Nikolai Ivanovich is a genius,
and we are not aware of this only because
that he is our contemporary.
D.N. Pryanishnikov
N.I. Vavilov is a world-famous scientist who made a huge contribution to the development of genetics, agronomic science, systematics and geography of cultivated plants, and the development of the scientific foundations of breeding. He created the theory of plant introduction, enriched the theory and methods of genetic breeding research. His works have been translated into many languages and published in many countries.
Nikolai Ivanovich was born on November 25, 1887 in Moscow. His father, Ivan Ilyich, came from a peasant family. Assigned in early childhood to a Moscow merchant as an errand boy, he eventually became a clerk and then one of the directors of the famous Trekhgornaya Manufactory company. In 1884, Ivan Vavilov married the daughter of the artist-engraver of the manufactory Mikhail Asonovich Postnikov, Alexandra. The groom was 21 years old, the bride was 16. Alexandra graduated primary school and learned drawing from her father.
The Vavilovs had seven children, of whom four survived: Alexandra, Nikolai, Sergei and Lydia.
Nikolai grew up healthy, inventive, and could stand up not only for himself, but also for his little brother. Sergei Ivanovich wrote in his memoirs: “We lived amicably with my brother Kolya, but he was much older and had a different character than me: brave, decisive, a “fighter” who constantly got into street fights. WITH early years He enjoyed serving in Nikola Vagankov’s church. But this was “social” work, and not religiosity at all. Nikolai very early became both an atheist and a materialist.”
Nikolai received his secondary education at the Moscow Commercial School, where his father assigned him, apparently hoping that over time his eldest son would become his successor. This educational institution was one of the best for its time in Moscow. It thoroughly taught natural science, physics, chemistry, modern languages. Among the teachers were famous professors S.F. Nagibin, Ya.Ya. Nikitinsky, A.N. Reformatsky and others.
At school, Nikolai became interested in natural science. In the garden behind the house, together with his younger brother, he set up a laboratory where he tried to independently conduct experiments in chemistry and physics. He collected butterflies and plants for herbarium.
In 1906, after graduating from college, despite his father’s persuasion to become a businessman, Nikolai entered the Moscow Agricultural Institute, the former Petrovsky Agricultural Academy. But why Petrovka? “The ardent propaganda for the Petrine Academy,” Nikolai Ivanovich later recalled, “was carried out by Ya.Ya. Nikitinsky and S.F. Nagibin is our teacher in high school.” In addition, while studying in high school, Nikolai often came to the Lubyanka, to the Polytechnic Museum, where he general public Many famous scientists spoke. He especially liked the lectures of Professor N.N. Khudyakov, who taught in Petrovka. “The tasks of science, its goals, its content have rarely been expressed with such brilliance,” wrote Vavilov. – The fundamentals of bacteriology and plant physiology turned into a philosophy of existence. Brilliant experiments complemented the spell of words. Both old and young listened to these lectures.”
All attempts by Ivan Ilyich to somehow influence the choice of his eldest son were unsuccessful. On this occasion, Vavilov told his friends that one day his father, wanting to persuade his son, invited a former master’s student in history home, and for a whole week he lectured especially for him about the “respectability and necessity for society” of commerce and industry.
During his student years, Vavilov stood out among his comrades for his knowledge and ability for independent scientific thinking. As a 3rd year student, he spoke at a gala meeting of the academy dedicated to the 100th anniversary of the birth of Charles Darwin (1909), with a report “Darwinism and experimental morphology.” His first scientific work, “Naked slugs (snails) damaging fields and vegetable gardens in the Moscow region,” dedicated to the problems of plant pathology, was awarded a prize named after the founder of the Moscow Polytechnic Museum, Professor A.P. Bogdanov and published in 1910 as having great practical significance.
After graduating from the institute, Vavilov was left to prepare for a professorship at the department of private agriculture, which was headed by the largest physiologist and agrochemist D.N. Pryanishnikov. Nikolai Ivanovich retained respect and warm affection for his teacher throughout his life. Dmitry Nikolaevich also loved and valued his student very much. Subsequently, Pryanishnikov suffered painfully because he outlived his student, Nikolai Ivanovich. It is known that after the arrest of N.I. Vavilov, having overcome serious difficulties, he achieved a meeting with L.P. Beria, but he had to listen only to rude moral teachings.
In 1911–1912 Vavilov lived in St. Petersburg, where he worked as an intern at the Bureau of Applied Botany under R.E. Regel and in the Bureau of Mycology and Phytopathology with the famous mycologist A.A. Yachevsky. He worked with extraordinary intensity: during the day - studying extensive collections, in the evenings (and nights) - studying in the library. And so every day... And in the summer, in his words, “viewing hundreds of vessels and thousands of plots with descriptions and reflections.” Nikolai Ivanovich was lucky to meet with outstanding scientists. Communication with them had a huge impact on the formation of Vavilov’s personality as a scientist.
In 1913, he was sent abroad “to complete his education” and become acquainted with the latest achievements of world science. Having received such an opportunity, Vavilov went first of all to London to the well-known English geneticist V. Batson, the author of the book “Mendelian Foundations of Heredity” (1902), which, for the sake of fidelity, he subtitled “In Defense of Mendelism.” Nikolai Ivanovich went on a long and distant journey not alone, but with his young wife Ekaterina Nikolaevna Sakharova, whom he married in April 1912 (their life together did not last long - the characters turned out to be too dissimilar. Soon after the birth of their son Oleg, the family broke up).
Communication with Batson and his students was truly invaluable for Vavilov. In the “Mecca and Medina of the genetic world,” as he later called the Bateson Institute, a spirit of intense intellectual exploration reigned. Special attention was given key issues science of heredity. Here he continued his research on the immunity of cereals.
Then Nikolai Ivanovich worked for several months in the laboratory of genetics at the University of Cambridge with professors Punnett and Beaven. During a trip to France, he became acquainted with the latest achievements selection in seed production at the famous breeding and seed company Vilmorin. In Germany, Vavilov visited the laboratory of the famous evolutionary biologist E. Haeckel in Jena. Started First World War forced him to return home.
Due to a visual defect (he injured his eye as a child), Vavilov was exempt from military service and therefore did not take part in hostilities. During 1915 and at the beginning of 1916, Nikolai Ivanovich passed the master's exams, and his preparation for professorship at the department of D.N. Pryanishnikova was finished.
Vavilov's doctoral dissertation was devoted to plant immunity. The same problem formed the basis of his first scientific monograph, “Plant Immunity to Infectious Diseases,” which contained critical analysis world literature and the results of our own research. It was published in the Izvestia of the Petrovsk Agricultural Academy in 1919. This is a classic work, and is now of theoretical and practical interest. The study of immunity showed Vavilov how important it is to study the entire world diversity of cultivated plants in order to isolate from it and develop immune varieties of agricultural crops. This has led to an interest in collecting more and more more plants, their differentiation, intraspecific systematics.
In 1916, Nikolai Ivanovich made his first major trip to Asia, visiting Northern Iran, Fergana and the Pamirs. It gave him interesting material, used later to substantiate the law of homological series for cultivated rye.
In the fall of 1917, Vavilov received an invitation to head the department of genetics, selection and private agriculture of the agronomic faculty of Saratov University. At the same time, on the recommendation of R.E. Regel, head of the Department (formerly Bureau) of Applied Botany, he was elected to the post of his assistant.
Difficult years came: devastation after the First World War, October Revolution, Civil War... But it was during the Saratov period, although it was short, that the star of Vavilov the scientist rose. There he gathered a team of young followers of his ideas, university students, and together with them he conducted research in the regions of the Middle and Lower Volga region. These works formed the basis of the work “Field Crops of the South-East”, which was published only in 1922. In the preface to it, Vavilov wrote: “Issues of choosing cultivated plants, varieties, replacing one crop with another, replacing old varieties with new ones, evaluating varieties - These are mainly the problems to which this essay gives a brief answer.” The book has become a model for the study of plant resources. It was in Saratov that the scientist summarized the results of observations of many collection crops at the Moscow Breeding Station and during a visit to the Vilmorin company, studies of the world collection of wheat at Percival in England, and his own collections.
At the III All-Union Selection Congress (June, 1920), held in Saratov, Vavilov made a report “The Law of Homologous Series in Hereditary Variation,” which was perceived by the audience as the largest event in the world biological science. Thus, plant physiologist Professor V.R. Zalensky uttered the well-known words: “The congress has become historic. These are biologists greeting their Mendeleev.”
Having studied many species and varieties of plants, Vavilov for the first time established a pattern in the chaos of variability of the plant kingdom. He systematized all its diversity in the form of a table (really reminiscent of Mendeleev’s), with the help of which he was able to predict the existence of forms not yet discovered by science. Thanks to him, breeders could no longer blindly, as was the case before, but purposefully carry out breeding work. It really was a revolution in genetics, selection, and biology.
Today, Vavilov’s law, like the theory of plant immunity he created, belongs to the most fundamental discoveries of natural science. It no longer applies only to the plant world - homologous series are found in the animal kingdom and microorganisms. It serves as an important theoretical and methodological tool in constructing a model of hereditary changes.
The last 20 years of Nikolai Ivanovich’s short life are connected with St. Petersburg. In March 1921, he was elected head of the Department of Applied Botany and Selection. “I’m sitting in the office at the desk of Robert Eduardovich Regel, and sad thoughts rushing one after another. Life here is difficult, people are starving, you need to put your living soul into the business, because there is almost no life here... We need to rebuild everything. Only books and good traditions remained immortal...” – Vavilov wrote from Petrograd.
It was a very difficult time. The civil war was ending... Everything had to be obtained, knocked out, searched for: cars, horses for sowing, fuel, books, furniture, housing, rations. It's hard to tell when he ate and slept. One late evening he dropped in to see Professor V.E. Pisarev, his closest assistant, embarrassed, asked his wife to prepare dinner from his supplies: millet and a small piece of lard. They made porridge from the millet, and Vavilov admitted that he had not eaten hot food for a week. Nevertheless, the work continued.
Many of his Saratov colleagues moved to the city together with Nikolai Ivanovich, and he proudly said: “We are a united group that allows us to guide the ship to the goal.” In 1924, the department was transformed into the All-Union Institute of Applied Botany and New Crops (since 1930 - the All-Union Institute of Plant Growing - VIR), and Vavilov was approved as its director. The institute became the basis for the formation of the All-Union Academy of Agricultural Sciences named after. IN AND. Lenin (VASKhNIL), and Nikolai Ivanovich became its first president. A network of institutions throughout the country was created in the VASKhNIL system. Vavilov supervised numerous departments and experimental stations of VIR, as well as institutes of the All-Russian Academy of Agricultural Sciences, in the most direct manner.
It was extraordinary person, and the usual life measures when applied to him lose all meaning. According to the testimony of his closest employees who communicated with the scientist for a long time, he had absolutely phenomenal performance. The working day, scheduled, as he put it, by half an hour, usually lasted 16–18 hours a day. When Nikolai Ivanovich was traveling, a few hours of travel or flight were enough to sleep, and already at 4 a.m. he began inspecting the crops, which often continued almost without interruption until late in the evening. And in the evenings - discussion and evaluation of what was seen, business meetings, viewing literature, new plans... And so every day, all my life...
Arriving at a selection station or laboratory, he set its employees such a pace that after his departure, it happened that some of them were given a week's leave, and Vavilov, as if nothing had happened, moved on to the next laboratory.
Despite this pace of life, Nikolai Ivanovich managed to follow not only scientific, but also cultural news, and was a friendly person, always ready to help. He often received scientists or production workers who came for consultations at home; conversations with them sometimes dragged on until the night. Academician E.I. Pavlovsky wrote: “Nikolai Ivanovich Vavilov happily combined enormous talent, inexhaustible energy, exceptional ability to work, excellent physical health and rare personal charm. Sometimes it seemed that he radiated some kind of creative energy that affected those around him, inspired them and awakened new thoughts.”
VIR was engaged in a comprehensive study, search and collection of seeds of cultivated plants and their wild relatives, clarification of the boundaries and characteristics of agriculture in various regions of the Earth for the use of plant resources and the experience of world agriculture in improving Agriculture our country. It is important to emphasize that the search was not carried out blindly, but was based on a coherent theory of the centers of origin of cultivated plants developed by Vavilov (the book “Centers of Origin of Cultivated Plants” was published in 1926, and for this work N.I. Vavilov was awarded the Lenin Prize). Subsequently, not only domestic, but also numerous foreign expeditions set out along the routes outlined by Nikolai Ivanovich.
The importance of this teaching has especially increased at the present time, when mass extinction is occurring. natural landscapes and primitive farming systems. The attention of not only specialists, but also the general public is now drawn to the problem of preserving the gene pools of cultivated and wild flora: the impoverishment or loss of this hereditary potential will be an irreparable loss for humanity. Measures for the conservation of gene pools should be based on the study of regions where the diversity of cultivated plants and their wild relatives is greatest.
By 1940, the collection of plant samples collected by Vavilov and his colleagues was the largest in the world and consisted of 250 thousand items, of which 36 thousand were wheat, 10 thousand were corn, 23 thousand were fodder, etc. On its basis, many domestic varieties of agricultural crops have been created and continue to be created.
By the 1920s–early 1930s. include numerous expeditions by Vavilov and his collaborators to collect and study cultivated plants. “If you have ten rubles in your pocket, travel!” - Nikolai Ivanovich, who visited more than 30 countries, laughed. It is difficult to even imagine how one person could travel around so many countries and collect tens of thousands of samples of seeds and plants. “If you have taken the path of a scientist,” said Vavilov, “then remember that you have doomed yourself to an eternal search for something new, to a restless life until your death. Every scientist must have a powerful worry gene. He must be possessed." Obsession was one of the characteristic features Vavilova.
Many of his travels involved great risk. Back in 1923, he wrote: “...I don’t feel sorry for giving my life for the sake of the smallest thing in science... Wandering through the Pamirs and Bukhara, I had to be on the verge of death more than once, it was scary more than once... And somehow It was even, in general, pleasant to take risks.” The expeditions to Afghanistan (1924) and Ethiopia (1927) were especially difficult and dangerous. For the first, the scientist was awarded the gold medal of the Russian Geographical Society “For Geographical Feat.”
Vavilov's expeditions attracted the interest of scientists from many countries. They began to imitate him, realizing the enormous importance of collecting plant material. The name of Nikolai Ivanovich was mentioned along with the names of the most famous travelers in the world.
Vavilov’s activities have received wide recognition in our country and abroad. In 1923, he was elected a corresponding member, and in 1929, a full member of the USSR Academy of Sciences. Nikolai Ivanovich was elected a member of the Royal Society of England, the Czechoslovak, Scottish, Indian, and German Academies of Sciences, the Linnean Society in London, the American Botanical Society and a number of other national and international organizations. The famous American geneticist G. Meller, more than 20 years after the death of Nikolai Ivanovich, wrote: “He was truly great in all respects - an outstanding scientist, a rare organizer and leader, unusually integral, open, mentally healthy... In work, in business, in solving all sorts of problems he was characterized by extraordinary insight and breadth of mind, and at the same time I have never met a person who loved life so much, spent himself so generously, created so generously and so much.”
However, starting from the mid-1930s. Vavilov and his collaborators were involved in “discussions” on problems of genetics and selection, which quickly ceased to be scientific and came down to persecution of the scientist. The first open public confrontation imposed by T.D. Lysenko and his like-minded people, happened in 1936 at a session of the All-Russian Academy of Agricultural Sciences. Here the Lysenkoites, having demonstrated their “achievements,” accused genetics of practical and theoretical worthlessness. It was a completely demagogic, but precisely calculated political provocation, which had severe consequences(you can learn more about the development of genetics in Russia from the book: Dubinin N.I. History and tragedy of Soviet genetics - M.: Nauka, 1992.
T.D. Lysenko, Hero of Socialist Labor, holder of seven Orders of Lenin, was apparently the only scientist in history who earned the title “great” during his lifetime. His portraits hung in all scientific institutions, and busts of the “people's academician” were sold in art salons. The State Russian Choir sang the majestic “Glory to Academician Lysenko,” and the songbooks, published in 200,000 copies, included ditties:
Play more fun, accordion,
Me and my friend together
Academician Lysenko
Let's sing eternal glory!
He's on Michurin's road
He walks with a firm step,
Mendelists-Morganists
He won't let us be fooled!
Lysenko's theoretical platform was Lamarckism, the idea of the inheritance of acquired characteristics. He used them to create a “teaching” about breeding the desired varieties and properties by “educating” plants and animals by changing conditions external environment and calling it “Michurin biology”. At the same time, the existence of genes, mutations, and chromosomes was denied. Soon, promising to quickly restore agriculture, Lysenko became a favorite of the head of state. And Stalin believed him, believed more than the greatest scientists.
Lysenko’s career was secured under those conditions. Soft, delicate, friendly, compliant, Nikolai Ivanovich showed great strength of spirit when he had to fight for scientific truth. “I am struggling, pressed against the wall, but I will never give up,” he wrote in 1938 to his friend, the American scientist Harland. And a year later he said from the podium: “We’ll go to the stake, we’ll burn, but we won’t give up our convictions.” These words of his turned out to be prophetic.
Beginning in 1930, a personal file was opened against Vavilov, which swelled with denunciations every year. Since 1934, he was not allowed to travel abroad on business trips; in 1935, the celebration of the anniversary of VIR and the 25th anniversary of his scientific activity were prohibited; since 1935, Nikolai Ivanovich, a recent member of the Central Executive Committee, the All-Russian Central Executive Committee, and the Leningrad City Council, was no longer elected anywhere. By 1939, many breeders, geneticists, and agronomists were arrested, and their place was taken by the Lysenkoites.
The most experienced employees of VASKhNIL and breeding stations became victims of mass repressions. Vavilov’s friends and associates, Academician N.P., died as enemies of the people. Gorbunov, one of the founders of VASKhNIL and VIR, President of VASKhNIL A.I. Muralov, vice-presidents N.M. Tulaikov, G.K. Meister and many other figures in agricultural science of the same caliber...
Vavilov’s fate was also decided. He was arrested on August 6, 1940 in Chernivtsi. Nikolai Ivanovich spent a whole year in solitary confinement, enduring endless interrogations. We do not know and are unlikely to find out what he was thinking and experiencing during these days. At the very beginning of the war, the case was transferred to a military collegium Supreme Court USSR, and on July 9, 1941 the trial took place.
Vavilov was judged by V.V. himself. Ulrich, chairman of the military board. What kind of trial it was can be understood at least from the protocol. The start and end times of the meeting are not marked, the text is two pages. Nikolai Ivanovich pleaded not guilty. The arrest warrant, in particular, stated that he was one of the leaders of the anti-Soviet, espionage, counter-revolutionary organization “Labor Peasant Party” and, on his instructions, carried out special studies, which refuted the new theories of Michurin and Lysenko. Witnesses in the case were not questioned. The accused was sentenced to capital punishment.
Vavilov was sent to prison No. 1 in Saratov, the execution was replaced by pardon with 20 years of imprisonment. Witnesses of the last months of the scientist’s life said that Nikolai Ivanovich tried to raise the spirits of the prisoners, encouraged them, and gave them lectures on genetics. Those who survived remembered them long years.
He died on January 26, 1943. Burial place of N.I. Vavilov is still unknown. In August 1955, the military collegium of the Supreme Court of the USSR made a decision on the rehabilitation of the scientist. Soon after, the republication of his works began. In 1964, the attitude towards genetics finally changed in our country, which received the opportunity for further development.
The name of Nikolai Ivanovich was given to the All-Union Institute of Genetics (1967), the Institute of General Genetics of the USSR Academy of Sciences (1983), as well as the Saratov Agricultural Institute and the All-Union Society of Genetics and Breeders. His name adorns the first page of the largest international magazine “Heredity” along with the names of Charles Darwin, G. Mendel, C. Linnaeus, and other luminaries of science.
Nikolai Ivanovich was an encyclopedically educated person who knew about 20 languages and corresponded with scientists from 93 countries! He received newly published scientific works from their authors - the largest world scientists. Vavilov had a phenomenal memory: while looking at the crops in the field, he could immediately dictate entire chapters of his books to successive stenographers, with precise digital calculations and quotes... Numerous scientific, documentary and artistic publications are devoted to Vavilov’s activities, his scientific and human feats , movies. Professor P.A. was right. Baranov, a participant in several Vavilov expeditions, when he wrote: “The bright and wonderful life of Nikolai Ivanovich will long attract the attention of researchers and inspire writers... Our youth should know this great life, which can rightfully be called a feat of a scientist, one must learn from it how one must work selflessly and how one must love one’s homeland and science.”
Life and work of N.I. There are many books devoted to Vavilov, of which the following can be recommended to students.Zigunenko S.N., Malov V.I. N.I. Vavilov: Book. for students in grades 9–10. Wed school – M.: Education, 1987. – 125 p. (People of science.)
A fascinating story about the short but colorful life of N.I. awaits the young reader. Vavilov: his childhood, years of study, teachers, development as a scientist. “Life is short, you have to hurry,” Nikolai Ivanovich liked to repeat. What he did alone would be enough for a dozen other researchers. All this is reflected on the pages of the book. And, of course, endless travels filled with risk and adventure, where he went to bring as much benefit as possible to his country in the business he was engaged in. Unfortunately, the authors practically omitted the last years of the scientist’s life, the dramatic history of the defeat of genetics in our country, the murder of many of the best representatives of Russian science, the tragic end of N.I. Vavilova...
Nikolai Ivanovich Vavilov: Essays, memoirs, materials / S.R. Mikulinsky. – M.: Nauka, 1987. – 487 p.
In essays and articles by employees and associates, students and foreign colleagues of N.I. Vavilov, in the most complete collection of memoirs of contemporaries and archival materials published for the first time, almost all periods of the scientist’s life and work are revealed. They contain comprehensive information about the Vavilov family, childhood, student years, talk about the Saratov period, the organization of the All-Union Institute of Plant Growing, the Institute of Genetics of the USSR Academy of Sciences and their leadership, about the activities as president and vice-president of the All-Union Academy of Agricultural Sciences, president of the All-Union Geographical Society, talks about numerous expeditions, the appearance of this charming man is recreated. At the end, the necessary notes on articles, memoirs and materials, as well as information about the authors, are given.
Works of N.I. Vavilova
Nikolai Ivanovich Vavilov. Five continents. – L.: Nauka, 1987. – 213 p.: ill.
Vavilov N.I. Five continents // Vavilov N.I. Five continents; Krasnov A.N. Under the tropics of Asia. M., 1987. – p. 7–171.
Vavilov N.I. Genetics and agriculture: Sat. articles. – M.: Knowledge, 1968. – 60 p.
Vavilov N.I. Genetics and agriculture: Sat. articles. – M.: Knowledge, 1967. 60 p.
Vavilov N.I. The law of homological series in hereditary variability // Classics of Soviet genetics. – M., 1968. P. 9–57.
Vavilov N.I. The law of homological series in hereditary variability. – L: Nauka, 1987. – 259 p.
Vavilov N.I. Organization of agricultural science in the USSR. – M.: Agropromizdat, 1987. – 383 p.
Vavilov N.I. Ways of Soviet selection // Classics of Soviet genetics. – M., 1968. – 58–84 p.
Vavilov N.I. Theoretical foundations of selection. – M.: Nauka, 1987. – 511 p.
Vavilov N.I. Plant immunity to infectious diseases. – M.: Nauka, 1986. 519 p.: ill.
Vavilov N.I. Selected works: In 2 volumes. in 2. L.: Nauka, 1967.
Vavilov N.I. Life is short, you have to hurry. – M.: Soviet Russia, 1990. – 702 p.
Nikolai Ivanovich Vavilov. From the epistolary heritage: 1911–1928. T. 5. – M.: Nauka, 1980. – 425 pp.: ill.
Nikolai Ivanovich Vavilov. From the epistolary heritage: 1929–1940. T. 10. – M.: Nauka, 1987. – 490 p.
Literature about N.I. VavilovNikolai Ivanovich Vavilov//Inspiration. – M., 1988. – S. 1941.
Nikolai Ivanovich Vavilov//People of Russian science. – M., 1963. – P. 434–447.
Nikolai Ivanovich Vavilov//Outstanding Soviet geneticists. – M., 1980. – P. 8–23.
Popovsky M.A. We must hurry! Travels of Academician N.I. Vavilova. – M.: Children's literature, 1968. – 221 p.: ill.
Golubev G.N. The Great Sower Nikolai Vavilov: Pages of the Life of a Scientist. – M.: Mol. Guard, 1979. – 173 p.
Reznik S.E. Nikolay Vavilov. – M.: Young Guard, 1968. – 332 pp.//ZhZL.
Reznik S.E. The road to the scaffold. Paris–New York: “The Third Wave”, 1983. – 127 p.
Baldysh G.M., Panizovskaya G.I. Nikolai Vavilov in St. Petersburg - Petrograd - Leningrad. L.: Lenizdat, 1987. – 287 p.
Ivin M.E. The fate of Nikolai Vavilov: Documentary story, essays. L.: Soviet writer, 1991. – 411 p.
Popovsky M.A. The case of Academician Vavilov. – M.: Book, 1991. – 303 p.
Bakhteev F.Kh. Nikolai Ivanovich Vavilov: 1887–1943. Novosibirsk: Nauka, 1987. – 269 p.
Nikolai Ivanovich Vavilov: to the 100th anniversary of his birth / V.I. Ivanov. – M.: Knowledge, 1987. – 63 p.
Boyko V.V., Vilensky E.R. Nikolai Ivanovich Vavilov: Pages of life and activity. – M.: Agroproimzdat, 1987. – 187 p.
Revenkova A.I. Nikolai Ivanovich Vavilov: 1887–1943. – M.: Selkhozizdat, 1962. – 271 p.
Next to N.I. Vavilov: Sat. memories. 2nd ed., add. / Yu.N. Vavilov. – M.: Sov. Russia, 1973. – 252 p.
Sinskaya E.N. Memories of N.I. Vavilov. – Kyiv: Naukova Dumka, 1991. – 203 p.
Korotkova T.I. N.I. Vavilov in Saratov: 1917–1921. Documentary essays. – Saratov, 1978. – 118 p.
Korotkova T.I. Going ahead of life: Pages of the Saratov biography of N.I. Vavilova. 2nd ed., add. – Saratov, 1987. – 142 p.
"...from convictions We will not give up our own” N.I. Vavilov and scientists of the Kharkov region / B.P. Guryev et al. – Kharkov: “Prapor”, 1989. 123 p.
Companions Nikolai Ivanovich Vavilov: Researchers of the plant gene pool / V.A. Dragavtsev et al. - St. Petersburg, 1994. - 615 p.: ill.
World ideas of Vavilov / A.V. Kantorovich. – M.: Knowledge, 1968. – 61 p.
Mednikov B.M. The law of homological variability: To the 60th anniversary of the discovery of N.I. Vavilov law. – M.: Knowledge, 1980. – 63 p.
Vavilovskoe heritage in modern biology /E.V. Levites, A.A. Homeland. – M.: Nauka, 1989. – 365 p.
Grumm-Grzhimailo A.G. In search of the world's plant resources: Some scientific results of the travels of Academician N.I. Vavilova. 2nd ed., add. – L.: Nauka, 1986. – 149 p.
Konarev V.G. N.I. Vavilov and species problems in applied botany, genetics and selection. – M.: Agropromizdat, 1991. – 46 p.
N.I. Vavilov and agricultural science: Dedicated to the 80th anniversary of the birth of Academician Nikolai Ivanovich Vavilov / D.D. Brezhnev et al. – M.: Kolos, 1969. – 423 p.
Questions geography of cultivated plants and N.I. Vavilov / L.E. Rodin. M. – L.: Nauka, 1966. – 132 p.
Dyachenko S.S. Vavilov's Star: Film script. – M.: Art, 1988. – 83 p.
Nikolai Ivanovich Vavilov: 1887–1943. 3rd ed., add. /R.I. Goryacheva, L.M. Zhukova, N.B. Polyakova. – M.: Nauka, 1987. – 165 p.
Nikolai Ivanovich Vavilov: On the centenary of his birth: 1887–1943 / A.M. Karpycheva, T.M. Sokolova. – M.: VASKHNIL, 1987. – 157 p.
Nikolai Ivanovich Vavilov / R.I. Goryacheva, L.M. Zhukova. – M.: 1967. – 130 p.
Personality in genetics: 20-30s of the twentieth century
(“The Golden Age” of Russian genetics – from Vavilov to “Vavilovia the Beautiful”)
Vavilov Nikolai Ivanovich (1887-1943) - botanist, plant breeder, geneticist, geographer and organizer of science; Academician of the USSR Academy of Sciences (1929).
Nikolai Ivanovich Vavilov was born in Moscow on November 13 (25), 1887. He graduated from the Moscow Commercial School (1906) and the Moscow Agricultural Institute. In 1913–1914 worked at the Horticultural Institute with one of the founders of genetics, W. Bateson, whom Vavilov later called his teacher, and then in France, in the largest seed-growing company, the Vilmorins, and in Germany, with E. Haeckel. In 1916 he went on an expedition to Iran, then to the Pamirs. From September 1917 to 1921 he taught at the Saratov Higher Agricultural Courses, where in 1918, with the transformation of the courses into an institute, he was elected professor and headed the department of genetics, selection and private agriculture. In March 1921 he moved to Petrograd and headed the Department of Applied Botany and Selection. Also in 1921, he visited the USA, where he spoke at International Congress in agriculture, became acquainted with the work of the Bureau of Plant Industry in Washington and the work of T. G. Morgan's Columbia Laboratory. In 1922, Vavilov was appointed director State Institute experienced agronomy. In 1924 he became director of the All-Union Institute of Applied Botany and New Crops, and in 1930 - director of the All-Union Institute of Plant Growing. In 1927 he participated in the V International Genetic Congress in Berlin. He was president, and in 1935–1940. - Vice-President of the All-Union Academy of Agricultural Sciences named after. V.I.Lenin (VASKhNIL).
At the All-Union Institute of Plant Growing, Vavilov created a department of genetics, and in 1930 he headed the Laboratory of Genetics. Three years later, the Laboratory of Genetics was transformed into the Institute of Genetics of the USSR Academy of Sciences. Vavilov attracted Yu.A. to work at the Institute. Filipchenko, A.A. Sapegina, G.A. Levitsky, D. Kostov, K. Bridges, G. Möller and other prominent scientists.
In 1923 N.I. Vavilov was elected a corresponding member, and in 1929 an academician of the USSR Academy of Sciences. In 1931–1940 was president of the All-Union Geographical Society. In 1942 he was elected a foreign member of the Royal Society of London.
Vavilov is the founder of the doctrine of plant immunity to infectious diseases, which continued the general doctrine of immunity developed by I.I. Mechnikov. In 1920, the scientist formulated the law of homological series in hereditary variability. In the 1920–1930s, Vavilov was a participant and organizer of many expeditions to collect cultivated plants, in particular to Afghanistan, Japan, China, the countries of Central and South America, North Africa, the Middle East, the Mediterranean, Ethiopia, etc., and after 1933 - to various regions of the USSR, as a result of which a rich collection of plant specimens was collected. The entire work was based on Vavilov’s idea of the need for a “census” of the varieties of all cultivated plants.
Starting from the mid-1930s, mainly after the famous IV session of the All-Russian Academy of Agricultural Sciences in December 1936, Vavilov became the main and most authoritative opponent of T.D. Lysenko and other representatives of the “agrobiology of Timiryazev – Michurin – Lysenko”. Vavilov called this group of biologists “neo-Lamarckians” and treated them tolerantly, as representatives of a different point of view, but one that had the right to exist. The International Genetic Congress scheduled for 1937 in Moscow was canceled by the authorities; not a single Soviet geneticist, including Vavilov, who was elected president of the congress, received permission to participate in the VII International Congress in London and Edinburgh (1939).
On August 6, 1940, Vavilov was arrested and by the decision of the military collegium of the Supreme Court of the USSR on July 9, 1941, on charges of belonging to the anti-Soviet organization “Labor Peasant Party”, and sentenced to death for sabotage and espionage. All those convicted in this case were shot on July 28, 1941; in relation to Vavilov, the execution of the sentence was carried out on the initiative of L.P. Beria's sentence was suspended and later commuted to 20 years in prison. The change in sentence was the result of the active intervention of Academician D.N. Pryanishnikov. On October 15, 1941, Vavilov was sent to Saratov to prison No. 1.
After Vavilov’s arrest, T.D. was appointed director of the Institute of Genetics. Lysenko, who by the summer of 1941 completed the defeat of “reactionary formal genetics” that began in the early 1930s and continued in 1936 and 1939, accompanied by arrests and physical destruction of Vavilov’s friends and collaborators. In prison, after transfer to general cell, sick and exhausted by the expectation of death, Vavilov wrote a (not preserved) book “The History of the Development of World Agriculture” and gave lectures on genetics to other prisoners.
Who is Nikolai Ivanovich Vavilov, what contribution to the science of biology did he make, what did this outstanding naturalist become famous for?Nikolai Vavilov - brief biography
N.I. Vavilov (1887-1943) - an outstanding Russian biologist, the founder of genetics, a famous plant breeder, one of the founders of Russian agricultural science.
The future great Soviet biologist was born into a very wealthy family for those times. His father was a fairly wealthy merchant, which provided Nikolai Ivanovich with an excellent education.
Having received a commercial education, the future outstanding biologist did not work in his specialty, since he did not feel the desire to become a merchant. The young man was more interested in the flora and living world of Russia, to the study of which he intended to devote his life.
Nikolai Ivanovich enters the Moscow Agricultural Institute, where he receives excellent knowledge that forms the “foundation” of his worldview. After graduating from this higher educational institution in 1911, he was left at the department of private agriculture, where Vavilov actively studied the flora, combining scientific and teaching activities.
The young scientist’s career is developing rapidly. Already in 1917, Vavilov became a professor at Saratov University. In 1921, he headed the department of applied botany in St. Petersburg. It is with this scientific institution that the entire subsequent life of the biologist will be connected.
Later, the department of applied botany was transformed into the All-Union Institute of Botany and New Crops, then into the All-Union Institute of Plant Growing, better known to a wide circle of gardening enthusiasts under the abbreviation VIR. Nikolai Ivanovich will lead this scientific society right up to his arrest in 1940.
For more than 20 years of practical activity, under the leadership of an outstanding scientist, several dozen scientific expeditions were carried out, the purpose of which was to study the rich flora Russia and foreign countries, including: India, Greece, Portugal, Spain, Japan and so on.
The scientific expedition to Ethiopia carried out in 1927 brought particular value to science. During research activities Nikolai Ivanovich, it was established for certain that it was on these lands that the first varieties of wheat were first grown.
Last years life
Talent is good for those who have it. Around such people there are always a lot of spiteful critics who consider it their duty to harm and deal with more gifted and capable people.
Noticing that Vavilov was bringing something new to science, such ignoramuses became jealous.
Outstanding Abilities brilliant people often brought only misfortune to their owners. Alas, history is replete with such examples. The difficult fate of Nikolai Ivanovich Vavilov confirms this statement.
Already an authoritative scientist, Vavilov supported the scientific works of his younger colleague Trofim Denisovich Lysenko. After some time, this once simple agronomist, with the support of Soviet ideologists, would launch an ongoing persecution of the great scientist, accusing him of participating in an anti-Soviet organization and branding his work as pseudoscience.
On false charges, Nikolai Ivanovich was arrested in 1940, and thanks to the swift execution of the court of those difficult times, after a short time Vavilov was sentenced to death. Later, for outstanding services to science, the scientist’s sentence was commuted, and capital punishment was replaced by 20 years of hard labor.
The scientist will spend little time in prison. In 1942, the heart of the great biologist stopped from hard labor conditions and constant hunger. The camp doctor, examining the body of the deceased, will make a conclusion about death as a result of a decline in cardiac activity.
In 1955, after the death of Joseph Stalin, Nikolai Ivanovich was completely rehabilitated. All charges of treason against him were dropped. The bright name of the outstanding biologist was restored, albeit posthumously. The masses of people were told what Vavilov had done for science, and his contribution to the general treasury of human knowledge received official recognition.
What new did Vavilov bring to biology?
Vavilov’s contribution to biology is difficult to overestimate. While studying the plant world, the scientist revealed to the world several thousand new plants previously unknown to mankind. The VIR research institution has created a collection of more than 300,000 plant specimens.
The law of homological series, discovered by Vavilov, determines the characteristics of hereditary variability in closely related species. According to this doctrine, similar hereditary changes occur in related plants.
It was thanks to the works of Nikolai Ivanovich that the world learned about the existence of immunity in plants. Under the leadership of the scientist, several hundred new species of zoned plants were bred, capable of growing even in atypical areas and producing significant yields.
Conclusion
The scientist’s merits have been repeatedly noted with numerous medals and recognitions. For the discovery of immunity in plants, Vavilov received Lenin Prize, behind research work in Afghanistan - the Przhevalsky medal. After rehabilitation, he was reinstated in the list of academicians of the USSR Academy of Sciences. In 1965, grateful descendants established a gold medal named after the great biologist. It was awarded for outstanding achievements in the field of agriculture. In 1967, VIR, headed by the scientist for many years, began to bear his great name.
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N.I. Vavilov is a brilliant scientist of the 20th century. Vavilov distinguished himself as a geographer, evolutionist and plant protection specialist. It is noteworthy that all of him scientific interests were interconnected. He was the first to see the possibility and vital necessity of studying cultivated plants from the point of view of genetics, evolution and geography. He is responsible for a number of discoveries that have not exhausted their relevance to this day.
Vavilov dreamed eradicate food shortages in the world. His plan was to use new science about genetics for propagating and increasing the yield of cultivated plants that could grow anywhere, in any climate; in sandy deserts and frozen tundras. He called it "a mission for all mankind." Vavilov is recognized as the main geographer of the modern plant. The scientist formulated very important postulates in the field of genetics, wrote more than ten books and carried out enormous work on organizing the system of agricultural institutions in the USSR.
Biography facts
Nikolai Ivanovich Vavilov was born on November 13, 1887 in Moscow in the family of a wealthy merchant Ivan Ilyich Vavilov and his wife Alexandra Mikhailovna Postnikova. I.I. Vavilov wanted his children to continue his business and become businessmen, but all the children became generally recognized specialists, each in their own field of activity.
There were seven children in the Vavilov family, but three of them passed away in childhood. N.I. Vavilov had two sisters and a brother. Nikolai Vavilov's sisters Alexandra and Lydia received medical education. Lydia died suddenly in 1913, having contracted smallpox during the expedition. His younger brother Sergei Ivanovich Vavilov became a famous physicist.
At the insistence of their father, brothers Nikolai and Sergei were educated in Moscow Commercial School. After studying at the school, he was going to enroll in the Imperial Moscow University, but he did not want to spend a year studying Latin, which was mandatory for admission, and in 1906 he was enrolled in the Moscow Agricultural Institute (MSHI). During his student years, he diligently studied the cycle of botanical and plant growing disciplines, and established himself as an enterprising and diligent student.
After completing the 2nd course, in 1908, Vavilov with a small group made his first trip to the Caucasus. From this trip he brought about 160 herbarium sheets.
In 1913-1914, N.I. Vavilov worked in the best laboratories in Great Britain, France and Germany. He was also planning to visit North America, however, in 1914, the First World War broke out, which prevented the planned plan. Particularly significant were his studies with William Betson at the John Innes Horticultural Institute. In 1922, a series of his works were published in England, including “The Law of Homologous Series in Hereditary Variation.”
N.I. Vavilov traveled to more than 64 foreign countries, learned about 15 languages, collected a collection of seeds, numbering 250,000 seed samples. He visited countries and was not afraid dangerous situations, which they found themselves in quite often. He made his first trip to Asia in 1916. In 1917, N.I. Vavilov was elected as a professor at the Department of Private Agriculture and Selection at the Voronezh Agricultural Institute and at the Faculty of Agronomy at Saratov University. He chose Saratov, where he worked as a teacher at the university.
During the time spent in Saratov, he published three fundamental works, one of them was the theory of centers of origin of cultivated plants.
Taking into account the significance and promise of the research done, Nikolai Vavilov was appointed corresponding member of the USSR Academy of Sciences and director of the State Institute of Experimental Agronomy in 1923. In 1926 - he became a laureate of the V.I. Lenin Prize
In 1940, Vavilov was arrested for criticizing the concepts of the Soviet biologist Trofim Lysenko, who enjoyed the support of Stalin. In 1941, Vavilov was sentenced to death penalty, but in 1942 it was changed to twenty years of imprisonment in “corrective labor” in KGB camps. It seems that Vavilov never knew about the commutation of his sentence. On January 26, 1943, he died in prison from starvation and was buried in a common grave.
Facts from personal life
N.I. Vavilov was married twice. First wife, daughter of a merchant Ekaterina Sakharova. She was not a beauty, but she had a brilliant mind, which is what attracted Nikolai Vavilov to her. Their marriage took place in 1912. Catherine was a caring and understanding wife; she assisted Nikolai in every possible way: she supported him in long trip abroad, she also knew several foreign languages and helped him with translations. In 1918, a son, Oleg, was born into their family. But soon after the birth of their son, their family life collapsed, Nikolai Vavilov went to Saratov, and his wife remained in Moscow with their son.
A year later, my husband got an apartment, Ekaterina came to Samara. But by that time, Vavilov was infatuated with his student Elena Barulina. After this, Nikolai led for some time double life, but in 1926 he was officially divorced. Catherine later suffered a difficult fate; her son died in 1946 in Dombay. She never remarried and lived completely alone until 1963.
The marriage to Elena Barulina took place shortly after his divorce from Katya. Two years later, their son Yuri was born.
- N.I. Vavilov was an atheist
- Since 1934, Stalin forbade Vavilov to travel abroad
- During the investigation, Vavilov was summoned for questioning about 400 times, total time interrogations amounted to 1,700 hours. It is also known that monstrous torture was used against Vavilov.
- While in prison, N. Vavilov wrote a book about agriculture, which after his death was burned along with the rest of his things.
- Sergei Vavilov received an “incognito” note every year on his brother’s birthday with the words: “Cain, where is your brother Abel?” These notes brought indescribable mental suffering to Sergei Ivanovich: in those terrible years, he provided assistance not only to his brother’s family, but also to other persecuted people.
The entire amazing life of this man can be called a feat. The scientist's feat was his outstanding Scientific research, the traveler's feat is his scientific expeditions. Biologist and plant breeder, geneticist and agronomist, geographer and statesman, tireless researcher and academician of the USSR Academy of Sciences and the All-Russian Academy of Agricultural Sciences Nikolai Ivanovich Vavilov devoted his entire life to selfless service to the Motherland and the organization of agricultural science.
Already during his years of study at the Moscow Agricultural Institute (now known as “Timiryazevka”), Vavilov conducted his first student research, for which he was awarded the Moscow Polytechnic Museum Prize. In 1916, Nikolai Ivanovich went to Northern Iran, and then to Fergana and the Pamirs. Here he collects seeds of bread plants. The scientist is looking for forms and varieties with properties beneficial to humans - rye with large ears and grains, wheat that is not affected by diseases. This was the first of his trips around the globe. Vavilov collected the plant resources of our planet all his life. He collected almost everything that had been created by mankind over the centuries-old history of agriculture, and discovered the wild ancestors of many cultivated plants.
Nikolai Ivanovich traveled to five continents. Traveled to more than 50 countries. Iran, Afghanistan, Algeria, Egypt, Syria, Ethiopia, Greece, Italy, Spain, China, Japan, Korea, Mexico, Peru, Bolivia, Brazil, Cuba... And from everywhere parcels with seeds and plants were sent home. Tens of thousands of samples! In the fields of the All-Union Institute of Plant Growing near Leningrad, at many experimental stations in different regions of our country, these seeds were sown in plots. The plants grown from them were studied and the best were selected. On their basis, high-yielding varieties were created and introduced into collective and state farm fields.
A living collection of Vavilov and his followers still exists. It is replenished all the time. Breeders use it as a source material when developing new varieties. The scientist suggested that in old farming areas one can find many different forms of cultivated plants. Moreover, plants with valuable properties, such as drought-tolerant non-lodging wheat, sweet large melons, starchy potatoes, high-protein beans, long-fiber cotton. Such areas with amazing variety Vavilov called plant forms the centers of origin of cultivated plants. From here they began to spread to other places.
The centers of origin of cultivated plants are not the only discovery of N. I. Vavilov. The scientist developed the basics of plant breeding - the science of breeding new varieties. Vavilov published about 300 scientific works on breeding, agriculture, geography, and agricultural organization. Nikolai Ivanovich paid a lot of attention to the organization of agricultural science. He was the first president of the All-Union Academy of Agricultural Sciences named after V.I. Lenin. Under his leadership, institutes of grain farming, potato farming, vegetable growing, feed, cotton growing, etc. arose in our country. Nikolai Ivanovich liked to repeat that life is short, you need to hurry. It is safe to say that the scientist did not waste a single day. What they did would be enough for several lifetimes. For his scientific feat, N. I. Vavilov in 1926 was among the first Soviet scientists awarded the V. I. Lenin Prize.
In the 1930s Vavilov paid more and more attention to the development of genetics - the science of the laws of heredity and variability of organisms. Soviet biologists occupied a leading place in world science in those years. But at the end of the 30s. N.I. Vavilov was unfairly accused of sabotage activities against Soviet power, and genetics was declared a pseudoscience. In 1940, the scientist was illegally arrested, and in January 1943 he died of illness in Saratov prison. In 1955, the honorable name of N.I. Vavilov was restored.
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