February 5, 2015

Devastation of science in the Donbas

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On January 15, the Ukrainian Physical Society appealed to the European Physical Society, the American Physical Society and the Forum for International Physics that will be meeting in San Antonio, Texas, in March, to help Ukrainian physicists and physics-based institutions that were displaced from occupied territories of Donetsk and Luhansk.

These are the physics departments that have been displaced and require immediate assistance: Donetsk National University (now in Vinnytsia), Donetsk National Polytechnic University (now in Krasnoarmiysk), Luhansk National University (now in Starobilsk), East-Ukrainian National University (now in Siverskodonetsk), Donetsk Institute for Physics and Engineering (now in Kyiv), Donetsk Institute of Mining Physics (now in Dnipropetrovsk) and other minor facilities.

Naturally, it is not only the physics departments that have been disrupted and dismantled, but the entire educational establishment of the Donbas. In the January 2 issue of Science, the leading scientific periodical in the U.S., Richard Stone wrote that a key concentration of Ukraine’s scientific infrastructure was located in southeastern Ukraine, which hosted scores of universities and research facilities.

In recent weeks, about 1,500 scientists and professors and 100,000 students have fled rebel-held parts of the Luhansk and Donetsk regions in the Donbas. In autumn of 2014, the Ministry of Education and Science of Ukraine hurriedly began moving 11 universities out of rebel territory. Most relocated to other parts of the Donbas that Ukraine still controls, in some cases leaving the original campuses in the hands of separatists.

It’s hard for most of us to imagine the toll of war on families. We read of the millions of Syrian refugees and the millions displaced by the civil wars in the Congo, South Sudan, Libya and Iraq. We forget that our parents and grandparents spent a decade as war refugees, in 1939-1949, wandering around Ukraine and Europe, without a permanent home or a job. It was a lost decade for them and their children. Then, when they emigrated, they had to start all over again.

The same circumstances are unfolding in Donetsk and Luhansk, with hundreds of thousands of refugees resettling in unfamiliar parts of Ukraine, Russia and Europe and looking to restore some of the normalcy of their previous lives.

As of December 2014, the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees said that 490,000 Ukrainians have registered as internally displaced persons (IDPs) in Ukraine, while 430,000 have sought asylum or other forms of legal status in Russia.

Those scientists who fled Donetsk and Luhansk have many harrowing stories of their time under the control of separatists, and how they were able to smuggle out some small part of their life’s work. Vast collections of laboratory specimens, valuable laboratory experiments and experimental fieldwork had to be terminated and left behind. The universities and laboratories were taken over by those loyal to the separatists.

The situation is comparable to that of the Nazi occupation of Ukraine – many Ukrainian scientists and institutes that were vital to the Soviet war effort were evacuated to the Urals – but in the occupied Reichskommissariat of Ukraine, approximately three-quarters of the Ukrainian Academy of Sciences staff remained behind, and suffered greatly, along with the rest of the populace.

There is an effort under way in the U.S., led by Dr. George Gamota ([email protected]), a respected research physicist and former high-level Department of Defense scientist, to respond to the Ukrainian Physical Society’s appeal, and to mobilize a broad program of assistance through the various research agencies, departments and programs of the U.S. government. He is working closely with the Ukrainian Physical Society, which has established a task force to provide the assistance for the relocated physicists and physical facilities. For the further detailed information on how one can assist, contact the secretary of Ukrainian Physical Society Vladyslav Kravchenko ([email protected]).

Specifically, the Ukrainian Physical Society is looking for donations of textbooks, magazines and databases, both in hard copies and in electronic form, including free access to scientific periodicals; laboratory equipment; exchange programs for displaced students, post-docs and researchers; mutual research projects with displaced institutions/researchers; assistance in organizing lectures in relocated universities; and monetary donations for living expenses and accommodations for displaced researchers.

The American Physical Society (APS) has already pledged a significant amount of immediate material assistance, and will be working with Dr. Gamota to expand its efforts. That assistance will take the form of free APS membership to all Ukrainian scientists; free access to journals and related literature; organizing additional appeals at the Forum for International Physics; organizing access to valuable secondary school and college teaching materials for all branches of physics; and guest authoring columns and editorials for the bimonthly International News Column in APS News.

One of the most promising avenues is a collaboration with an existing program, called “Seeding Labs” (http://seedinglabs.org/ <http://seedinglabs.org/) which connects universities around the world with equipment that they might need. Their next “call for Applications” for equipment is scheduled for early 2015 (http://seedinglabs.org/equipment/how-to-receive/).

There are numerous other venues for U.S. technical and scientific assistance to Ukraine, in the form of various U.S. science agency grant programs (NASA, USAID, NOAA, EPA, NSF, etc.) and special programs such as the Civilian Research Defense Fund (CRDF), the Science and Technical Center of Ukraine (STCU) and the U.S.-Ukraine Science and Technical Bilateral Agreement, signed in 2007, under which many U.S. agencies can engage in research initiatives with their counterparts in Ukraine.

One such particularly fruitful engagement has been led by Dr. Ihor Bodnar of Argonne National Laboratory, located near Chicago. He has assisted numerous Ukrainian scientists and laboratories in a wide range of innovative biomedical research projects, providing advanced equipment, training opportunities and grants.

This past week, Dr. Gamota, Andriy Bihun and I visited several U.S. research funding entities in Washington, trying to galvanize assistance for the plight of Ukrainian scientists, especially in Donetsk, as a first step. CRDF is establishing a special separate fund to assist Ukrainian scientists. It will solicit private-sector donors, corporations, individuals and philanthropic organizations. Marilyn Pifer of CRDF ([email protected]) is organizing that effort.

Ms. Pifer also organized a panel, “Ukraine’s Scientific Future, International Cooperation and Science Diplomacy,” at the annual meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) that will be held in San Jose, Calif., on February 12-16. The keynote speaker on the panel will be Dr. Serhiy Kvit, Ukraine’s minister of education and science. The 2015 AAAS annual meeting is one of the largest and most prestigious of science conferences, and is expected to draw 8,000 attendees from 60 countries.

Minister Kvit will be addressing his education initiatives for Ukraine. These consist of long-overdue reforms of the science and education sectors. Ukraine’s new government has enacted legislation to give universities greater autonomy and strengthen university research. Planned legislation to reform the science sector is likely to greatly increase merit-based distribution of research funding and strengthen ties between universities and research institutes. Special attention to the potential role of international research and funding partners will highlight the value of science diplomacy and international collaboration to revitalize Ukrainian science.

Ukraine is in desperate straits on many different fronts – a faltering economy and devalued hryvnia, a feeble national defense system and a dilapidated social welfare safety net. The needs and appeals for aid escalate weekly. Each reader of The Ukrainian Weekly contributes to supporting Ukraine in his/her own way. Our diasporan scientific establishment is gearing up because Ukraine’s science and technology sectors are the essential leading edge to Ukraine’s future prosperity. We cannot ignore their plight.

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