The Russian Space Research Institute (; SRI RAS,

Russian Russian(s) may refer to: *Russians (), an ethnic group of the East Slavic peoples, primarily living in Russia and neighboring countries *A citizen of Russia *Russian language, the most widely spoken of the Slavic languages *''The Russians'', a b ...

abbreviation An abbreviation () is a shortened form of a word or phrase, by any method including shortening (linguistics), shortening, contraction (grammar), contraction, initialism (which includes acronym), or crasis. An abbreviation may be a shortened for ...

: ИКИ РАН, IKI RAN) is the leading organization of the

Russian Academy of Sciences The Russian Academy of Sciences (RAS; ''Rossíyskaya akadémiya naúk'') consists of the national academy of Russia; a network of scientific research institutes from across the Russian Federation; and additional scientific and social units such ...

space exploration Space exploration is the process of utilizing astronomy and space technology to investigate outer space. While the exploration of space is currently carried out mainly by astronomers with telescopes, its physical exploration is conducted bo ...

to benefit

fundamental science Basic research, also called pure research, fundamental research, basic science, or pure science, is a type of scientific research with the aim of improving scientific theories for better understanding and prediction of natural or other phenome ...

. It was formerly known as the Space Research Institute of the USSR Academy of Sciences (

abbr. An abbreviation () is a shortened form of a word or phrase, by any method including shortening, contraction, initialism (which includes acronym), or crasis. An abbreviation may be a shortened form of a word, usually ended with a trailing perio ...

: ИКИ АН СССР, IKI AN SSSR). It is usually known by the shorter name Space Research Institute and especially by the initialism IKI. The institute is located in

Moscow Moscow is the Capital city, capital and List of cities and towns in Russia by population, largest city of Russia, standing on the Moskva (river), Moskva River in Central Russia. It has a population estimated at over 13 million residents with ...

with a staff of 289

scientist A scientist is a person who Scientific method, researches to advance knowledge in an Branches of science, area of the natural sciences. In classical antiquity, there was no real ancient analog of a modern scientist. Instead, philosophers engag ...

s. It conducts scientific research in the fields of

astrophysics Astrophysics is a science that employs the methods and principles of physics and chemistry in the study of astronomical objects and phenomena. As one of the founders of the discipline, James Keeler, said, astrophysics "seeks to ascertain the ...

planetary science Planetary science (or more rarely, planetology) is the scientific study of planets (including Earth), celestial bodies (such as moons, asteroids, comets) and planetary systems (in particular those of the Solar System) and the processes of ...

solar physics Solar physics is the branch of astrophysics that specializes in the study of the Sun. It intersects with many disciplines of pure physics and astrophysics. Because the Sun is uniquely situated for close-range observing (other stars cannot be re ...

Sun The Sun is the star at the centre of the Solar System. It is a massive, nearly perfect sphere of hot plasma, heated to incandescence by nuclear fusion reactions in its core, radiating the energy from its surface mainly as visible light a ...

Earth Earth is the third planet from the Sun and the only astronomical object known to Planetary habitability, harbor life. This is enabled by Earth being an ocean world, the only one in the Solar System sustaining liquid surface water. Almost all ...

relations, cosmic plasma, and

geophysics Geophysics () is a subject of natural science concerned with the physical processes and Physical property, properties of Earth and its surrounding space environment, and the use of quantitative methods for their analysis. Geophysicists conduct i ...

. IKI also develops and tests space technologies in collaboration with the

and the Federal Space Agency.

History

It was founded on May 15, 1965, by the Soviet Union's

Council of Ministers Council of Ministers is a traditional name given to the supreme Executive (government), executive organ in some governments. It is usually equivalent to the term Cabinet (government), cabinet. The term Council of State is a similar name that also m ...

decree #392-147. Initially, the institute formed its staff by drawing scientists from other research organizations. With time, it grew to two thousand employees, including those in a few branches located elsewhere in the country. In 1992, a year after the

dissolution of the Soviet Union The Soviet Union was formally dissolved as a sovereign state and subject of international law on 26 December 1991 by Declaration No. 142-N of the Soviet of the Republics of the Supreme Soviet of the Soviet Union. Declaration No. 142-Н of ...

it was rechristened with its present name.

Directors of the institute

# Georgy Petrov (1965–1973) # Roald Z. Sagdeev (1973–1988) # Albert Galeev (1988–2002) # Lev Zeleny (2002–2018) # Anatoly Petrukovich (2018–present)

Research

The institute engages in research in the following areas: * High-energy astrophysics *

Planetary science Planetary science (or more rarely, planetology) is the scientific study of planets (including Earth), celestial bodies (such as moons, asteroids, comets) and planetary systems (in particular those of the Solar System) and the processes of ...

* Space plasma physics *

Interplanetary medium The interplanetary medium (IPM) or interplanetary space consists of the mass and energy which fills the Solar System, and through which all the larger Solar System bodies, such as planets, dwarf planet A dwarf planet is a small planetary ...

and

solar wind The solar wind is a stream of charged particles released from the Sun's outermost atmospheric layer, the Stellar corona, corona. This Plasma (physics), plasma mostly consists of electrons, protons and alpha particles with kinetic energy betwee ...

Earth science Earth science or geoscience includes all fields of natural science related to the planet Earth. This is a branch of science dealing with the physical, chemical, and biological complex constitutions and synergistic linkages of Earth's four spheres ...

Optical physics Atomic, molecular, and optical physics (AMO) is the study of matter–matter and light–matter interactions, at the scale of one or a few atoms and energy scales around several electron volts. The three areas are closely interrelated. AMO th ...

research *

Satellite A satellite or an artificial satellite is an object, typically a spacecraft, placed into orbit around a celestial body. They have a variety of uses, including communication relay, weather forecasting, navigation ( GPS), broadcasting, scient ...

Situation Center * Russian Space Science Internet * Data Archive

Current missions and experiments

* Plasma-F suit (three scientific instruments and data processing unit) onboard

Spektr-R Spektr-R (part of RadioAstron program) ( Russian: Спектр-Р) was a Russian scientific satellite with a radio telescope on board. It was launched on 18 July 2011 on a Zenit-3F launcher from Baikonur Cosmodrome, and was designed to perform ...

spacecraft (end of mission 2019), * HEND (short for High Energy Neutron Detector) instrument onboard

Mars Odyssey ''2001 Mars Odyssey'' is a robotic spacecraft orbiting the planet Mars. The project was developed by NASA, and contracted out to Lockheed Martin, with an expected cost for the entire mission of US$297 million. Its mission is to use spectro ...

mission (

NASA The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA ) is an independent agencies of the United States government, independent agency of the federal government of the United States, US federal government responsible for the United States ...

), *

Mars Express ''Mars Express'' is a space exploration mission by the European Space Agency, European Space Agency (ESA) exploring the planet Mars and its moons since 2003, and the first planetary mission attempted by ESA. ''Mars Express'' consisted of two ...

( ESA) mission for Mars

remote sensing Remote sensing is the acquisition of information about an physical object, object or phenomenon without making physical contact with the object, in contrast to in situ or on-site observation. The term is applied especially to acquiring inform ...

. IKI contributed to three instruments on board the mission: OMEGA mapping spectrometer, PFS (Planetary Fourier Spectrometer), and SPICAM infrared and UV spectrometer. Russian scientists are also co-investigators in most scientific groups of the project. Launched in 2003. * Venus Express ( ESA) mission for Venus remote sensing. IKI contributed to two instruments on board the spacecraft: SPICAV/SOIR infrared and UV-spectrometer and PFS (Planetary Fourier Spectrometer). Russian scientists are also co-investigators in three other experiments VIRTIS, VMS, and ASPERA. Launched in 2005. * LEND (short for Lunar Exploration Neutron Detector) instrument onboard

Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter The Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO) is a NASA robotic spacecraft currently orbiting the Moon in an eccentric Polar orbit, polar mapping orbit. Data collected by LRO have been described as essential for planning NASA's future human and robotic ...

(

), * DAN (short for Dynamic Albedo of Neutrons) instrument onboard

Curiosity Curiosity (from Latin , from "careful, diligent, curious", akin to "care") is a quality related to inquisitive thinking, such as exploration, investigation, and learning, evident in humans and other animals. Curiosity helps Developmental psyc ...

rover (

Mars Science Laboratory Mars Science Laboratory (MSL) is a robotic spacecraft, robotic space probe mission to Mars launched by NASA on November 26, 2011, which successfully landed ''Curiosity (rover), Curiosity'', a Mars rover, in Gale (crater), Gale Crater on Augus ...

project,

), * Chibis-M microsatellite (end of mission October 15, 2014), *

INTEGRAL In mathematics, an integral is the continuous analog of a Summation, sum, which is used to calculate area, areas, volume, volumes, and their generalizations. Integration, the process of computing an integral, is one of the two fundamental oper ...

(INTErnational Gamma-Ray Astrophysics Laboratory, ESA) X-ray and gamma-ray orbital observatory. It was delivered to space by Proton launcher from Baikonur cosmodrome, under condition that Russian scientists get 25% of the observational time. IKI hosts INTEGRAK Russian Scientific Data Center, * RTT150 Russian-Turkish 1.5-m Telescope. International observatory in Turkey (previously called AZT-22), mountain Bakyrlytepe is an international project carried out under supervision of the Ministry of Education and Science of Russian Federation and the Scientific and Technological Research Council of Turkey (TUBITAK). From the Russian side the main executing participants are Kazan State University (KGU) and IKI, from the Turkish side it is managed by TUBITAK National Observatory (TUG). In accordance to the agreement between the participants of the project, the telescope observing time is shared as follows: 45% – KGU, 15% – IKI, and 40% – are shared between Turkish universities through TUG, * MKS-Obstanovka (ISS-Environment) experiment onboard

International Space Station The International Space Station (ISS) is a large space station that was Assembly of the International Space Station, assembled and is maintained in low Earth orbit by a collaboration of five space agencies and their contractors: NASA (United ...

(Russian segment), * RELEC (microsatellite experiment to study energetic particles in the near-Earth space, principal organisation — Skobeltsyn Institute for Nuclear Physics of Lomonosov Moscow State University). Additionally, IKI's scientists belong to various international collaborations on a number of science projects, such as

IBEX An ibex ( : ibex, ibexes or ibices) is any of several species of wild goat (genus ''Capra''), distinguished by the male's large recurved horns, which are transversely ridged in front. Ibex are found in Eurasia, North Africa and East Africa. T ...

and

Planck Max Karl Ernst Ludwig Planck (; ; 23 April 1858 – 4 October 1947) was a German theoretical physicist whose discovery of energy quanta won him the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1918. Planck made many substantial contributions to theoretical p ...

, and are engaged in studies with Earth-based facilities.

External links

Space Research Institute of the Russian Academy of Sciences

References

{{authority control 1965 establishments in the Soviet Union Institutes of the Russian Academy of Sciences Soviet and Russian space institutions Buildings and structures built in the Soviet Union Buildings and structures in Moscow Research institutes in the Soviet Union Space technology research institutes Moscow Institute of Physics and Technology