62 Laura Sembritzki
carry out medical care, and support the regional administration. In the
process of regional and local decision-making, radiation expertise by the
ChLenNIIRG played an important role. The assessments and recommendations filled the gap of absent procedures. Sometimes, as the examples of
the non-resettled villages, Tatarskaia Karabolka and Bagariak were demonstrated, at odds with Moscow.
At the same time, these institutions were also engaged in research. In the
1950s, new research branches such as radiobiology and radioecology evolved.
A series of new professional journals bear witness to these evolving research
fields. 73 Due to the fact that the Soviet nuclear program and its facilities were
kept secret, personal experience was of particular importance. Thus, staff
members moved up to high-profile positions. Radiation knowledge, produced in the nuclear landscapes in the Southern Urals, became crucial for
the development of permissible doses and radiation protection standards. For
further research, the exchange of knowledge and expertise between scientist,
physicists, physicians, and sanitary staff that were deployed in the evolving
network of institutions dealing with the radiating side of the nuclear program should be considered. Not only in Semipalatinsk, but also in Tomsk,
Leningrad, and Angarsk, additional branches of the Institute of Biophysics
were established as well as further closed institutions in the surroundings
of other closed cities belonging to the atomic program. 74 Conferences held
in the mid-1960s suggest that these closed institutions pursued an intense
exchange of experience, knowledge, and expertise. 75
Notes
1. For the euphoria regarding nuclear power and the civil application of the atom
as well as for the cult that arose in particular around nuclear physicists, see: Paul
R. Josephson, “Atomic-Powered Communism. Nuclear Culture in the Postwar
USSR,” Slavic Review, 55, 2(1996), pp. 297–324; Paul R. Josephson, “Rockets,
Reactors, and Soviet Culture,” in Science and the Soviet Social Order, ed., Loren
R. Graham (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1990), pp. 168–191; Sonja D.
Schmid, “Celebrating Tomorrow Today. The Peaceful Atom on Display in the
Soviet Union,” Social Studies of Science, 36 (2006), pp. 331–365.
2. Mark B. Adams, “Networks in Action. The Khrushchev Era, the Cold War and the
Transformation of Soviet Science,” in Science, History and Social Activism: A Tribute
to Everett Mendelsohn, eds., Garland E. Allen and Roy M. MacLeod (Dordrecht;
Boston, MA: Springer Netherlands, 2001), pp. 266–267.
3. David Holloway, “Yulii Khariton (1904–96). Physicist, Instrumental in Developing Soviet Nuclear Weapons,” Nature 385, 6614 (1997), p. 302.
4. This also relates to the lack of discussion of the role of forced labor in the nuclear
program; Holloway pointed out that the missing memories are no coincidence,
as most Gulag prisoners have not been released after their sentence had ended;
David Holloway, Stalin and the Bomb. The Soviet Union and Atomic Energy 1939–1956
(New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1994), p. 193.
5. A.S. Lebedinskii, Sovetskie uchenye ob opasnosti ispytanii iadernogo oruzhiia (Moskva:
Sovet Ministrov SSSR, 1959); Matthew Evangelista, Unarmed Forces. The Transnational Movement to End the Cold War (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1999).
carry out medical care, and support the regional administration. In the
process of regional and local decision-making, radiation expertise by the
ChLenNIIRG played an important role. The assessments and recommendations filled the gap of absent procedures. Sometimes, as the examples of
the non-resettled villages, Tatarskaia Karabolka and Bagariak were demonstrated, at odds with Moscow.
At the same time, these institutions were also engaged in research. In the
1950s, new research branches such as radiobiology and radioecology evolved.
A series of new professional journals bear witness to these evolving research
fields. 73 Due to the fact that the Soviet nuclear program and its facilities were
kept secret, personal experience was of particular importance. Thus, staff
members moved up to high-profile positions. Radiation knowledge, produced in the nuclear landscapes in the Southern Urals, became crucial for
the development of permissible doses and radiation protection standards. For
further research, the exchange of knowledge and expertise between scientist,
physicists, physicians, and sanitary staff that were deployed in the evolving
network of institutions dealing with the radiating side of the nuclear program should be considered. Not only in Semipalatinsk, but also in Tomsk,
Leningrad, and Angarsk, additional branches of the Institute of Biophysics
were established as well as further closed institutions in the surroundings
of other closed cities belonging to the atomic program. 74 Conferences held
in the mid-1960s suggest that these closed institutions pursued an intense
exchange of experience, knowledge, and expertise. 75
Notes
1. For the euphoria regarding nuclear power and the civil application of the atom
as well as for the cult that arose in particular around nuclear physicists, see: Paul
R. Josephson, “Atomic-Powered Communism. Nuclear Culture in the Postwar
USSR,” Slavic Review, 55, 2(1996), pp. 297–324; Paul R. Josephson, “Rockets,
Reactors, and Soviet Culture,” in Science and the Soviet Social Order, ed., Loren
R. Graham (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1990), pp. 168–191; Sonja D.
Schmid, “Celebrating Tomorrow Today. The Peaceful Atom on Display in the
Soviet Union,” Social Studies of Science, 36 (2006), pp. 331–365.
2. Mark B. Adams, “Networks in Action. The Khrushchev Era, the Cold War and the
Transformation of Soviet Science,” in Science, History and Social Activism: A Tribute
to Everett Mendelsohn, eds., Garland E. Allen and Roy M. MacLeod (Dordrecht;
Boston, MA: Springer Netherlands, 2001), pp. 266–267.
3. David Holloway, “Yulii Khariton (1904–96). Physicist, Instrumental in Developing Soviet Nuclear Weapons,” Nature 385, 6614 (1997), p. 302.
4. This also relates to the lack of discussion of the role of forced labor in the nuclear
program; Holloway pointed out that the missing memories are no coincidence,
as most Gulag prisoners have not been released after their sentence had ended;
David Holloway, Stalin and the Bomb. The Soviet Union and Atomic Energy 1939–1956
(New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1994), p. 193.
5. A.S. Lebedinskii, Sovetskie uchenye ob opasnosti ispytanii iadernogo oruzhiia (Moskva:
Sovet Ministrov SSSR, 1959); Matthew Evangelista, Unarmed Forces. The Transnational Movement to End the Cold War (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1999).