SCIENTIFIC AND TECHNICAL LITERATURE OF THE U. S. S. R.'." II.
Facts and Figures
M. HOSEH Chemical Abstracts, Washington, D. C. T H E literature searcher will be greatly aided if he knows something of the literature which he is about to search. Not the subject-for this is a conditio sine qua mn-but the background which produces the published body of information. This background comprises research institutes, universities and professional schools, sponsoring bodies, publishers, and some aspects of publishing technique. This background is of special importance when searching the literature published in the Soviet Union, not only because of language difficulties but also because Soviet scientific literature is not generally available and bibliographical guides to it are equally scarce. Furthermore, Soviet publishing and distribution patterns differ widely from our own and from the ones with which we are familiar. Not long ago a representative of one of our largest and best equipped libraries consulted me on how to obtain scientific and technical publications from the U. S. S. R. When questioned what is it specifically that his library wants he was vague and assured me that they have ample funds to buy "everything" of a scientific or technical nature to satisfy the many and various demands of their readers. In the U. S. S. R. where private enterprise is non-existent and the motive of financial profit absent such orders are totally useless. To obtain U. S. S. R. publications you have to know what you want and know it well. This is one of the reasons for the present series of papers.
RESEARCH IN THE U. S. S. R.
Basic research in the U. S. S. R. is carried on predominantly by the academies and universities, and the results are reported accordingly in academy and university publications. Industrial and applied research is carried on in industrial training and research institutes usually called Nauchno-Issledovatel'skii Institut, and in technological institutes called Politelchnicheskii Institut. Scientific research is also conducted in Pedagogical Institutes, Pedagogicheski; Institut, and the publications of these institutes contain very good papers. By far the greatest number of industrial training and research institutes is in the jurisdiction of the various ministries and supervised by the Learned Council, Uchenyi Sovel, established a t each of the ministries for the purpose of planning and directing the training, research, and development work in the field of activity of the particular ministry. This article embodies papers delivered before the Division of Chemical Literature s t the 128th Meeting of the American Chemical Society, Minneapolis, September, 1955, and at the 130th Meeting, Atlantic City, September, 1956. a For the first of this series, see THIS JOURNAL, 33, 397 (1956). The third will appear in May. 1
There are scores of these industrial training and research institutes in the U. S. S. R. Their fields range from training and research in confectionery and pastry, Institut K o d t o r s k o i Promyshlennosti, leather and footwear, Institut Kozheuno-Obuvnoi Promyshlennosti, to steel, Institut Stali, and chemical intermediates, Institut Khimicheskikh Poluprodnktou. Many of the ministries maintain more than one institute doing research in the various phases of the same general field. Most of the institutes provide for further academic training, analogous to our postgraduate work, leading to higher academic degrees. In this phase of their work the institutes are subject to regulations of Ministry of Higher Education, Ministerstvo Vysshego Obrazovaniya. An industrial training and research institute is carrying on research for an entire field of industry, e.g., cement, steel, or glass, and not for one particular plant or industrial establishment, which they call "kombinat," roughly comparable to our corporation. The results of research carried out in these institutes are usually published in full in their own serials. The material included in the theses and submitted in partial fulfillment of requirements for an academic degree are published in condensed form and usually referred to as "Autoreferat dissertatsii." Patent practices of the U. S. S. R. are quite different from ours and those of other countries. A patent is granted for an invention or an improvement either by the ministry concerned or by the Patent Commission of the Council of Ministers. The inventor is compensated and the invention, if it has merits, is incorporated where it is applicable. The patent has no restrictive force. Patent specifications are published in the form of abstracts in the Bulletin of Inventions, Ryulleten' Izobretenii, which is roughly comparable to our O&ial Gazette issued by the Patent Office. Individual plants (zavod, fabrika) or corporations (kombinat) usually have their own control and experimental laboratories. Papers written by members of these laboratories are usually published in the industrial journals. Judging from our receipts and available information, the largest volume of printed matter appears to he issued by the Ministry of Agriculture, Ministerstvo Sel'skogo Khoryaistva S S S R , and the Ministry of Health, Ministerstvo Zdravoolchraneniya S S S R . CLASSIFICATIONS OF TECHNICAL LITERATURE
Roughly, the scientific and technical publications can be divided into these groups: 1. Those published by the Academy, its subdivisions and institutes, and by the major universities, JOURNAL OF CHEMICAL EDUCATION
Moscow, Leningrad, Kiev, Kazan, and others. These publications report fundamental research in their respective fields: 2. Publications of the industrial training and research institutes. These report predominantly applied research. 3. Industrial publications reporting little research and dealing mainly with plant-laboratory tests of practical nature. There are no hard and fast rules, and the demarcation lines are easily crossed. For that matter, the very division between fundamental and applied science can hardly he very clear-cut. The academies of the Federated Republics, with the exception of the Ukrainian Academy, cannot afford as sharp division between fundamental and applied research. Of necessity they have t o deal with problems peculiar to their regions and this is reflected in the contents of their publications. The same is true of the material published by the many provincial universities which have neither as large nor as high caliber teaching staffs. Recently, 715 U. S. S. R. scientific and technical periodical publications falling within the three above mentioned groups, and containing material of interest to chemists were examined to ascertain their sponsoring bodies and fields of interest. With reference to the sponsoring body, the puhlications are grouped as follows: 1. Academies and their subdivisions.. . . . . . . 215 or 30.0% 2. Universities, Pedagogical Institutes, Schools of Agriculture, of Medicine, and other professional schools.. . . . . . . . . . . . . . 196 or 27.470 3. Industrial training and research institute8 141 or 19.9% 4. Miscellaneouu.. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17 or 2.3%
The "Miscellaneous" group comprises puhlications of professional societies, such as the All-Union Engineering Society, All-Union Chemical Society, AllUnion Mineralogical Society, Metallurgical Society, Society of Physiologists, Biochemists, and Pharmacologists, Society of Naturalists, and others. With reference to their subject field, the 715 titles can he grouped as follows: Agriculture. . ,100 or 14.0% Astronomy and mathematics..13 or 1.8% Biology, botany, and zoology. . 5 l or 7.1% Building, heavy industry, . 5 0 or 7.0% power.. Chemistry.. . . .51 or 7.1% Engineering.. . .23 or 3.2% Food industry.. .22 or 3.2%
. .. . .
General. .. . . ,119 or 16.6% Geology and geophysics. . . .59 or 8.3% Medicine. . . I20 or 16.8% Mining and metallurgy.. . .39 or 5.5% Petroleum. . . . . I 3 or 1.8% Physics.. . . . . . .14 or 1.9% Process industries.. . . .38 or 5.3% Miscellaneous. . 3 or 0.4%
..
. .
.
This is a rather rough classification. Agriculture includes pedology, agronomy, animal husbandry, poultry, apiculture, veterinary medicine, etc. The group "General" includes publications which cover several subject fields, e.g., Doklady, Vestnik, and Soobscheuiya of the academies, the general publications of academy branches, and the general puhlications of universities. The publications of academies, universities, and institutes having specific subject fields are grouped in the respective fields. A good knowledge of the nature and quality of these puhlications, a knowledge extending so-to-speak horiVOLUME 34, NO. 4, APRIL, 1957
zontally and vertically is indispensable for effective and efficient search of U. S. S. R. scientific and technical literature. By horizontal and vertical distribution is here understood the distribution with respect to field of interest, e.g., steel, dyes, cement, and the professional level within the specific field, e.g., theoretical considerations, manufacturing practices, production, plant safety, etc. Such knowledge is essent,ial in searching the literature in any language, hut since fewer of us know Russian than other major languages, because U. S. S. R. literature is not generally available, and few if any reliable guides to it are extant, this background kuowledge is much more important. To take a specific example: if you are interested in naval stores it would be quite futile to search the publications of the Armenian Academy or those of the Crimean Branch of the U. S. S. R. Academy, or puhlications of the Kishinev University. This particular search should concentrate on the puhlications of the Forest Technology Institute, Sbornik Nauchno-lssledouatel'skikh Rabat, Lesotekhnicheslcii Institut, those of the Forest Technology Academy, Trudy, Lesotekhnicheskaya Akademiya, of the Belorussian Forest Technology Institute, Sbornik Nauchnykh Trudou, Belorusskd Lesotelchnicheskii Institut, the puhIications of the Siberian Branch of the U. S. S. R. Academy, Sibirskii Filial Akademii Nauk S S S R , of the Ural Branch, Ural'slcii Filial Akademii Nauk S S S R , of the several Siberian universities, or the pertinent publications of the Latvian and Lithuanian academies and universities, to mention the most important sources. SIZE OF PUBLICATIONS: 1940-55
It is quite obvious that the size of an edition affects greatly the availablity of a publication. Ordinarily, the number of printed copies is of little interest to the chemist searching the literature. If a publication is needed but not available in the library, its purchase can be requested even if it means ordering it from abroad. In the worst case, a reprint of a particular paper or a photocopy can be obtained. This is not the case with U. S. S. R. publications. Unless the publication is available at our ,national library (Library of Congress), it cannot be obtained. The period covered by this study extends from 1940 to 1955 and the comparative surveys are made at five years' interval. In 1940 or just before the war, the output of scientific and technical literature in the U. S. S. R. was normal for that time. Immediately following the outbreak of the war, the number of pnblications and the size of editions dropped. Publications in related fields combined and others were suspended. The downward trend continued to about 1945 at which time it started upward again. In 1950 the recovery was complete. In 1954-55 new titles appeared in number and the size of editions increased greatly. For the purpose of examining the size of editions as it varies with the character of the publication and over a period of time 100 titles currently received in this country were selected. These comprise predominantly periodicals, i.e., publications scheduled to appear a t definite time intervals, and a few serials or publications appearing continuously but having no definite periodicity.
Of the selected titles 76 are published by bodies of the central government: U. S. S. R. Academy of Sciences publishes 24 and the ministries publish 52 of this selection. Another 7 titles are the various series of R~ferativni Zhurnal. Ten others are published by the academies of the Federated Republics and the rest by universities. The professional level of the selected publications varies from those which are intended for technicians and industrial foremen to pnblications of purely theoretical interest. The main publication of a university if it appears in one series includes both humanities and sciences. Frequently, two series are puhlished, one devoted to humanities and the other to natural and mathematical sciences. If a university publishes more than one serial, such as Vestnik and Nauchnye or Uchenye Zapiski, the Zapiski (usually a serial) may contain papers in more than one department of sciences or it may be devoted alternatingly to chemistry in one issue, to physics, geology, or other fields in subsequent issues. Of the publications examined Sovetskaya Meditena had the largest number of printed copies-58,000. This publication is sponsored by the Ministry of Health (Ministerstuo Zdravookhraneniya S S S R ) and is puhlished by Medgiz, the publishing arm of the same Ministry. Among the publications issued by the central administration, the serial Izuestiya Sektora Platiny i Drugilch Blagorodnykh Metallou has the smallest number of copies-1500. It deals with noble metals and their coordination compounds, the work being done by a subdivision of the Department of General and Inorganic Chemistry in the U. S. S. R. Academy of Sciences. It is published by the Academy. The second and third largest editions, 55,000 and 43,000, respectively, are those of Veterinariya and Energetik, the former (Veterinary Medicine) sponsored by the Ministry of Agriculture (Ministerstvo Sel'slcogo Khozyaistua S S S R ) and published by Sel'slcho~giz,and the latter (Power Engineer) sponsored by the Ministry of Power Generating Stations (Ministerstuo Elektrostantsii S S S R ) and published by Gosenergizdat. Of Academy publications examined, the largest editions were those of the Vestnik Akademii Nauk S S S R (the house organ of the Academy), 7625 copies, Uspekhi Khimii (Advances in Chemistry), 6725 copies, and Zhurnal Analiticheslcoi Khimii (Analytical Chemistry), 6625 copies. The smallest editions were those of the previously mentioned Izvestiya Sektora Platiny and Izuestiya Sektora Fiziko-Khimicheskogo Analiza, 1500 copies each, Trudy Pochvennogo Instituta (Soil Institute) and Trmdy Instituta Fiziologii Rastenii (Plant Physiology), around 2000 copies each, and Kolloidnyi Zhurnal, 3080 copies. The increase in the number of copies printed in 1955 over that of 1940 or 1939 (whichever was available for examination) is very substantial except in the case of one publication Zavodskaya Laboratoriya (Industrial Laboratory) where there was a decrease of 16.7%. For Academy publications, the increase ranges from 41% for Poehvouedenie (Pedology) and 43% for Zhurnal Obshchei Khimii (Journal of General Chemistry) to 1480jo for Izuestiya Akademii Naulc, Otdelenie Tekhnicheskikh Nauk (Division of Technological Sciences) and 2210j0 for Zhurnal Analiticheskoi Khimii. The
average increase in the number of copies printed of periodicals in the field of heavy industry is 68.6% and ranges from 2000j0 for Vestnik Mashimstroeniya (Machine Building) to minus 16.30jo for the above mentioned Zavodskaya Laboratoriya. The increases in the size of editions in 1955 over that of 1940 or 1939 of periodical publications in the fields of mining, power, medicine, and agriculture is of the same order of magnitude. Periodicals of the Ukrainian Academy of Sciences appear in 1000-1200 copies, an exception being Avtomaticheskaya Suarlca (Automatic Welding) published in 5000 copies. The Kazakh Academy of Sciences prints 1200 copies of its Vestnik. Most of the academies of the other Federated Repuhlics print around 700-750 copies of each of their periodicals. The Vestnik of the Moscow and Leningrad universities appear in 1400-1600 copies, the Nauchnye and Uchenye Zapiski of most of the universities appear in around 700 copies or less. Some of the provincial university publications not included in this survey appear in approximately 300 copies. The Referativnyi Zhurnal series appears in 21,950 copies. Of these the largest edition is that of Khimiya series in 4850 copies and the smallest is the Biologicheskaya Khimiya in 1500 copies. The latter was only recently split out from Khimiya and is actually a part of it; thus, the chemistry series appears in 6350 copies. The other series Fizika, Geologiya i Geografiya, Astronomiya i Geoderiya, Mekhanika, and Biologiya appear in approximately 3000 copies each. ABSTRACTSIAND BIBLIOGRAPHIES
Except for a brief period of 193841 during which appeared Khimicheskii Referativnyi Zhurnal, abstracting of chemical literature in the Soviet Union did not start until 1953. Therefore, any search of that material has to start with Chemical Abstracts. I n 1953 the various series of Referativnyi Zhurnal began to appear. The coverage also started with that year, i.e., that material published prior t o that does not enter the Referatiunyi Zhurnal. Chemical Abstracts has an understanding with Referat. Zhur. that abstracts may he translated from one into the other giving credit to the source. The Referat. Zhur. appearsin these series: Astronomy and Geodesy; Automation; Radio Engineering, Electronics, and Electrical Engineering; Biology; Biological Chemistry; Chemistry; Geography; Geology; Mathematics; Mechanical Engineering; Mechanics; Metallurgy; and Physics. There also is an abstract journal from medical literature, Sovetslcoe Meditsinskoe Referatiunoe Oborrenie (SMRO). This publication appears in fifteen series dealing with the various branches of medicine and has an author and subject index. Three Soviet publications, Uspekhi Khimii, Uspekhi Fizieheskikh Nauk, and Uspekhi Sovremennoi Biologii, are largely devoted to reviews. These publications should be noted by the searcher because of extensive bibliographies appended to the reviem articles. Pertinent, extensive bibliographies are to be found in Trudy Instituta Geologicheskikh Naulc A N S S S R . Review articles on specific topics are likely t o appear in other publications and they are worth perusing for their bibliographies. JOURNAL OF CHEMICAL EDUCATION
The publications just mentioned are periodicals, i.e., are scheduled to appear a t regular intervals. In addition, there are Uspekhi (Advances) appearing as serials, e.g., Uspekhi Biologicheskoi Khimii published by the Academy, Uspekhi Khimii i Tekhmlogii Polimerov (Advances in chemistry and technology of polymers) sponsored by the All-Union Chemical Society, and others. These publications too carry extensive bibliographies. Soviet periodicals are rather prompt in publishing indexes a t the end of the year. The subject indexes of specific publications should be examined when marching for specific topics. An organization within the Ministry of Culture is the Vsesoyuznaya Knizhnaya Palata (All-Union Book Palace) charged with maintaining the national bibliography of the Soviet Union. The law provides that the Vsesoyuznaya Knizhnaya Palata receive one
VOLUME 34, NO. 4, APRIL, 1957
or more copies of each item printed anywhere in the Soviet Union. The material received by the Knizhnaya Palata is recorded in a series of bibliographies called Letopis' (Record) published by the Knizhnaya Palata. Of primary interest to the searcher of scientific and technical literature is the Knizhnaya Letopis' (Book Record) which also indexes dissertations for advanced degrees, and the Letopis Zhurnal'nykh State; (Record of Periodical Articles). . There is also a record of newspaper articles, one for music, one for art, and so on. The Record of Periodicals, issued weekly, comprises a briefly annotated listing of articles published in the periodical literature arranged by subject. Each issue has an alphabetical index of periodicals reviewed in the particular issue. The Letopis Zhurnal'nykh Statel is not a very efficient tool for subject searching. It is of primary importance as a title bibliography, i.e., a listing of what is being published.
