Nikolai Drozdov - Soviet and Russian zoologist, professor, TV presenter. From the history of zoology

After the opening in 1725 of the Academy of Sciences, and in 1755 of the Moscow University in Russia, the rapid formation of Russian science began. Back in 1720, Peter the Great sent to Siberia the scientific physician Daniil Messerschmidt, who traveled around Siberia for seven years and brought back rich collections of animals and birds. Even richer collections and discoveries were made by the participants of the second Kamchatka northern expedition of 1733-1742: S.P. Krasheninnikov, Gmelin the Elder, Steller.

The development of Russian natural science was greatly influenced by the research of M. V. Lomonosov, the brilliant son of the Russian people, who outstripped Western science with his brilliant discoveries. Academician PS Pallas lived in Russia almost all his life. He and his contemporaries I. Lepekhin, Gmelin the Younger and A. Guldenshtedt explored the east and south of the European part of Russia, Western Siberia, Altai, Baikal and Transbaikalia. In the 19th century The zoological survey of Russia was continued by the expeditions of the Academy of Sciences (K. Baer, ​​A. F. Middendorf), the Moscow Societies of Naturalists and Natural Science Lovers (S. Karelin, N. A. Severtsov, A. P. Bogdanov, A. P. Fedchenko) and Russian Geographical Society (N. M. Przhevalsky, I. Potanin, P. K. Kozlov, M. N. Bogdanov, P. P. Semenov-Tyan-Shansky).

Of great importance for the study of the fauna of the seas was the discovery of biological stations: the Sevastopol biological station (founded by A. O. Kovalevsky in 1871), the Neapolitan zoological station (A. Dorn, 1872), the freshwater station on Lake Deep near Moscow (N. Yu. Zograf, 1891), Murmansk station (K. M. Deryugin, 1896), Baikal limnological station, etc.

The publication in 1859 of Charles Darwin's On the Origin of Species was a major turning point in the history of zoology.

After the appearance of the teachings of Darwin (1859), the established concepts and ideas in all areas of biology underwent a radical revision. The view is no longer considered unchanged. Variety came to be understood as a formative species, animal system as a relation between groups resulting from evolutionary process. The phenomena of similarities in the development and basic plan of the structure of organs (homologues, see below) already known before Darwin received a natural explanation. It became clear the unity of multicellular animals in relation to their cellular structure. In embryology, the theory of germ layers began to develop rapidly (see below); the phenomenon of the similarity of embryos in animals that differ greatly in the adult state became clear and served as the starting point for the doctrine of the repetition of evolutionary development by embryonic development. Numerous interesting facts about the geographical distribution of animals and their geological history etc.

Nikolai Drozdov - Soviet and Russian zoologist, professor, TV presenter. ******************************************************* ******************************* Nikolai Nikolaevich Drozdov was born on June 20, 1937 in Moscow, in the family of a famous chemist. His father also had excellent knowledge of Latin and several other languages, was fond of paleontology, astronomy, botany, and history. In the appropriate atmosphere, Nikolai also grew up. While still at school, on the advice of his father, during the summer holidays he worked as a herdsman at a stud farm near Moscow. After school, he entered the Faculty of Biology of Moscow State University, but two years later he dropped out - he wanted independence, so he began to work. In a clothing factory, starting as an apprentice, in two years he "grew" to a master in tailoring men's outerwear. But then he returned to Moscow State University and in 1963 he graduated with honors from the Faculty of Geography, in 1964-1966 he studied there in graduate school, in 1968 he defended his candidate's, and in 2000 - his doctoral dissertation on biogeography. In parallel with his studies, Drozdov has been working as a researcher at the Department of Biogeography since 1966, since 1979 as an associate professor, and since 2000 as a professor, being today one of the most respected scientists and teachers of Moscow State University. He teaches ecology, ornithology, nature conservation, biogeography of the world, constantly delivers lectures, including abroad.

But Nikolai Nikolayevich is best known as the host of the weekly popular TV show "In the Animal World", where he has been participating since 1968. He started as a speaker (with host A. Zguridi) and scientific consultant for films about animals, and since 1977 he has become an author and host. The guests of the Drozdov program were such famous scientists and travelers as: Jacques-Yves Cousteau, Thor Heyerdahl, Peter Scott, Gerald Darrell, Frederic Rossif, Heinz Silman ... In 1995, the program "In the Animal World" was awarded the TEFI award as the best educational program. Also, Nikolai Nikolaevich repeatedly participated in numerous scientific expeditions, both across the territory of our country and around the world. In 1971-1972, he traveled around Australia, traveled around many areas of it, published a book about this trip, "Flight of the Boomerang", which was reprinted several times. In 1979 he climbed the top of Elbrus. He visited the North Pole three times and dived into the hole there, twice descended to the bottom of Lake Baikal in a bathyscaphe, made two round-the-world trips on scientific ships, and hundreds more expeditions, thousands of meetings ... In 2003 and 2004, Drozdov took part in the reality show " Last Hero”, having lived both times for more than a month on the uninhabited islands of the archipelagos of Bocas del Toro and Los Perlos (Panama).

Nikolai Nikolayevich is also known as the author of more than 200 scientific and popular science articles, about 30 books, textbooks and manuals. He is also the author and co-author of many films about nature and animals, the largest of which is the 6-episode television film The Kingdom of the Russian Bear, produced in collaboration with the BBC Natural History Department. The film was a great success in many European countries, the USA and Australia. Drozdov was repeatedly invited to the jury of film festivals of popular science films about animals and nature in Great Britain and Italy. Member of the International Explorers Club (Explorers Club), Russian Geographical Society, Russian Ecological Academy (REA), Russian Academy Natural Sciences (RANS), the New York Academy of Sciences, the Russian Academy of Television, International Academies of Patronage, Social Sciences, Culture and Art, Chairman of the Board of Trustees of the ICF "Patrons of the Century" - Drozdov was awarded the Orders of Friendship, Honor, "For Merit to the Fatherland" IV degree, St. Macarius, Metropolitan of Moscow, II degree, the Golden Panda Prize (also called the Green Oscar), the Kalinga Prize for the popularization of science, the A. Einstein UNESCO medal and other awards. He is included in the honorary list of leading ecologists and environmentalists of all countries of the world "Global 500" UNEP. Drozdov is a consultant to the UN Secretary General on ecology, a member of the Civic Chamber of the Russian Federation and a member of the IUCN National Parks Commission, where he still works. Nikolai Nikolaevich is married. His wife, Tatyana Petrovna, works as a biology teacher at the Moscow Palace of Children's and Youth Creativity. Their daughters are Nadezhda and Elena. In his free time from work and travel, Drozdov likes to work with living creatures. Among his favorites are snakes, tarantulas, phalanges, scorpions. He is fond of horse riding, skiing, swimming in the hole, studying yoga. He likes to perform old Russian folk songs, romances and modern popular songs in Russian and foreign languages. In the 1990s, he even released a video for a song for the In the World of Animals program, and in 2005, a CD with his favorite songs. Nikolai Nikolaevich is sure that it is "kindness that will save the world."

ABSTRACT ON ZOOLOGY ON THE TOPIC:

"Outstanding Scientists"

Novosibirsk city

Plan

1. Krasheninnikov Stepan Petrovich (1713-1755)

2. Pallas Peter Simon (1741-1811)

3. Ruler Carl (1814-1858)

4. Przhevalsky Nikolai Mikhailovich (1839-1888)

5. Kovalevsky Alexander Onufrievich (1840-1901)

6. Kovalevsky Vladimir Onufrievich (1842-1883)

7. Menzbir Mikhail Alexandrovich (1855-1935)

8. Severtsov Alexey Nikolaevich (1866-1936)

9. Sushkin Petr Petrovich (1868-1928)

10. Ognev Sergey Ivanovich (1886-1951)

11. Zenkevich Lev Alexandrovich (1889-1970)

12. Serebrovsky Alexander Sergeevich (1892-1933)

13. Geptner Vladimir Georgievich (1901-1975)

Krasheninnikov Stepan Petrovich

Krasheninnikov Stepan Petrovich (10/18/1713-02/12/1755) - the first Russian academic geographer, member of the Second Kamchatka Expedition, explorer of the Kamchatka Peninsula.

Born in Moscow in the family of a soldier. In 1724-1732 he studied at the Slavic-Greek-Latin Academy (Moscow), then in the philosophy class of the Academy of Sciences and Arts (St. Petersburg). In 1733, he was enrolled as a "student student" in the Academic Detachment of the Second Kamchatka Expedition and left for Okhotsk. Here he conducted hydrometeorological research, studied ichthyology, compiled a dictionary of the "Lamut language". On October 4, 1737, on the ship "Fortuna" he left Okhotsk for Kamchatka, where he was engaged in research for 4 years, having made many expeditions around the peninsula. In four years, he crossed the peninsula in different directions: he walked, rode sleds, rafted down rivers, climbed mountains. He conducted comprehensive research as a geologist and geographer, as a botanist and zoologist, as a historian and ethnographer, as a meteorologist and linguist. Krasheninnikov conducted a comprehensive study of Kamchatka in the field of natural sciences (geography, geology, seismology, volcanology), was the first Russian to study tsunamis, made meteorological observations, paid much attention to the ethnography of local peoples (Itelmens, Koryaks, Ainu), compiled aboriginal dictionaries, collected folklore of the inhabitants of Kamchatka . In Nizhne-Kamchatsk, Verkhne-Kamchatsk, Bolsheretsk, he restored the history of the region based on archives and inquiries from local residents. He studied the flora and fauna of Kamchatka, and the ichthyology of rivers and adjacent sea waters. In February 1743, with his young wife Stepanida Tsibulskaya (from Yakutsk), he returned to St. Petersburg. Since 1748 he was the rector of the academic university and the gymnasium attached to it. On the basis of the collected material, he wrote the books "Description of the Kamchatka people", "On the conquest of the Kamchatka land" (1751), the capital work "Description of the land of Kamchatka" (1756) with the application of two maps. This was the first thorough work on Kamchatka. In 1745, Krasheninnikov was elected an adjunct of the Academy of Sciences, and in 1750 he was appointed professor (academician) of natural history and botany. In 1751 he completed his book Description of the Land of Kamchatka, but the author never managed to see it printed. February 25, 1755 Krasheninnikov died, and his book was published in 1756.

His work was the first in Russian and world scientific literature a study about Kamchatka, devoted to its geography, natural history, description of the life and languages ​​of local peoples. "Description of the land of Kamchatka", which has not lost its scientific value for more than 200 years, is an example of a comprehensive regional description of a little-explored territory, an example of the Russian literary language of that time. S.P. died. Krasheninnikov in St. Petersburg. In 1989, his name was given to the Kamchatka Regional Library. 10 geographical objects are named after Krasheninnikov, including in Kamchatka - a peninsula, a bay, a mountain, an island; on the island of Karaginsky - a cape, on the island of Paramushir - a bay, a cape, near it - an underwater valley; on Novaya Zemlya - a peninsula and a cape, in Antarctica - a mountain.

Pallas Petr Simon

In 1767, the St. Petersburg Academy of Sciences elected Pallas as its full member. Despite his incomplete 27 years, Pallas already had the glory of a brilliant biologist behind him, blazing new trails in the taxonomy of animals. He gave more than 40 years of his life to the new Motherland scientific life.

Pallas' first big undertaking was an expedition to Eastern Russia and Siberia. From 1768-1774 the scientist explored central Russia, the regions of the Lower Volga region, the Caspian lowland, the Middle and Southern Urals, crossed Siberia, visited Baikal, Transbaikalia, and Altai.

Pallas had a hard time enduring the hardships of the journey. Several times he suffered from dysentery, suffered from chronic colitis, rheumatism, and his eyes were constantly inflamed. The 33-year-old scientist returned to St. Petersburg completely exhausted and gray-haired.

Thanks to Pallas, zoology was enriched with new methods of research related to ecology and ethology.

For six expeditionary years, collected unique material in zoology, botany, paleontology, geology, physical geography, economics, history, ethnography, culture and life of the peoples of Russia.

Peter Simon proposed a scheme for the structure of the Ural Mountains, in 1777 for the first time he compiled a topographic scheme of Siberia. The collected material about the flora and fauna of these territories, the scientist outlined in the work "Travel to different provinces of the Russian Empire."

Pallas described more than 250 species of animals that lived on the territory of Russia, additionally reporting on the distribution, seasonal and geographical variability, migrations, nutrition, and behavior of the animals he described. Pallas often expressed ideas about the physical and geographical factors of their settlement, so he can be considered one of the founders of zoogeography.

In the 1780s, he worked hard on the preparation of a general code of plants in Russia. Due to lack of funds, only two editions of this extensive work "Flora of Russia", 1784 and 1788, containing descriptions of about 300 plant species and amazing illustrations, were published.

At the same time, Pallas published articles on geography, paleontology, ethnography, and a two-volume work on the history of the Mongolian people was published. On behalf of Catherine II, Pallas published a comparative dictionary of all languages ​​​​and dialects of Russia.

In 1793-1794, Pallas undertook his second great journey, this time through the southern provinces of Russia. He explored the Crimea. The collections collected during this trip formed the basis of the collections of the academic cabinet of curiosities, and part of them ended up in the University of Berlin.

Pallas's works provide detailed information about climate, rivers, soils, flora and fauna. Crimean peninsula, contains descriptions of many historical places (Mangupa, Ai-Todor, Ayu-Daga, Sudak, etc.). The scientist was the initiator of the bookmark Nikitsky botanical garden, vineyards and orchards in the Sudak and Solnechnaya valleys, founded the Salgirka park in Simferopol. In honor of the scientist-geographer, one of the species of the Crimean pine was named the Pallas pine.

In 1797, Pallas's work "List of wild plants of the Crimea" was published. The author for the first time brilliantly described the vegetation cover of the Crimean peninsula, compiled an exhaustive list of wild plants of 969 species for that time.

The scientist initiated the laying of the Nikitsky Botanical Garden, vineyards and orchards in the Sudak and Solnechnaya valleys, founded the Salgirka park in Simferopol. In honor of the scientist-geographer, one of the species of the Crimean pine was named the Pallas pine.

In 1797, Pallas's work "List of wild plants of the Crimea" was published. The author for the first time brilliantly described the vegetation cover of the Crimean peninsula, compiled an exhaustive list of wild plants of 969 species for that time. In 1810 he returned to Berlin, where he died on September 8, 1811.

Ruler Carl

Ruler Karl (1814-1858) - Russian zoologist and doctor of medicine - was born on April 8 (20), 1814 in Nizhny Novgorod, Russian Empire.

In 1829, Roulier entered the Moscow Department of the Medico-Surgical Academy, from which he graduated on August 18, 1833 with a silver medal and received the title of doctor. On August 6, 1836, he was approved as a tutor (assistant) under G. I. Fischer von Waldheim. Roulier worked with Fischer for one year. In September 1837, Fischer retired, and the Department of Natural History passed to Professor I.O. Shikhovsky, and Roulier was appointed adjunct professor. By this time, he had already received a doctorate in medicine. She was awarded to him for his dissertation on bleeding in general and hemorrhoidal in particular.

On March 5, 1838, the Council of the Academy instructed Roulier to independently read a course in zoology and mineralogy. At the same time, he was entrusted with the management of the zoological and mineralogical rooms of the Academy, the exhibits of which Roulier widely used for demonstration at his lectures. Even before that - on July 13, 1837 - Roulier was appointed curator of the Natural History Museum of Moscow University. On November 18, 1837, he was elected a full member of the Moscow Society of Naturalists. On September 20, 1838, Roulier was elected second secretary of this society. On July 13, 1840, in connection with the relocation of I.O. Shikhovsky in St. Petersburg, Rulye was elected the first secretary of the Moscow Society of Naturalists and stayed with him until 1851.

At the same time, Roulier began a great deal of work on the study of the history of zoology in Russia. Roulier's work did not see the light of the day, but with the help of processing a huge amount of factual zoological material, Roulier was able to quickly understand the main directions of contemporary zoological science and understand the prospects for its development.

On February 28, 1840, the Council of Moscow University invited Roulier to take the chair of zoology that had been vacated after the death of Professor A. L. Lovetsky. In 1842 he was elected extraordinary, and in 1850 ordinary professor.

In the article "Doubts in Zoology as a Science" (1842), Roulier showed that the main direction of contemporary zoology - systematics - does not have reliable scientific principles of classification, that "where there should be the strictest laws, pure arbitrariness guides" and, consequently, many ideas prevailing in zoology are completely untenable. Accepting the idea of ​​the evolution of organisms, Roulier believed that the evidence for it, put forward by Lamarck, Geoffroy and others, was insufficient.

Roulier believed that numerous observations and "historical evidence" - data from geology and paleontology - are needed to prove the variability of species. Until 1849, Roulier intensively conducted field geological and paleontological studies and studied in detail all the most interesting outcrops of the Moscow region basin.

The study of geology and fossil organisms convinced Roulier more and more of the historical development of the earth's surface and life on it, of the interconnection between natural phenomena and the materiality of the causes that determine the development of the organic world. His classic work "On the Animals of the Moscow Province" and many others were essentially devoted to the proof of this.

Roulier developed the idea that the evolution of the earth's surface was accompanied by the evolution of the organic world, that changes caused successive successive changes in organic forms.

Roulier called the path that the researcher of the organic world must take the comparative-historical method of research. He was deeply convinced of the historical development of nature and the organic world, of the obligatory unity of the organism and the conditions of existence.

Roulier's essential contribution to the development of the theory of evolution was that he included interaction between organisms in the concept of environment.

Roulier was the first Russian biologist who began developing the problems of zoopsychology as a special branch of biology and pointed out the need to create "comparative psychology". He proved the dependence of the mental activity of animals, their instincts and way of life on the conditions of existence in which this species has been throughout history. Roulier was the first to approach the problems of zoopsychology as an integral part of animal ecology.

Roulier opposed the consideration of the instincts and mental activity of animals as phenomena that are not amenable to scientific explanation. “Either there is no instinct, or there is a sense in it”, - this is how he formulated his approach to the study of instincts, which he understood as reactions developed by a species throughout its history to certain environmental influences.

In 1854, Roulier founded and until his death (1858) edited the journal "Bulletin of Natural Sciences".

PRzhevalsky Nikolai Mikhailovich

Przhevalsky Nikolai Mikhailovich (03/31/1839 - 11/20/1888) - scientist, geographer, traveler, explorer of Central Asia, honorary member of the St. Petersburg Academy of Sciences since 1878, major general since 1886.

Born in the village of Kimborovo, Smolensk province, into a noble family. I have dreamed of traveling since childhood. His father, Mikhail Kuzmich, served in the Russian army. His initial teacher was his uncle P. A. Karetnikov, a passionate hunter who instilled in him this passion and, along with it, a love for nature and wandering.

In 1855 he graduated from the Smolensk gymnasium. At the end of the course at the Smolensk gymnasium, Przhevalsky decided in Moscow as a non-commissioned officer in the Ryazan infantry regiment; having received an officer rank, he moved to the Polotsk regiment, then entered the academy general staff. At the height of the Sevastopol defense, he entered the army as a volunteer, but he did not have to fight. After 5 years of the unloved Przhevalsky N.M. military service was refused to transfer him to the Amur for research work.

In 1861 he entered the Academy of the General Staff, where he completed his first geographical work "Military Geographical Review of the Amur Territory", for which the Russian Geographical Society elected him a member.

In 1863 he graduated from the academic course and went as a volunteer to Poland to suppress the uprising. He served in Warsaw as a teacher of history and geography at the cadet school, where he was seriously engaged in self-education, preparing to become a professional researcher of little-studied countries.

In 1866 he was assigned to Eastern Siberia. He made a number of expeditions to the Ussuri region (1867-1869), as well as in 1870-10-1885 to Mongolia, Tibet and China. Surveyed more than 30 thousand km. the path he traveled, discovered unknown mountain ranges and lakes, a wild camel, a Tibetan bear, a wild horse named after him. He told about his travels in books, giving vivid description Central Asia: its flora, fauna, climate, peoples who lived in it; collected unique collections, becoming a universally recognized classic of geographical science.

The result of the first trip was the book "Journey in the Ussuri Territory" and rich collections for the geographical society. For the first time he described the nature of many regions of Asia, lakes and mountain ranges unknown to Europeans; collected collections of plants and animals, described a wild camel, a wild horse (Przewalski's horse), etc.

He died of typhoid fever (11/20/1888), preparing to make his fifth expedition to Central Asia. A number of geographical objects, species of animals and plants are named after him. In 1892, a monument to Przhevalsky N.M. was opened in St. Petersburg. sculptors Schroeder I.N. and Runeberg R.A.

TOOvalevsky Alexander Onufrievich

Kovalevsky Alexander Onufrievich (1840-1901) - a famous Russian scientist, was born on November 19, 1840 in the estate of Vorkovo, Dinaburg district, Vitebsk province. Alexander Onufrievich entered the Corps of Railway Engineers, but soon left it and entered the natural science department of the Faculty of Physics and Mathematics of St. Petersburg University. In 1960, Kovalevsky left for Germany, where he soon began scientific work in the laboratory of the famous chemist Bunsen. Carried away by zoology, Alexander Onufrievich began to study histology and microscopy techniques with Professor F. Leydig. Returning to St. Petersburg, in 1863 Kovalevsky passed the university exams and received a PhD in natural sciences for his work on the anatomy of the sea cockroach.

In 1864, the scientist again went abroad. On the coast of the Mediterranean Sea A.O. Kovalevsky conducted a study of the larval development of ascidians, which showed a similar development with the lancelet larva. The zoologist studied the structure of intestinal-breathers, observed the embryonic development of ctenophores, bryozoans, phoronids, and echinoderms.

In 1865, Kovalevsky defended his master's thesis: "The history of the development of the lancelet - Amphioxus lanceolatus", two years later a doctorate degree for his dissertation: "On the development of Phoronis." Having completed a number of comparative embryological studies, Kovalevsky formulated his provisions on full compliance germ layers in vertebrates and invertebrates, drawing evolutionary conclusions from this position. For his work on the development of worms and arthropods (1871), the scientist was awarded the Baer Prize of the Academy of Sciences.

Alexander Onufrievich was successively professor of zoology at Kazan and Kiev universities. In Kyiv, he took an active part in the organization of the Society of Naturalists, and published his works in its publications. In 1870-73, the scientist made scientific expeditions to the Red Sea and Algeria, where, studying the biology of the development of brachiopods, he established their similarity in embryogenesis with bryozoans and annelids. It became clear that Brachiopoda could not be combined with mollusks. Later, brachiopods were identified as a separate type.

In 1874, I.I. Mechnikov persuaded Kovalevsky to transfer to the Novorossiysk (Odessa) University. The scientist often traveled abroad, in Villafranca, a town near Nice, in 1886, with the participation of Kovalevsky, a Russian zoological station was organized, in our time it is run by the University of Paris. His article "Observation of the development of Coelencerata" (1873) was published, where the author cited data on the development of hydroid polyps and jellyfish, scyphomedusa and coral polyps.

In Odessa, Kovalevsky continued his embryological observations and began comparative physiological studies of the excretory organs of invertebrates. Kovalevsky A.O., applying the teachings of Mechnikov to explain the processes of dissolution of the larval organs and pupae of flies, showed that the larval organs are destroyed and eaten by the blood cells of the pupa, and special accumulations of cells (imaginal rudiments) remain intact and subsequently give the organs of an adult insect.

After being elected an ordinary academician of the Imperial Academy of Sciences in 1890, A.O. Kovalevsky moved to St. Petersburg, where in 1891 he took the chair of histology at St. Petersburg University. On the Black Sea coast, the scientist founded the Sevastopol Zoological Station, and for a long time was its director.

Since 1897, Kovalevsky was one of the editors of the biological sciences department in the 82-volume Brockhaus-Efron Encyclopedic Dictionary.

In the last years of his life, he studied a lot of leeches, exploring their anatomical structure, physiological features and lifestyle.

Alexander Onufrievich Kovalevsky died after a cerebral hemorrhage on November 22, 1901 in St. Petersburg.

Kovalevsky Vladimir Onufrievich

Kovalevsky Vladimir Onufrievich (1842-1883) - Russian paleontologist was born on August 12, 1842 in the village of Shustyanka, Vitebsk province. Since 1851 V.O. Kovalevsky studied at the private boarding school V.F. Megina in Petersburg. In March 1855 he entered the sixth grade of the School of Law, from which he graduated in 1861. Fascinated by natural science after his brother (the famous embryologist Alexander Kovalevsky), Vladimir Kovalevsky earned a living by translating books on natural science.

In 1861 he left for Germany, then to England, where at first he continued to study law. At the beginning of 1863, V.O. Kovalevsky went to Poland, where, together with P.I. Jacobi participated in the Polish uprising. Returning to St. Petersburg at the end of the year, Kovalevsky met I.M. Sechenov and Dr. P.I. Lateral. Soon V.O. Kovalevsky abandoned the profession of a lawyer, and, again taking up translations, he finally became interested in the natural sciences.

In the autumn of 1868, V.O. Kovalevsky married Sofya Vasilievna Korvin-Krukovskaya, who later became an outstanding mathematician. Family circumstances forced the spouses to leave Russia for Germany: only there Sophia could enter the university.

In 1870, having moved with difficulty to London because of the Franco-Prussian War, the Kovalevskys settled near the British Museum. The scientist began an in-depth study of geology in all its directions. He spent a lot of time in the museum library, engaged in the taxonomy of mollusks, fish, and reptiles. Using the works of Cuvier, Owen, and Blainville, using the skeletons available in the Anatomical Museum and the dental system, Vladimir Onufrievich studied mammals.

One of the most important tasks of paleontology V.O. Kovalevsky considered the clarification of kinship in the animal world. He traced phylogenetic series, considering them to be the best evidence for evolution. IN. Kovalevsky made the first attempt to build a pedigree of ungulates based on the principles of Charles Darwin's theory. His classic monograph “On Anchiteria and the Paleontological History of Horses” (1873) is devoted to this issue.

In his works, the scientist posed and correctly resolved such problems as monophyly and polyphyly in evolution, the divergence of signs (principles of divergence and adaptive radiation). He was concerned about the problem of the relationship between progress and specialization, the role of leaps in the development of the organic world, the factors and patterns of extinction of organisms, changes in organs due to changes in functions, the problem of correlations (ratios) in the development of organs, and some other patterns of the evolutionary process. V. O. Kovalevsky became a pioneer of the paleoecological trend in paleontology.

Despite the fact that V.O. Kovalevsky to the study of paleontological material, based on the theory of Darwin, was fresh and new, world fame came to the scientist only after his death: V.O. Kovalevsky was recognized as the founder of evolutionary paleontology, a new stage in the development of this science.

In November 1874, V.O. Kovalevsky successfully passed the exams for a master's degree at the St.

On December 22, 1874, the St. Petersburg Mineralogical Society awarded V.O. Kovalevsky for his work on Entelodon Gelocus and his dissertation on Anchiteria.

Vladimir Onufrievich established a number of regularities in the evolution of ungulates. Of particular importance is the discovery by Kovalevsky in 1875 of the Law of adaptive and non-adaptive changes. The ecological distribution of almost all living organisms is subject to this law: the relative expediency of the structure of an organism is developed in connection with certain changes in the environment as a result of natural selection.

In 1875, due to the deteriorating financial situation, the paleontologist had to resume publishing work and, at the insistence of his wife, start a number of commercial cases, in particular, the construction of tenement houses and baths. In 1883, after a serious illness, he died.

Menzbir Mikhail Alexandrovich

Menzbir Mikhail Alexandrovich (1855-1935) - was born on October 4, 1855 in Tula, Russian Empire, into a poor noble family. His father was in the military; when Mikhail Alexandrovich was 11 years old, he lost his mother, who died of tuberculosis. After graduating from the Tula gymnasium in 1874 with a silver medal, Menzbir entered Moscow University in the natural department of the Faculty of Physics and Mathematics. His teachers were Yakov Andreevich Borzenkov (1825-1883) and Sergey Aleksandrovich Usov (1827-1886), students of K.F. Ruler (1814-1858).

Mikhail Alexandrovich graduated from the university in 1878, was left to prepare for a professorship at the Department of Zoology in the laboratory of Ya.A. Borzenkov. Menzbier's first scientific work, "The Ornithological Fauna of the Tula Province" (1879), was devoted to faunistics and zoogeography.

In 1879, having met N.A. Severtsov, Mikhail Alexandrovich began to work on his master's thesis "Ornithological geography European Russia”, successfully defending it in 1882.

After defending the dissertation M.A. Menzbier undertook an obligatory foreign business trip to Europe. The scientist was engaged not only in zoogeography, but also in the comparative anatomy of vertebrates and invertebrates.

To work on his monograph, he collected material on birds of prey, got acquainted with the setting of the museum business, studied evolutionary problems, investigated and described many new subspecies and forms of diurnal predators. Despite the long period of rejection of the “triple taxonomy” and critical statements about it, Mikhail Alexandrovich was one of the first in our country to switch to the use of the triple (subspecies) nomenclature and later supported the interest in the new taxonomy among his students, zoologists B.M. Zhitkova, S.I. Ogneva, N.A. Bobrinsky, G.P. Dementieva.

Returning to Moscow University in 1884, M.A. Menzbier took up the position of assistant professor and began teaching. Mikhail Aleksandrovich was a brilliant lecturer; he taught lecture courses on zoology, comparative anatomy, and zoogeography.

At the age of 31, Mikhail Alexandrovich became one of the youngest professors of zoology in the history of Moscow University, he was approved as a professor at the Department of Comparative Anatomy and Zoology.

The principles of morphological and taxonomic analysis laid down in Mikhail Alexandrovich's doctoral dissertation "Comparative osteology of penguins in application to the main divisions of the class of birds" (1885) were later brilliantly developed by one of his talented students - P.P. Sushkin.

In 1914 M.A. Menzbier made a number of fundamental amendments and additions to the zonal zoning schemes proposed by N.A. Severtsov, zoogeographic schemes of A. Wallace, completing his study "Zoological sites of the Turkestan region and the probable origin of the fauna of the latter."

In the two-volume book “Birds of Russia”, for the first time, a synthesis of all knowledge on the systematics, distribution and biology of birds in our country was carried out. This monograph contains modern principles and traditions of taxonomy, zoogeography and ecology.

In 1911, in protest against the arbitrariness of the authorities, along with other professors and teachers, Menzbier left the university. After the revolution, the scientist returned and became its first rector (1917-1919). In 1896 he was elected a corresponding member of the Academy of Sciences, in 1927 he became an honorary member, and in 1929 a full member of the USSR Academy of Sciences. Also M.A. Menzbir was elected an honorary member of the Moscow Society of Naturalists, and for many years was its president.

In 1930 M.A. Menzbir, having made a long trip abroad, headed the Zoogeographical Laboratory of the USSR Academy of Sciences established for him.

However, in 1932, Mikhail Alexandrovich was bedridden by a serious illness, and on October 10, 1935 he died.

Severtsov Alexey Nikolaevich

Severtsov Aleksey Nikolaevich (1866-1936) - Russian evolutionist, author of studies on comparative anatomy of vertebrates. Created the theory of morphophysiological and biological progress and regression. In 1889 he graduated from Moscow University, and in 1890 he received a gold medal from the university for his work "A summary of information on the organization and history of the development of the hymnophion". In 1896, he brilliantly defended his doctoral dissertation on the topic "Metamerism of the Head of the Electric Stingray". He was a professor at Yuryevsky (1898-1902), Kyiv (1902-1911) and Moscow (1911-1930) universities. In 1930 he organized and headed the Laboratory of Evolutionary Morphology and Ecology of Animals (now the A.N. Severtsov Institute for Problems of Ecology and Evolution).

The main scientific researches of A.N. Severtsov are devoted to evolutionary morphology, the establishment of the laws of the evolutionary process, and the problems of ontogenesis. Each theoretical judgment of A.N. Severtsov is a generalization arising from specific long-term studies of his own and studies of his students. He devoted a lot of time to the study of head metamerism and the origin of the limbs of vertebrates, the evolution of lower vertebrates. As a result, he created the theory of the origin of the five-fingered limb and paired fins in vertebrates, which is now generally accepted in world science.

Based on the analysis of the morphological patterns of evolution, A.N. Severtsov created two theories: the morphobiological theory of the paths of evolution and the theory of phylembryogenesis. Developing the first theory, A.N. Severtsov came to the conclusion that there are only two main directions of the evolutionary process: biological progress and biological regression. He established four main directions of biological progress: aromorphosis, idioadaptation, cenogenesis, general degeneration. His teaching about the types of phylogenetic changes in organs and functions, about phylogenetic correlations, made a significant contribution to the largest general biological problem of the relationship between form and function in the process of evolution. He gave a detailed classification of the ways of phylogenetic changes in organs, proved that the only cause of phylogenetic changes is changes in the environment.

For 26 years, developing the significance of the role of embryonic changes in the evolutionary process, A.N. Severtsov created a coherent theory of phylembryogenesis, which in a new way highlighted the problem of the relationship between ontogenesis and phylogenesis. This theory develops the position on the possibility of hereditary changes at any stage of ontogenesis and their influence on the structure of descendants.

His ideas and works A.N. Severtsov developed until his death, that is, until 1936.

Sushkin Petr Petrovich

Sushkin Petr Petrovich (1868--1928) - a prominent Russian zoologist. Widely known as an ornithologist, zoogeographer, anatomist and paleontologist.

Born in Tula in a merchant family on January 27 (February 8), 1868. He received his secondary education at the Tula classical gymnasium, after which in 1885 he entered the natural department of the Faculty of Physics and Mathematics of Moscow University.

Sushkin's brilliant abilities set him apart from the students early on. Professor M. A. Menzbir (also from Tula), from whom he studied ornithology and comparative anatomy of vertebrates, immediately appreciated the observation and other important qualities of the student and did his best to help him.

In 1892, Sushkin's first scientific work "Birds of the Tula Province" was published.

After graduating from the university in 1889 with a gold medal, Sushkin was left at the department to prepare for a professorship. In 1904 he successfully defended his doctoral dissertation.

Conducted a lot of teaching work at Moscow and other universities. Students highly appreciated high level his teaching.

P.P. Sushkin advanced early into the ranks of major zoologists and earned recognition at home and abroad. He was not only a theoretician, but also a first-class field naturalist, continued his work as a field researcher and traveler until old age and personally explored the fauna on a vast territory from Smolensk and Tula provinces to Altai. The result of the trip was numerous observations and rich collections.

In 1921, Sushkin headed the ornithological department of the Zoological Institute of the Academy of Sciences. In 1922, he began work at the Geological Museum of the Academy of Sciences and was able to do a lot for the development of paleontological research.

In 1923 P.P. Sushkin was elected a full member of the USSR Academy of Sciences. His scientific heritage includes 103 works.

P.P. Sushkin died suddenly of pneumonia on September 17, 1928. He was buried in St. Petersburg at the Smolensk cemetery.

Ognev Sergey Ivanovich

Ognev Sergey Ivanovich (11/5/1886-12/20/1951) - Soviet zoologist, Honored Scientist of the RSFSR (1947). Outstanding spine zoologist, head of the Moscow school of theriology in 1930-1940. Comes from a family of hereditary Moscow intelligentsia. He graduated from Moscow University in 1910, left at the Department of Zoology (with which at that time the Zoological Museum was a single entity) as an assistant to prof. G.A. Kozhevnikov.

He read a number of courses at the department, in 1926 he received the title of associate professor, in 1928 - the title of professor, in 1935 - doctor of science.

All his professional activity was connected with scientific gathering and study of theriological collections. He was one of the first in Russia to collect serial materials on small mammals.

Already in 1910, on the basis of these collections, his first solid monograph "Mammals of the Moscow Province" was published, which laid the foundations for the fauna-ecological research direction of both Ognev himself and his students. S.I. Ognev traveled a lot around the country in order to study local theriofauna. Since the mid 1920s. he began to collect his personal collection small mammals, which later became one of the largest collections of its kind in Russia and was acquired by the Zoological Museum of Moscow State University.

The main work of his entire life was a multi-volume summary of the fauna and ecology of mammals in Russia and adjacent territories: the first two volumes were called "Animals of Eastern Europe and North Asia", the next five - "Animals of the USSR and adjacent countries".

In addition, S.I. Ognev, being the head of the Department of Zoology at Moscow State University, published a number of textbooks, including the fundamental work "Vertebrate Zoology". The main works are also on the taxonomy and faunistics of mammals; works on the fauna of birds, the history of zoology, biogeography, evolution of animals. Conducted field research in Central Russia, in the Caucasus, the Urals, in Semirechye and Turkmenistan.

Described a number of new species of mammals, paid much attention to the conservation of nature. The founder of the Moscow school of theriologists - specialists in mammals, among them: S.S. Turov, V.G. Geptner, A.N. Formozov, N.A. Bobrinsky, A.G. Tomilin and others. State Prize USSR (1942, 1951). He was awarded the Order of Lenin and medals. He died after a serious illness in 1951.

Zenkevich Lev Aleksandrovich

Lev Alexandrovich Zenkevich (1889-1970) - was born in the city of Tsarev, Astrakhan province of the Russian Empire, in the family of a veterinarian. In 1916 he graduated from the natural department of the Faculty of Physics and Mathematics of Moscow University. After graduation, he was left at the university to prepare for a professorship. From 1930 until his death, he headed the Department of Zoology and Comparative Anatomy of Invertebrates at Moscow University.

The whole life of L.A. Zenkevich was devoted to the study of marine biology. He was one of the founders of the first oceanographic institution in our country - the Floating Marine Scientific Institute. He was directly involved in the construction and equipment of the Perseus, the pioneer of our research fleet, and then led complex expeditions on it in the Barents, White, and then in the Kara Seas. While working in the Barents Sea, for the first time on the scale of the whole sea, he applied quantitative methods for studying the benthic fauna.

In the 30s, the attention of L.A. Zenkevich is attracted by our southern seas and, first of all, by the Caspian Sea, which is exceptionally rich in valuable sturgeon fish. Studies of the benthic fauna of the Northern Caspian, which showed its relative poverty, are cited by L.A. Zenkevich to the search for ways to increase the biological productivity of this sea. Together with Ya.A. Birshtein, he developed a project for the acclimatization of valuable food invertebrates from the Sea of ​​Azov in the Caspian Sea, which was successfully implemented.

During the Patriotic War, which interrupted expeditionary research on the seas, L.A. Zenkevich is engaged in experimental and theoretical development of the problem of the evolution of the animal motor system.

His scientific background is great. He published more than 300 scientific articles in journals and collections, over 10 monographs and textbooks, a lot of popular articles and correspondence. He acted as the editor of seven volumes of Proceedings of the Institute of Oceanology and a number of thematic collections of scientific articles. His works cover a wide range of issues on the anatomy, systematics and ecology of aquatic organisms, biocenology and productivity of marine fauna and flora, their quantitative distribution and biogeography. In recent years, he paid special attention to the problems of studying the deep-sea fauna and its origin in connection with the problem of the antiquity of the ocean as an aquatic environment. Theoretical works related to the development of ideas about the biological structure of the ocean and about oceanic ecosystems are singled out. From applied research, it should be noted works on the use of biological and mineral resources of the oceans and seas, forecasts about the prospects for the development of fisheries, the development of mariculture, and much more. Of exceptional importance is his monograph "Biology of the Seas of the USSR", which in 1965 was awarded the Lenin Prize. Being a high-class zoologist, L.A. Zenkevich acted as a pioneer in the field of broad comprehensive studies of marine fauna. He significantly expanded the concept of the biological productivity of a reservoir, introduced a quantitative method into the study of fish nutrition, which literally caused a scientific revolution in marine biological research. Developing the theoretical problems of oceanology, he proceeded from the concept of the ocean as a single whole, where the physical, chemical, biological processes occurring in it are interconnected and interdependent. His concept of the biological structure of the ocean became the methodological basis for many years of biological research by the Institute of Oceanology in the World Ocean. Years of life of L.A. Zenkevich fell on a difficult period in the history of our country. He headed the department for 40 years (from 1930 to 1970) and one can imagine how incredibly difficult it was to keep the department and not lose face either during the years of Stalinist repressions or during the rampant Lysenkoism! All my life L.A. Zenkevich devoted himself to science, he worked for his country and for world science. His scientific and organizational activities are extensive. He was the founder and permanent president since 1952 of the All-Union Hydrobiological Society, the organizer of the Interdepartmental Oceanographic Commission under the Presidium of the USSR Academy of Sciences since 1951, the vice-president of the Moscow Society of Nature Testers since 1956, the founder and editor-in-chief of the journal "Oceanology" since 1961, a member of the editorial board many others scientific journals, including foreign ones. His merits in science are noted orders of Lenin, the Red Banner of Labor, the medal "For Valiant Labor", the Lomonosov Prize of Moscow State University (1954), the Gold Medal. F.P. Litke Geographic Society USSR (1956), the Gold Medal of Prince Albert I of Monaco - the highest award of the French Oceanographic Institute (1959). He was the recognized head of Russian oceanology, an outstanding biologist, the founder of an extensive school of Russian marine biologists, the largest organizer of research on the World Ocean, a scientist of exceptional breadth and versatility, a Man with a capital letter. The marginal underwater swell bordering the Kuril-Kamchatka Trench in pacific ocean and studied in the expeditions of the "Vityaz", was named after him.

In the post-war years, with the advent of the new research vessel Vityaz, a new stage began in the study of the biology of the World Ocean, in which L.A. Zenkevich has a leading role. He led a complex multi-year oceanographic expedition of the Institute of Oceanology of the USSR Academy of Sciences, which covered almost the entire World Ocean with research. He became the initiator, organizer and participant of deep-sea research of oceanic fauna, in particular in the area of ​​the Kuril-Kamchatka depression, where depths of 9.5 km were explored.

L.A. Zenkevich was an excellent lecturer and teacher. He laid the foundations of the system of zoological education in our country, which is still in operation.

WITHerebrovsky Alexander Sergeevich

Serebrovsky Alexander Sergeevich (1892-1933) - was born in Tula, Russian Empire in 1892. Serebrovsky belonged to the group of those biologists who had an enormous influence on the development of genetics and breeding in the USSR. Research work of A.S. Serebrovsky began in the first years after the Great October Socialist Revolution and continued until his very premature death. In addition to 120 published works, about 30 unpublished works remain in his scientific archive, including several major monographs.

Circle of interests of A.S. Serebrovsky as a researcher was very broad - from questions of general biology and evolutionary theory, to specific questions of the selection of individual species of farm animals.

At the same time, he was a very strong analyst and mathematician. The mathematical mindset of Serebrovsky was revealed even in his first works, for example, in the article "Experience in the Statistical Analysis of Sex" (1921). "Polygons with foci and their significance for biometrics" (1925), etc.

Having begun the development of the genetics of domestic chicken, he inevitably faced the need to develop a theory of genetic analysis, those issues that are now included in the so-called mathematical or statistical genetics. There were very few works in this area at that time, and A. S. Serebrovsky had to go largely on his own, original paths. The results of AS Serebrovsky's long work on the development of the theory of genetic analysis are reported in the monograph "Genetic Analysis".

In 1928, the theory of the indivisibility of the gene underwent its first limitation. Immediately after the discovery of the mutagenic effect of X-rays, they were used in many laboratories around the world to obtain mutations. In the laboratory of Serebrovsky, evidence was obtained that the gene is not indivisible genetic structure, but is a region of the chromosome, some parts of which can mutate independently of each other. This phenomenon was called Serebrovsky stepped allelomorphism.

Having developed a system that allows one to quantify the result of each mutation, Serebrovsky, Dubinin and other authors at the same time revealed the phenomenon of adding one mutant gene to another. In this case, the disturbed function of one gene was corrected by the normal function of another. The second gene, in turn, could be defective in another region, normal in the first gene. This phenomenon was subsequently rediscovered in microorganisms and was called complementation.

In the 30s, A.S. Serebrovsky promoted the ideas of the so-called genogeography, developed its methods, and himself conducted several genogeographic studies. Unfortunately, these methods are now forgotten.

Serebrovsky was engaged in one of the main methods for studying the effectiveness of natural selection, the analysis of complex protective devices (body shape, color, behavior, etc.). The presence of such adaptations testified that their evolution could not be explained either by the direct influence of the environment, or by the exercise or non-exercise of organs, nor reduced to a single mutation. It could not be understood only on the basis of the recognition of the complex relationship between predators and their prey, in which the former play the role of culling the latter. A brilliant analysis of these interrelations was given by Serebrovsky in 1929 in the article "The Experience of a Qualitative Characterization of the Evolutionary Process".

Geptner Vladimir Georgievich

Geptner Vladimir Georgievich (06/22/1901-07/05/1975) - June 22, 1901 in Moscow, in a Russified German family. His father was an accountant. After graduating from high school in 1919, he immediately entered the natural department of the Physics and Mathematics Faculty of Moscow University. Since 1925 - in graduate school with well-known figures of nature conservation, professors of the State Academy of Sciences. Kozhevnikov and S.I. Ogneva. Since 1929, he has been working at the Zoological Museum of Moscow State University, participating in expeditions in Central Asia. From 1934 - until the end of his days - Professor of the Department of Vertebrate Zoology of Moscow State University.

Since 1938, Vladimir Georgievich became the deputy chairman of the section for the protection of mammals of the VOOP, and since 1943 - its chairman. From 1938 to 1955 - a member of the presidium of this only then in the USSR environmental public organization. From 1952 to 1964 -- Member of the Commission on Reserves (Nature Conservation) of the Academy of Sciences of the USSR. In the 1960s and 1970s, he participated in the scientific and technical councils of the RSFSR Chief Hunting and the USSR Ministry of Agriculture Glavpriroda, was a member of the IUCN.

The sphere of his interests in environmental protection is the protection of mammals and conservation work. As chairman of the section for the protection of mammals, he did a lot for the protection of bison, saiga, muskrat, sika deer, polar bear, sable, walrus.

It was thanks to his support that the zoologist L. Kaplanov managed to do so much in protecting the Amur tiger. Geptner headed the Soviet commission for the restoration of the bison. On the initiative of V.G. Geptner in the Prioksko-Terrasny Reserve, a bison nursery was created, and work began on the restoration of the bison.

In August 1946, together with V. Makarov, G. Dementiev and other members of the Presidium of the VOOP, he prepared a memorandum on the needs of nature protection to the Council of Ministers of the RSFSR, participated in a meeting of the Russian Council of Ministers, as a result of which the first post-war resolution of the Council of Ministers of the RSFSR was adopted " On the Protection of Nature on the Territory of the RSFSR. He edited the two-volume book “Reserves of the USSR” (1951).

Professor Geptner has done an unusually great amount for conservation work. He is one of the few who defended the reserves from reduction in 1951 and 1961. In April 1954, he signed a collective letter of scientists addressed to G. Malenkov with a request to restore closed nature reserves, and in April 1957 he published in Izvestia, together with other biologists, a rather bold article “In defense of nature reserves” for those times.

Vladimir Georgievich is one of the main developers of the “Prospective Plan for the Geographical Network of Reserves of the USSR”, which was prepared by a commission led by Academician E.M. Lavrenko in 1957 and promoted the creation of other reserves in the USSR. Geptner is one of the organizers and participants of the All-Union environmental conferences at the MOIP in 1954, 1957 and 1958.

It is impossible not to note the honesty, decency and integrity with which V.G. Geptner to the protection of nature. When in August 1951 the All-Russian Society for Conservation of Nature was threatened with disbandment, together with other activists of the VOOP, he went to an appointment with the Deputy Chairman of the Council of Ministers of the RSFSR Bessonov, and convinced him not to close the Society.

In January 1952, after numerous complaints and slanderous statements, the enemies succeeded in removing the head of the VOOP, V.N. Makarov. Many friends and colleagues recoiled from him. But not Geptner, who defended V.N. Makarova: “Not only V.N. is to blame. Makarov - even though we offered him to resign, but this is wrong. Everyone knows the activities of Makarov, the name of V.N. Makarova will enter...........

Sergei Fokin

"Don't miss out on this wealth"

(from the book "Russian Sicily", 2nd ed. / ed. M. G. Talalaya. M.: Staraya Basmannaya, 2013. S. 225-244)

Sicily, one of the pearls of the Italian Mediterranean, has long attracted travelers, among whom, in addition to just tourists, there were many "scientific tourists" - scientists. Naturalists-zoologists were especially often guests of the city of Messina, located in a semicircle along the bay, in view of the Calabrian coast and surrounded by low, but very picturesque mountains. The peculiarity of the winds, currents and general hydrological features of this strait, which separates Sicily from Calabria, have long created a unique opportunity for collecting representatives of marine fauna there, especially pelagic invertebrates and lower chordates, the diversity of which is famous for the Mediterranean Sea. As our famous zoologist-embryologist A.O. Kovalevsky:

A richness like Messina should not be missed. Such an abundance of Coelenterat and transparent caviar, as here, I will not find anywhere<…>. The weather is fine this evening, and I expect a rich catch tomorrow.

One of the first to notice this feature of the Messinian coast was in the second half of the 18th century. the famous Italian naturalist and one of the first experimental biologists L. Spallanzani, who studied the pelagic fauna there in 1788. Since then, this place on the northeastern coast of Sicily has become a favorite for naturalists interested in the life of marine, especially invertebrates, animals for a long time.

This is how Messina was recalled by one of the Russian zoologists S.S. Chakhotin, who spent several years there at the beginning of the 20th century. and miraculously escaped during the catastrophic Messinian earthquake of 1908:

The love of scientific research took me to Messina - this distant, wonderfully located corner of the south of Europe. Everything is peculiar here, and tells you that you are far from modern life with its external culture, with its cities drowning in clouds of smoke and dust, with streets flooded with electric light and tram cars rumbling along them, with a luminous, running crowd.<…>No, everything is frozen here; palm trees proudly reach for the dark blue sky in the squares, cacti cut out against its background with sharp thorns.<…>Law enforcement officers dressed in funny colorful uniforms walk slowly and sedately in pairs - carabinieri<…>. Somewhere near the trattoria a hurdy-gurdy rattles and a dark-skinned girl sings fiery melodic songs of the South in a juicy, sonorous voice.

Among the "scientific tourists" in Sicily, whose number increased markedly with the course of the 19th century, German zoologists at first predominated. First of all, we must remember I. Müller, K. Vogt, E. Haeckel, O. and R. Hertwig and their students. As the Italians joked - in the middle of the XIX century. Messina became a Mecca for German professors. However, no special conditions - scientific stations, laboratories, equipment for field biological research in Messina, as well as in general on the coasts of the Mediterranean Sea did not exist then. Scientists had to take everything necessary tools and devices with you and, having settled in a hotel or in a private apartment, at your own peril and risk, go with the fishermen to collect material. Collected from the sea, or even bought from the market, the animals were then studied on the spot, kept alive in glass jars of various sizes, and (or) examined under a relatively primitive microscope. Basically, in a fixed form, the material was taken away for serious research, sometimes thousands of kilometers away - to universities in Germany, England, and Russia.

The first to break this tradition of "scientific tourism" was a student of the famous German professor-zoologist E. Haeckel, privatdozent, and later professor Anton Dorn(1840-1909), who arrived in Sicily in the autumn of 1868 from the University of Jena and organized a temporary marine laboratory in Messina. For this laboratory, a large aquarium with a water circulation system was specially delivered from Glasgow. Having experienced the difficulties of expeditionary work with a constant lack of necessary equipment, literature, while being unfamiliar with local conditions, Dorn thought about the need to organize permanent (stationary) research in nature. Then, in Messina, Dorn worked privately in one of the rooms of the Palazzo Vitale and, together with his colleague at the University of Jena, the young Russian zoologist N.N. Mikulukho-Maclay, they were actively engaged in the study of biology and morphology of marine life.

Nikolai Nikolaevich Miklukho-Maclay(1846-1888) - then only a beginner zoologist (he was 6 years younger than Dorn) was interested, first of all, in fauna sea ​​sponges and brain morphology of primitive fish. Dorn at this time was developing the questions of the life cycle of some crustaceans. All these studies required long-term observations of living objects, both in nature and in the laboratory, and the aquarium installed in the palazzo turned out to be very useful. Understanding the benefits of working in a well-equipped laboratory, the friends began to discuss the possibility of organizing a permanent biological station to study the life of the inhabitants of the sea. The meeting of Dorn and Miklukho-Maclay in Messina had another consequence for the former, since Miklukho-Maclay introduced Dorn into the Russian-Polish family of Yegor Ivanovich Baranovsky. According to some sources, Baranovsky, together with his brother Andrei, represented the Russian Shipping Company in Sicily. Six years later, Anton married the daughter of Yegor Ivanovich, Maria Baranovskaya (1856-1918). This subsequently gave rise to the strong ties of the Dorn family with Russia.

Friends, like most travelers who visited Sicily, undertook an ascent to Mount Etna, the highest volcano in Europe. This excursion, made at the beginning of January 1869, almost ended tragically for Dorn. Already on the upper plateau, Anton slipped and rolled down a rocky icy slope for several tens of meters, fortunately receiving only numerous bruises and abrasions. Miklouho-Maclay, who studied in Jena at the Faculty of Medicine, was able to examine a friend and help him go down. The treatment took several weeks, during which Nikolai continued to work alone. In Messina, he completed a work on the structure of the brain of a cartilaginous chimera fish. March 12, 1869 N.N. Miklouho-Maclay left Messina. He was never destined to return there, but he was in constant correspondence with Dorn and was aware of the realization in Naples of their common dream of a permanent marine zoological station.

Among the major Russian scientists who worked in Messina, one should first of all recall A.O. Kovalevsky, I.I. Mechnikova, N.N. Miklukho-Maclay and N.P. Wagner, although, of course, there were many more domestic biologists who worked in Sicily. Further, in the last quarter of the 19th century, the number of Russian zoologists coming to Sicily dropped sharply, as it became possible to work at the Neapolitan Zoological Station organized by A. Dorn and at other Mediterranean (Russian and French) biological stations - Villefranche-sur-mer, Marseille , Banyuls . Quite apart in this series is the life story of the biologist S.S. Chakhotin, a graduate of Heidelberg University, Germany (1907) and an assistant at the Institute of Pharmacology in Messina in 1907-1908.

It so happened that the majority of Russian zoologists began to visit Messina in order to study marine organisms precisely in the late 1860s. There were certain prerequisites for this. The development of zoological science, and biology in general in the second half of the 19th century. in many respects it was determined by the famous work of C. Darwin "The Origin of Species" published in 1859. After the publication in England, this book, first appearing in a German translation by G. Bronn (1860), in 1864 was also translated into Russian by S.A. Rachinsky, withstood three editions in Russia for 9 years. For the next few decades, biologists around the world were partly busy testing and confirming Darwin's evolutionary ideas. For this, the study of the organization, development, and phylogenetic relationships of the lower groups of marine invertebrates turned out to be the most promising. Thus, evolutionary studies based on the comparative anatomical and embryological study of the various inhabitants of the sea made up a significant part of the "zoological results" of the 19th century.

Through the combined efforts of numerous domestic biologists, the Russian zoological school took one of the leading places in the world during the period under review. scientific community. This statement is especially true for the evolutionary comparative embryology of invertebrates, the foundations of which in 1865-1885. were laid down by the classics of Russian natural science A.O. Kovalevsky and I.I. Mechnikov, primarily as a result of their many years of work in the Mediterranean.

Having begun his embryological research in Italy in 1864 with work on the development of the lancelet, Alexander Onufrievich Kovalevsky(1840-1901) consistently made a number of remarkable discoveries on the development of almost all groups of invertebrates and animals of an unclear (before Kovalevsky) systematic position. Corals, jellyfish, ctenophores, annelids, echinoderms, brachiopods, insects, and finally, ascidians - the study of representatives of all these and some other groups, carried out by scientists in the majority in the Mediterranean Sea (including in Messina!) Gave into the hands of Alexander Onufrievich invaluable comparative embryological material. The works of Kovalevsky showed with extraordinary clarity the presence of a number of common features in the development of all animals. His research meant more to the triumph of Darwin's evolutionary doctrine than the biggest ideas of other advocates of Darwinism.

During this heyday of embryology in Russia, Kovalevsky was by no means alone. First of all, one should point to a friend, and partly to a scientific rival of Alexander Onufrievich - Ilya Ilyich Mechnikov(1845-1916). His work on the development of insects, echinoderms, intestinal-breathers, also carried out mostly in Italy, supplemented the discoveries of Kovalevsky. The development of sponges, jellyfish, siphonophores, analysis of the structure of lower ciliary worms are the areas of unconditional scientific priority of Ilya Ilyich. His "parenchymal" theory of the origin of multicellular animals, created in opposition to Haeckel's "gastrea", is now recognized by many scientists, and the phagocytic theory of inflammation, developed by the scientist on the basis of experiments made in Messina, brought the author Nobel Prize 1908 in immunology.

For the first time, Mechnikov came to Messina in April 1868, when Kovalevsky had been working there for about a month, for whom this place had been familiar since 1866. In his memoirs, Ilya Ilyich described his appearance in Sicily as follows:

For the first time I was taken there by my unforgettable comrade and friend A.O. Kovalevsky, who went there in the spring of 1868. In his letters, he so enthusiastically described to me the wealth of the Messinian marine fauna and called me to him so intensely that without thinking twice, I left Naples and sailed to Messina<…>. In general, the city of Messina did not represent anything of any outstanding beauty, but in the highest degree picturesque surroundings. It was worth climbing to a certain height to see a wonderful view of the sea and Calabria, or walk or drive along the seashore, towards the village of Faro, to enjoy the marvelous nature.

It was the time of the struggle for the unification of Italy, which was headed by G. Garibaldi, and even in Messina, far from the metropolis, social activity was very noticeable. Kovalevsky, who appeared in Messina in March, wrote to a common acquaintance with Mechnikov, a professor of zoology from Kazan Nikolai Petrovich Wagner (1829-1907) :

I live in Hotel di Milano, no. 6 (Strada Garibaldi) . Willy-nilly, I see all the processions and manifestations of liberal Messinians or Messinians in favor of Garibaldi and Mazzini, and yesterday and the third day I had to watch all the torments of Christ, since all this was presented in faces and traveled past my windows<…>. The inconvenience of Messina is that there is no Giovanni and the like here and you have to catch it yourself<…>. As for the fish market, it is not rich.

Nevertheless, Kovalevsky successfully investigated the development of siphonophores, jellyfish and tunicates in Messina. Mechnikov did not lag behind him:

I have worked diligently on the development of lower animals in the hope of finding in it the key to understanding the genealogy of organisms. After a day spent at the microscope, Kovalevsky and I exchanged the obtained results, argued and tested each other. But enhanced microcopying in Messina with her bright sun ruined my vision. I had to take breaks from classes for several hours in a row<…>. Despite the obstacles, I still managed to get some interesting results (especially on the history of echinoderms); but still the disease of the eyes compelled me to leave Messina and return again to Naples.

In April, Kovalevsky's wife came to Messina with their newborn daughter Olga, who was baptized by the local Greek priest. Mechnikov became the godfather of the child:

I kept the child as a godfather. Kovalevsky, on the other hand, was especially concerned that the remains of the wax candles used during the ceremony would not be lost, but would serve as a material for pouring preparations, which at that time were contained in a mixture of wax and olive oil.

Subsequently, Mechnikov worked in Messina 2 more times. In 1880 it was a fairly short visit. The scientist wrote in his memoirs:

The first two weeks of May were spent by me in Messina, where I went for the special purpose of studying the formation of the nemertean gastrula, and where, moreover, I succeeded in finding the aforementioned orthonectid.

The next, last visit of Mechnikov to Messina (1882-83) turned out to be a landmark in his scientific destiny. Ilya Ilyich recalled:

This time we settled not in Messina itself, but in its environs, in the town of Ringo, on the very shore of the sea<…>. In the wonderful environment of the Strait of Messina, resting from university troubles, I devoted myself to work with passion.

Mechnikov discovered that in lower animals with intestinal digestion, there are wandering cells that retain the ability for intracellular digestion. In part, he engaged in the study of these cells. Mechnikov's idea was that, apparently, such cells in the body can absorb not only food particles, but also foreign bodies. The scientist called these cells phagocytes (devouring cells). Later, Ilya Ilyich developed the idea he had conceived into a detailed phagocytic theory that explains many of the phenomena of inflammation and immunity of organisms to infectious diseases. The scientist wrote:

It occurred to me that such cells should serve in the body to counteract harmful agents.<…>. I told myself that if my assumption was correct, then the splinter inserted into the body of the larva starfish should in a short time be surrounded by mobile cells, just as it is observed in a person who sticks his finger<…>. I plucked a few pink thorns and immediately inserted them under the skin of magnificent, transparent as water, starfish larvae.<…>. And the next morning he happily stated the success of the experiment. This latter formed the basis of the “phagocyte theory”, the development of which was devoted to the next 25 years of my life.<…>. Thus, in Messina, a turning point took place in my scientific life. Before that, a zoologist, I immediately became a pathologist.

The turning point associated with Messina occurred in life Sergei Stepanovich Chakhotin(1883-1993) - a biophysicist and experimental cell biologist, like many of the Russians mentioned above, who spent part of his life in the Mediterranean. The biography of this scientist turned out to be closely connected with the history of Messina and requires more detailed consideration.

As a student of the medical faculty of Moscow University, Chakhotin was arrested for participating in the riots in 1902 and, after being imprisoned in Butyrki, was deported "to his homeland." Since, according to the passport, the homeland of S.S. Chakhotin was listed as Constantinople, he was forced to go abroad and decided to continue his studies in Germany.

Sergey Stepanovich studied 3 semesters at the Faculty of Medicine at the University of Munich, 2 semesters at the University of Berlin and 5 semesters at the Faculty of Physics and Mathematics at the University of Heidelberg. Among his main biology teachers in Germany are professors brothers O. and R. Hertwig and O. Buchli, at whose Heidelberg Zoological Institute Chakhotin specialized since 1904. During his studies, Sergei Stepanovich worked twice at the Austrian marine zoological station in Trieste (4 months ), three times - at the Russian Zoological Station in Villafranca (10 months) and half a year at the Pharmacological Institute in Messina. In 1907, at the University of Heidelberg, S.S. Chakhotin defended his thesis for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy "Die Statocyste der Heteropoden" (Structure and physiology of the balance organs in mollusks) with the highest mark - "summa cum laude". In 1912, this work was awarded the small Baer Prize of the Imperial Academy of Sciences. The first published article of a young scientist - "On bioelectric currents in invertebrates" was written on the basis of Chakhotin's research carried out in Messina (1907). After that, he received a position as an assistant at the local Institute of Pharmacology.

Chakhotin recalled his impressions of collecting animals in the Gulf of Messina in the following way:

So I went out into the sun-drenched laughing port, hired a boat, and rode out to its middle. The sea is like a mirror. Although outside, in the strait, between Scylla and Charybdis, powerful currents rage, a thunderstorm for fishermen, however, in the port, closed on all sides, except for a small northern entrance, an absolute smooth surface<…>. Here are jellyfish with bizarre tentacles, and amazing, transparent as crystal, siphonophores, and beating with their fins, like wings, the so-called sea butterflies, and countless chains of small barrels, salps, and frisky, transparent keel-legged mollusks<…>. My life flowed peacefully between science and family: I lived in Messina with my wife and two-year-old child. The whole day is absorbed in work in the laboratory, among more and more new experiments, new and new thoughts.

It would seem that the prospect of a successful scientific career in Italy opened up before the young scientist. But at the end of December 1908, Sergei Stepanovich's promisingly begun research in the field of electrophysiologists was interrupted by the famous Messinian earthquake, when Chakhotin was covered by a collapsed house and, after spending 12 hours under the rubble, miraculously survived.

After his recovery, at the suggestion of the Imperial Academy of Sciences, the scientist worked for three months at the Neapolitan Zoological Station. In Naples, he tried to restore the materials he had collected in Messina on the electrophysiology of invertebrate muscles and the phenomenon of the luminescence of marine animals, but lost under the ruins of the Messina laboratory. He did not quite succeed in this and, returning to Russia in 1909, Chakhotin began to prepare for the master's examinations, which he had to take at St. Petersburg University. However, the ideas of developing new methods for studying living cells, which Sergei Stepanovich had in Messina, haunted him and forced him to return abroad. In 1910-1912. he worked again in Heidelberg with prof. Buchli and at the Institute for Experimental Cancer Research under prof. Czerny, and later at the Pharmacological Institute of the University of Genoa.

It was about microoperations on a living cell, for which already in 1910 Chakhotin designed the first micromanipulator in Heidelberg. Then it occurred to him to replace the mechanical tool with an ultraviolet (UV) beam. The first sample of the apparatus for UV microinjection of living objects was designed by him on the basis of the Institute for Experimental Cancer Research in Heidelberg, and assembled and tested on the basis of the Pharmacological Institute in Genoa (1912), where Chakhotin was sheltered by A. Benedicenti, his former professor in Messina. After two years of persistent experimental work, operations on sea urchin eggs have convincingly shown that the UV beam can serve as the finest and most selective tool for influencing living cell.

With the hope of continuing his research in Russia, Chakhotin appeared in St. Petersburg, and after a conversation with Academician I.P. Pavlov, who became very interested in his invention, was invited to become a laboratory assistant (assistant) in his academic laboratory of physiology. There, Sergei Stepanovich created the material base for a new department - experimental cellular physiology and continued to work with UV microinjection.

From science, like many, Chakhotin was torn off for a long time by the First World War, and then, as once in Messina, life in Russia collapsed in one day - October 25, 1917. Among the hundreds of scientists who left Russia after this collapse of 1917 , was also S.S. Chakhotin. The fate of this then young man was more than unusual. He left Russia in 1919 for a long 39 years and was one of the few who returned to the USSR after the beginning of the Khrushchev thaw in 1958.

A variety of hobbies and talents, perhaps too numerous, led to the fact that Chakhotin is now remembered more as a person. amazing fate than as a prominent scientist, but also a politician, one of the first domestic Esperantists, an artist, a fighter for peace. As often happens, none of the facets of his rich nature turned out to be decisive, but still, first of all, Sergei Stepanovich was a scientist and an outstanding scientist. As early as the beginning of the 20th century. he invented devices that are still widely used in experimental biological research all over the world - one of the first micromanipulators (1910) and an installation for local ultraviolet irradiation of living cell structures (1912). Renowned zoologist, president of the French Academy of Sciences, prof. M. Colleri characterized his Russian colleague in the late 1930s as follows:

Mr. Chakhotin worked for a long time at my institute, and I had the opportunity to appreciate his inexhaustible activity and experimental ingenuity. He is rich in original ideas and is distinguished by the ability to bring them to life. His method of beam micro-injection is highly ingenious and precise. It allows approaching many new experimental problems.

Looking back at the past from Moscow in 1965, prof. Chakhotin, with his characteristic tendency to systematize any information, wrote:

So, I'm not an academic, but just a professor, PhD and PhD at the University of Heidelberg. My life has been full of adventures and many experiences. I summarize it in the form of the following diagram. In eighty years, I went through 5 stages, each of which (especially the last three) covered a period of 10 years or a multiple of ten. 1. 1883 - 1893 (childhood); 2. 1893 - 1902 (study); 3. The first creative biological - the search for a new scientific method of cytophysiological work. Its result was the discovery of the method of micro-operations of the cell "microbeam" and the publication of relevant works; 4. 1912 - 1932 (second creative, public). The search and discovery of the principle of "psychological violence against the masses" and the fight against fascism and war - its result was the publication of my large book "Le Viol Des Foules Par La Propaganda Politique" published in France by the Gallimard publishing house and translated into English, Italian, Danish and German . Scientific works also, of course, continued during this period; 5. 1933 - 1964 (third creative - organizational). Work in the field of raising the productivity of scientific and mental labor in general. Its completion is my last work - "cyberization" of my laboratory. Creation of systems of algorithms for research laboratory. Of course, in this period, as well as in the first and second, there were scientific and social works.

Strange as it may seem, the political flair inherent in S.S. Chakhotin, by old age he was clearly changed. It appears to be in the 1960s. he really believed in Russia's "communist future". Although attempts to publish in the USSR his book on psychological violence against the masses and applications for leaving the country for treatment and for scientific conferences (dedicated to his own scientific invention!), which remained unfulfilled, should have opened his eyes. European Chakhotin found himself "locked" in his small Moscow apartment-laboratory.

Sergei Stepanovich managed to return to the places of his youth, as he bequeathed to bury himself on the island of Corsica, where he had been in his youth. The fulfillment of this desire of a Russian citizen of Europe took place only 32 years after his death - his ashes were scattered over the Mediterranean Sea, where Chakhotin once worked, loved, was happy. Where in 1908 he was “born into the world” a second time - in Messina!

Pelagic animals are inhabitants of the sea water column, where the predominant forms are the larvae of many groups of invertebrates and lower chordates - tunicates (ascidians, appendicularians, salps), as well as jellyfish, ctenophores and fish.

Extract from a letter to Mechnikov sent by Kovalevsky from Messina on March 21, 1868 Nauk SSSR, 1955, p. 43).

Chakhotin S.S. Under the ruins of Messina. The story of a man buried alive in the earthquake of 1908 / Ed. J. Yannello. Messina: Intilla Editore, 2008. C. 81.

On December 28 and 29, 2012, Chakhotin's story was staged in Messina, interpreted by the actor Gianni Di Giacomo and translated into Italian. Giuseppe Ianello (curator - Association "Messina-Russia"). - Note. ed.

Shmalgauzen I.I. Anton Dorn and his role in the development of evolutionary morphology. In the book: Dorn A. The origin of vertebrates and the principle of change of function. M.-L.: Ogiz, 1937.

Miklouho-Maclay studied at St. Petersburg, Heidelberg, Leipzig and Jena universities (1864-1868), a student of E. Haeckel, who worked as an assistant; initially studied the taxonomy of sea sponges and the morphology of the brain of lower fish (1867-1869). Since 1870, he switched to anthropo-ethnographic research, spending 2 years in New Guinea, and then studying the indigenous population of the Philippines, Indonesia and the islands of Oceania; for a long time he lived in Australia (Sydney), where he married in 1884. He visited Russia only on short visits (1883, 1886-1888). Considered the largest domestic ethnographer, a pioneer in the study of the indigenous population South-East Asia, Australia and Oceania.

At first, such a station was supposed to be organized in Messina. Then life made adjustments to the dreams of young zoologists. As you know, in 1873 Dorn founded the first zoological station on the Mediterranean in Naples, and his friend Miklukho-Maclay, who became a famous ethnographer, explorer of New Guinea and contributed to the emergence of the first Russian biological station in Sevastopol (1871), created in 1881 The first marine biological station in the vicinity of Sydney, Australia. They worked together in Messina until the spring of 1869; cm. Fokin S.I. Russian scientists in Naples. Aleyteya, St. Petersburg, 2006; Fokin S., Talalay M. Flora e fauna nelle acque caprese: testimonianze dei zoologi russi, ospiti della Stazione ‘Anton Dohrn’ [Flora and fauna of Capri waters: testimonies of Russian zoologists, guests of the Dorn station] // Conoscere Capri. No. 8-9, 2010. P. 89-104; Tumarkin D. Miklukho Maclay. Two lives of a white Papuan. M.: Young guard, 2012.

Nikolai Nikolaevich Drozdov (June 20, 1937, Moscow) is a Russian zoologist, professor at Moscow State University, who has been broadcasting “In the Animal World” since 1977.

Life and career

The future zoologist was born to a family of scientists. His father was a professor at the Department of Organic Chemistry, his mother worked as a general practitioner. Drozdov's maternal great-great-grandfather, Ivan von Dreiling, came from an old Tyrolean family and was a guards officer. Dreiling participated in the Russian-French war, kept a diary of military operations, which is now kept in Historical Museum. On the line of his father, the Drozdov family tree goes into the layers of the higher Russian clergy.

While studying at school, Nikolai worked as a herdsman at a stud farm. After graduating from school, he entered the Faculty of Biology at Moscow State University. True, he studied for only 2 years and went to work. For about 2 years he worked in a garment factory. During this time, Nikolai became a master tailor of outerwear. Then he took up his studies again.

1963 - graduated from the Faculty of Geography of Moscow State University (Department of Biogeography).

1964-1966 - studied in graduate school.

1968 - first starred in the TV show "In the Animal World". At first, Nikolai Drozdov was a speaker and scientific consultant for films about animals (Riki-Tiki-Tavi, Black Mountain). At the same time, he defended his Ph.D. thesis and began working at the Department of Biogeography at Moscow State University.

1971-1972 - Trained at the Australian National University (Canberra). During this time he traveled extensively in Australia. As a result, the book "Flight of the Boomerang" was written.

1975 - was elected a member of the commission of the World Conservation Union for national parks.
1977 - became the host of the TV show "In the Animal World".

1979 - became an assistant professor at the Department of Biogeography of Moscow State University. At the moment, Drozdov is a professor. He lectures on ornithology, ecology, biogeography of the world and conservation. In addition, Drozdov was a member of numerous scientific expeditions. In particular, he climbed Elbrus.

1980 - took part in the UNESCO expedition to the islands of Tonga, Fiji and Samoa.

1989 - included in the "Global 500" - a list of leading environmentalists from all over the world.

1993-1995 - participated in expeditions to the North Pole.

1994 - became a member of the International Explorers Club.

1996 - became a member of the Russian Television Academy.

2001 - elected a member of the Russian Academy of Natural Sciences.

2002 - made another landing on North Pole. But this time I lived here for a week.

Nikolai Drozdov wrote about 200 scientific articles, 20 books and textbooks. His books have been published, such as:

• "Biogeography of the world";
• "Stories about the biosphere";
• "Ecosystems of the World";
• "Biogeography of continents";
• "Deserts".

• "Rare animals";
• "Through the pages of the Red Book";
• "The kingdom of the Russian bear";
• "Standards of the biosphere".

Drozdov has repeatedly been a member of the jury of international festivals of popular science films. He also voiced BBC films (cycle " Live nature»).

2006 - starred in the TV series Rublyovka. Live".

2008 - hosted the program "In the world of people" (Channel One). But this transfer did not last long, causing a lot of criticism.

In 2003 and 2004 he took part in the TV show "The Last Hero".
Drozdov's wife Tatyana teaches biology. The zoologist met her in an elevator. He has two daughters - Elena (veterinarian) and Nadezhda (biologist).

Nikolai Drozdov loves to perform Russian romances, folk and modern songs. In the 90s, he even shot a video for a song for the program "In the Animal World". In 2005, Nikolai Nikolaevich released a CD with his favorite songs called "Have you heard how Drozdov sings?".

Drozdov was 3 times at the North Pole and 2 times sank to the bottom of about. Baikal.

He enjoys skiing, horseback riding, ice swimming and yoga. In addition, he has not eaten meat for many years. IN free time Nikolai Nikolaevich deals with living creatures. His favorites are snakes, phalanxes, tarantulas and scorpions.