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The consequences of political dictatorship for Russian science

Nature Reviews Genetics volume 2, pages 723–729 (2001)Cite this article

Abstract

The Soviet communist regime had devastating consequences on the state of Russian twentieth century science. Country Communist leaders promoted Trofim Lysenko — an agronomist and keen supporter of the inheritance of acquired characters — and the Soviet government imposed a complete ban on the practice and teaching of genetics, which it condemned as a “bourgeois perversion”. Russian science, which had previously flourished, rapidly declined, and many valuable scientific discoveries made by leading Russian geneticists were forgotten.

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Figure 1: Photo of Trofim Lysenko speaking at the Kremlin in 1935.
Figure 2: Nikolai Koltsov in his laboratory, 1929.
Figure 3: Giant hereditary molecules.

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Acknowledgements

The author thanks M. Adams, V. Chandhoke, K. Fryxell, G. Sher and G. Brillantes for their assistance and useful comments.

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  1. Department of Biology, Laboratory of Molecular Genetics, George Mason University, 4400 University Drive, MSN 3E1, Fairfax, 22030, Virginia, USA

    Valery N. Soyfer

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FURTHER INFORMATION

Nikolai Vavilov

Stalin

Ivan Pavlov

Ilya Mechnikov

Francis Crick and James Watson

Thomas H. Morgan

Lenin

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Soyfer, V. The consequences of political dictatorship for Russian science. Nat Rev Genet 2, 723–729 (2001). https://doi.org/10.1038/35088598

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