Translation. Region: Russian Federal
Source: State University Higher School of Economics – State University Higher School of Economics –
© TASS
More than 10,000 scientific projects were supported by the Russian Science Foundation (RSF) in 2024. One of the recipients of the foundation’s grants is a scientist from Iran, HSE Associate Professor Ahmad Ostovari Moghaddam. Thanks to the support of the RSF and HSE, he decided to stay in Russia for a long time.
A conference was held at TASS to sum up the results of the RSF’s work last year. In his greeting, RSF Director General Vladimir Bespalov recalled that the foundation carried out its activities in accordance with the presidential decree, which defined the strategic directions for the foundation’s development until 2030. The RSF development program includes activities in four priority areas: support for scientific research and the development of research teams that occupy leading positions in certain areas of science; support for projects to develop promising and priority science-intensive technologies in order to solve problems associated with major challenges for society, the state and science; support for young scientists and popularization of the achievements of Russian science.
In 2024, the funding volume for 10 thousand projects implemented with the support of the Russian Science Foundation amounted to 39.2 billion rubles, 60 thousand performers from more than 800 organizations in 81 regions of the Russian Federation worked on them, including from the Donetsk People’s Republic and the Zaporizhia region. Based on the results of research supported by the Russian Science Foundation, more than 45 thousand reporting publications were published. A significant part of them were published in leading peer-reviewed Russian and foreign scientific journals.
The projects not only contribute to the “development of science, but also have practical value, ensuring the creation of new industries,” Vladimir Bespalov noted. In 2024, 2.3 thousand new projects were supported. “It is very important that one and a half thousand managers received grants from the Science Foundation for the first time,” the speaker said. At the same time, in 2025, with the support of the Russian Academy of Sciences, “the post-grant life of the projects will be implemented,” he added. According to him, “the research teams implementing the projects supported by the foundation are centers of attraction for young people in science.” The majority of project implementers (42.7 thousand) are under 39 years of age (inclusive), including more than 9 thousand postgraduate students and more than 7 thousand students.
Associate Professor of the National Research University Higher School of Economics Ahmad Ostovari Moghaddam, a scientist from Iran, noted that he submitted documents to begin research in Russia and in a number of European countries. “But of all the options that I had, it was work in Russia that seemed the most interesting and convenient. This concerned both the interesting topic for scientific work that was proposed at the Higher School of Economics and the advanced equipment that the university provided,” the scientist said. HSE gave him the opportunity to “form his own research teams.” “I have permanent young research associates who work with me, and I also have the opportunity to implement projects in my own laboratory at the Higher School of Economics,” he noted.
It was thanks to the support of the Higher School of Economics and the Russian Science Foundation (the foundation awarded the scientist a grant twice) that Ahmad Ostowari Moghaddam decided to stay in Russia for a long time. The project that the scientist is currently implementing at the Higher School of Economics is related to the use of catalytic technologies. “I am also studying the reaction of oxygen reduction from carbon dioxide. My future goal is to increase the focus on practical research, to move away from the academic format. Although, of course, publishing articles and participating in scientific projects are extremely important, I would like my research to also benefit people, making their lives easier and more convenient. As one of the recipients of the Russian Science Foundation grant, I hope that I will be able to initiate new research at the Higher School of Economics,” he noted.
The scientist recommends “all young researchers from foreign countries to join scientific work in Russia, to come and implement their projects here.”
The press conference was also attended by Georgy Yakovlev, Assistant to the General Director of Svetlana-Rost (he spoke about the implementation of a new technology in the field of the full-cycle semiconductor industry) and Director of the Research Institute of Neurosciences of the Lobachevsky State University of Nizhny Novgorod, laureate of the Russian President’s Prize in Science and Innovation for Young Scientists Susanna Gordleeva. She emphasized that a very important mission of the RSF is to support young scientists. Speaking about her personal experience, Susanna Gordleeva noted that “she started with winning a small RSF grant”, and this year she was lucky enough to win an interdisciplinary RSF grant, where there was a competition of about 20 people per place. “We are trying to develop biologically plausible realistic mathematical models that we build on the basis of experimental data to explain the mechanisms of formation of cognitive functions, as well as the development of neurodegenerative diseases,” she said about her work. The obtained research results allow us to move “to the development of new promising artificial intelligence technologies that will be built on the principles of the brain’s functioning.”
According to the Chair of the RSF Expert Council, Academician of the Russian Academy of Sciences Yulia Gorbunova, last year marked the tenth anniversary of the RSF’s existence and its work was cited as an example of the “gold standard”. “Of course, when we talk about finances, it is very important how we distribute them, to whom, for what work we give this money. And here, of course, the correct examination mechanism is very important, which is constantly being improved at the RSF,” she noted. In particular, according to her, the procedure for selecting experts is very thorough: their achievements, their scientific reputation are assessed, possible conflicts of interest are identified, etc.
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