Every October, the Space Research Institute of the Russian Academy of Sciences hosts Space Science Days in memory of the launch of the first artificial satellite on October 4, 1957. This year they will be held on October 2 and 4 and will be dedicated to the 60th anniversary of the institute. Anatoly Petrukovich, Director of the Institute, Academician of the Russian Academy of Sciences, spoke about the priority areas of research, the role of the IKI in the new national space project and extensive plans in an interview with TASS.
— Anatoly Alekseevich, thank you so much for agreeing to talk with us. The Institute is celebrating its 60th anniversary this year. How is such an important date celebrated within the walls of this institution?
— As it should be, before the big holiday they "clean the feathers", sum up the results, make plans.
The 60th anniversary of our institute coincided with the approval of the national space project. It is ambitious both in terms of the number of satellites that are planned to be launched and in terms of funding, both in terms of fundamental space research and in terms of applied work, in which our institute is also involved.
Therefore, on the eve of this round date, we are not only remembering previous successes, but also working on the implementation of a new national project.
— What are the priority projects for IKI today?
— I remember a quote from the classics — "there is no second-freshness sturgeon." In the same spirit, there is no non-priority science. There are a huge number of objects and phenomena that would be interesting to study, but there is obviously not enough time, people, or finances to study everything. Therefore, by definition, everything that falls into the plans has already passed a very strict selection process, and it is probably incorrect to say that this project is "half a centimeter" higher than the other.
Nevertheless, flagship areas have been identified in space science, and they are almost completely included in the new national project. These are the exploration of the Earth, the exploration of the Sun, near-Earth space, the exploration of Venus, the exploration of the Moon, and astrophysical missions. And in order to implement these projects, even in a few years, it is necessary to deploy the work now.
Of course, what is working in orbit now is also a priority at the institute, because it is these devices that provide relevant scientific data. These are instruments on foreign spacecraft from Mars to Mercury, the Spektr-RG observatory, which turned six this year, four Ionosphere-M satellites launched last year and this year, as well as experiments on the International Space Station, two of which were delivered to orbit last year..
We are working quite extensively in the field of remote sensing of the Earth — we are involved in the creation of equipment for Russian devices: Arctic-M, Electro-L and others, and we are also engaged in the analysis of remote sensing data of the Earth. On board the Meteora-M hydrometeorological devices, in particular, multi-zone Earth survey complexes of our production, as well as star sensors created in the walls of the ICI, are installed.
Now I would like to note the work of the Carbon-E system, created in the ICI to monitor the carbon balance in the country's ecosystems, primarily forest ecosystems. Its data is necessary for the formation of the Russian Federation's reporting under the Paris Agreement on Combating Climate Change. Last year, for example, there was a serious gap between the actual amount of carbon that our forests absorb and the internationally declared figure. Our data helped to correct this inaccuracy.
Carbon-E operates on the basis of the infrastructure of the IKI-Monitoring Collective Use Center. It was established in 2012, and today it is one of the largest online archives of satellite sensing data in the Russian Federation.
— Which vehicles are planned to be launched as part of the federal Space Science project?
— All the proposals of the scientific community — a variety of ideas not only from IKI, but also from other scientific organizations — were carefully selected by the Academy of Sciences and the RAS Space Council, and as a result, the academy submitted an application to the national project. The application was approved in full, but, of course, not all of our original desires were included in the application.
If we start with near-Earth science, the national project includes the launch of the Bion-M satellite No. 3 in 2030, which is the responsibility of the Institute of Biomedical Problems, two launches for the Resonance research project to study the dynamics of the Earth's magnetic field, and the launch of the Arka project to study the Solar corona for the RAS Institute of Physics. There is a project called "Nucleon" on cosmic ray research, and Moscow University is responsible for it.
There is a large lunar program of six launches of automatic vehicles that will explore the Moon and lay the foundation for a Russian lunar base in the circumpolar region. There is also the Venus-D project, with a launch around 2035, which, like the lunar program, is led by IKI. In the new year, we will begin the preliminary design of the Venera-D and Luna-28.
Of the astrophysical projects, there is Spektr-UV, which is led by the Institute of Astronomy of the Russian Academy of Sciences, but we are very involved in terms of onboard equipment, and we plan to launch it in 2031. I would also like to highlight the Spektr-RGN ICI project, the successor of Spektr-RG. The letter "H" stands for "navigation", as the goal of the project is to learn how to use X—ray sources for autonomous navigation of spacecraft.
As a continuation of the Radioastron project, also known as the Spektr-R spacecraft, it is planned to implement the Millimetron project with the Spektr-M spacecraft at the request of the Physics Institute. Radio interferometry will be performed in the shorter millimeter wavelength range, which is more informative.
— Which vehicle will fly first?
— The Luna-26 orbital. Its launch is scheduled for 2028. In addition to scientific tasks, it will provide backup communications for the two Luna-27 landers, which will fly in 2029-2030, and possibly specify their landing site.
— How will IKI cooperate with the new RAS Space Directorate?
— The new management will work in the interests of the thematic customer, which is the Russian Academy of Sciences for scientific space projects, and therefore scientific institutes. Management will, on the one hand, control us as a performer, and on the other, receive information from us about tasks and experimental results. The interaction will be working, not administrative.
— Is the institute engaged in the creation of target equipment for the Russian space Station?
— If we talk about scientific experiments, a list of applications is being compiled. This is a rather lengthy procedure. If we talk about the equipment in general, we are involved in the creation of navigation systems for the new station and for the new generation ship.
If the station eventually operates in a high-latitude orbit, then we are very interested in observing the Earth, in particular observing the aurora borealis. Of course, satellites are already flying in such an orbit, but the station's orbit is significantly lower than that of such devices, so the observations are more detailed.
— Speaking of the inclination of the ROS orbit, at what stage is the solution to this issue now?
— The Roscosmos state Corporation is currently reviewing it. It should be noted here that there are enough technical and organizational issues, since the development of the ROS is taking place simultaneously with the extension of the ISS. We receive new information, we detail what we have, and therefore our views on something change, and this should not frighten. The main thing is that it all leads to success.
— Recently, there has been more and more news about solar activity in the information field. Has our luminary really become more active?
— We are witnessing a kind of artifact of the short memory of our social consciousness. The solar cycle itself, as we know it, usually lasts 11 years, of which plus or minus 7 years falls during the period of solar maximum, when there are many spots and flares on the Sun, and magnetic storms on Earth. Then — a few years of peace. Therefore, when a new solar maximum comes, everyone has time to forget about what happened during the previous one.
As a researcher, if we talk about extreme events, I would rather remember the events of 30 or 40 years ago than the events of the current cycle. Nothing unusual is happening in the Sun right now — if anything, the cycle is now below average in intensity. But when certain events occur that we don't fully understand— not because it can't be, but simply because the Sun is very complex—we enthusiastically talk about it.
— To some extent, the current excitement about solar activity can be explained by the surge in popularity of social media as sources of information?
— I think so. If 20 years ago such things were not always even talked about on TV, today there are a large number of online media, channels in messengers.
— In just a couple of months, the Spektr-RG observatory will reach its planned active life. What is the current state of the device?
— When we talk about the period of active existence, we must understand that this is a standard period prescribed in the documents. We estimate the probability and survival rate and get such a figure, but it has no direct relation to the actual life of the device. For example, fuel consumption for maneuvers may affect it — in this regard, Spektr-RG is provided with many, many more years of work. The condition of the equipment on board is also quite good — we are optimistic that he will live for a long time.
— What is he working on now?
— Now the device operates in two modes — it conducts surveys of the sky, and if it suddenly finds interesting objects, it stops the survey and focuses on the object. Also, if we receive "telegrams", that is, operational messages from the astronomical community about interesting phenomena in the celestial sphere, then we also aim at this area and look carefully.
The main product of Spektra-RG's work is sky surveys. Surveys allow you to create catalogs of objects, and new catalogs are ten times more sensitive than those created 30 years ago.
Therefore, what we are doing now will be in demand in the global community for several decades to come. Our data is useful because now almost all discoveries in astronomy are made at the junction of different observations — you need data from the visible range that we understand best, conditional "Hubble images", X-ray observations, radio data, combine and get new information.
— You mentioned the promising Spektr-RGN telescope. Can you tell us how the work is going on it?
— We are starting the preliminary design of a new telescope soon. We need to outline the contours of the project, justify prices, properties, and feasibility. All this will start in 2026 — in fact, even a month earlier, from the end of 2025.
— Besides the Moon and Venus, are we currently planning any new planetary studies?
— We have instruments working on the satellites of the Moon, Mars and Mercury. A document on participation in the Chinese lunar mission Chang'e-7 has also been signed, and our device is already in China. In addition, Russia's participation in subsequent Chinese and Indian projects to study the Moon, Venus and Mars is currently being discussed. When the agreements are signed, it will be possible to inform.
There is pure international cooperation here, because no country, even with such a space program and such finances as the United States or China, can implement all projects equally well. The exchange of devices and joint projects is an important element of diversification. Yes, we have chosen the Moon and Venus as priorities, but through this collaboration we are involved in research on a very wide range of issues. In this sense, it is good for everyone, both for us and for our colleagues from abroad.
— In the last few years, there have been more and more plans to launch missions to asteroids — individual vehicles are already flying. Are there any such plans on our part?
— Unfortunately, this has remained "under the line". Such projects were proposed, but against the background of the Moon, Venus and all other projects, they were not included in the main program. Nevertheless, we are actively studying the theoretical side of the issue so that if the situation changes in any way, we can be prepared for it.
There are two main topics on asteroids. The first is the search for potentially dangerous near—Earth asteroids, and the second is the question of what to do with them when one is found sooner or later. We are learning how to control the movement of asteroids. There are beautiful theories on deflecting massive asteroids with small ones, like in billiards. This science is well developed in IKI, and it arouses great interest among colleagues. Let's see if there will be projects already in international cooperation.
— With such extensive plans, does the institute have the strength to complete everything on time?
— Indeed, it is not enough to just come up with an experiment and then wait for the results. It is often necessary to make a unique device that no one has ever made before, and even so that it can withstand a rocket launch and then many years of work in space. For example, today some of our instruments have been operating in orbit for more than 20 years. To solve these problems, IKI was created not only as a scientific institute, but also as a "full-cycle" space enterprise, albeit not the largest.
Special units develop instruments commissioned by science, manufacture them, test them, and organize in-flight control. We do some of the work at the Moscow site, and our branch, the design bureau, operates in Tarusa, Kaluga Region. In addition to scientific equipment, the institute also produces a large number of service equipment for spacecraft. So the question of readiness for the implementation of the national project is not an idle one.
In recent years, our supplies have been constantly growing, the equipment has been updated, and we are ready to meet new challenges. Since the institute was originally built for the extensive Soviet space program, the new volumes should actually bring us to an optimal operating mode.
