The project is designed for three years. It is also connected with the analysis of the ethnos, so anthropologists and historians will participate in it. This genetic analysis will allow us to determine, in particular, which peoples appeared on this territory and when, which peoples came from where.
This is one of the projects. There will be more of them in the future. Faculties will unite in working on problems related to all pressing human problems – health, ethics, creativity, etc.
In the Renaissance, man was the measure of everything. Now there are philosophical currents that say that not man is the main one on Earth, but all species have the same right to survive, and let the strongest win. It is claimed that bacteria and humans have the same rights to life. There are serious disputes, for example, about experiments on animals. The "greens" and students, besotted with this philosophy, go to release rats, rabbits, mice from vivariums, not realizing that laboratory animals born in captivity and fed in captivity are doomed to die in freedom.
These are indispensable issues that, I think, can also find a place in the activities of the Human Institute.
Marina Muravyeva was talking, STRF.ruPortal "Eternal youth" www.vechnayamolodost.ru