Yekaterinburg. February 11. INTERFAX - Institutes of the Russian Academy of Sciences (RAS) are preparing proposals to Roscosmos to organize a program for sending professional scientists to the International Space Station, RAS President Alexander Sergeev said in Yekaterinburg on Friday.
"There was a joint proposal, together with the head of Roscosmos, to think about sending there (to the ISS, "IF") scientists - not professional cosmonauts who are trained in some skills of working with instruments, namely: professional scientists who could effectively conduct experiments there. Now several of our institutes are formulating their proposals to Roscosmos in order to somehow organize this program," he told reporters.
Sergeyev stressed that the proposals will be submitted to the Roscosmos Council. "Roscosmos has its own Council, which decides exactly how to carry out this launch, how to organize an expedition," he said.
When asked by Interfax about the possible timing of the appearance of the lists or sending scientists to the ISS, Sergeev said that he would "not be in a hurry now."
"It is clear that there are some issues with the ISS, issues of the duration of existence. But I would really like such expeditions to take place before the regular completion time (of the space station, - "IF")," the President of the Russian Academy of Sciences said.
He explained that in the module "Science", docked to the ISS, there is a large space in which you can "perform a lot of different experiments." In particular, in the field of fine physics, for which it is important to have the possibility of conducting experiments in zero gravity to study the fundamental laws of nature.
On February 1, NASA announced plans to flood the ISS in January 2031. Meanwhile, the press service of the rocket and space corporation Energia informed Interfax on February 3 that the date of completion of the ISS operation and the flooding of the station will be determined by the governments of the participating countries of the project.
The issue of training a research cosmonaut from the Russian Academy of Sciences for a flight to the ISS was considered at a meeting of the Space Council of the Russian Academy of Sciences on November 11, 2021. The head of Roscosmos, Dmitry Rogozin, asked for help from the Russian Academy of Sciences in conducting a number of biological experiments.