Dominant thread- доминирующая нить

 

Lomonosov, Mikhail Vasilyevich is aRussian poet, scientist, and grammarian who is often considered the first great Russian linguistic reformer. He also made substantial contributions to the natural sciences, reorganized the St. Petersburg Imperial Academy of Sciences, established in Moscow the university that today bears his name, and created the first coloured glass mosaics in Russia.

Lomonosov was the son of a poor fisherman. At the age of 10 he too took up that line of work. When the few books he was able to obtain could no longer satisfy his growing thirst for knowledge, in December 1730, he left his native village, penniless and on foot, for Moscow. His ambition was to educate himself to join the learned men on whom the tsar Peter I the Great was calling to transform Russia into a modern nation.

His bitter struggle began as soon as he arrived in Moscow. In order to be admitted to the Slavonic-Greek-Latin Academy he had to conceal his humble origin. In January 1736 Lomonosov became a student at the St. Petersburg Academy. In 1739 in Freiberg, Lomonosov studied firsthand the technologies of mining, metallurgy, and glassmaking. He freely indulged the love of verse that had arisen during his childhood with the reading of Psalms. Lomonosov returned in July 1741 to St. Petersburg. The Academy gave the young scholar no precise assignment, and the injustice aroused him. In May 1743 he was placed under arrest. Two odes sent to the empress Elizabeth won him his liberation in January 1744, as well as a certain poetic prestige at the Academy.

While in prison he worked out the plan of work that he had already developed in Marburg. " 276 Notes on Corpuscular Philosophy and Physics" set forth the dominant ideas of his scientific work. Appointed a professor by the Academy in 1745, he translated Christian Wolff's (" Studies in Experimental Philosophy" ) into Russian and wrote, in Latin, important works on " Cause of Heat and Cold", " Elastic Force of Air", and " Theory of Electricity". In 1748 the laboratory that Lomonosov had been requesting since 1745 was granted him; it then began a prodigious amount of activity. He passionately undertook many tasks and recorded in three years more than 4, 000 experiments, the results of which enabled him to set up a coloured glass works and to make mosaics with these glasses. " Discourse on the Usefulness of Chemistry", " Letter to I.I. Shuvalov Concerning the Usefulness of Glass" and the " Ode" to Elizabeth celebrated his fruitful union of abstract and applied science. Anxious to train students, he wrote in 1752 an introduction to the physical chemistry course that he was to set up in his laboratory. The theories on the unity of natural phenomena and the structure of matter that he set forth in the discussion of the " Origin of Light and Colours" and in his theoretical works on electricity in 1753 and 1756 also matured in this laboratory.

Encouraged by the success of his experiments in 1760, Lomonosov inserted in the " Reflections on the Solidity and Fluidity of Bodies" the " universal law of nature" --that is, the law of conservation of matter and energy, which, with the corpuscular theory, constitutes the dominant thread in all his research.

From 1755 he followed very closely the development of Moscow State University (now Moscow M.V. Lomonosov State University), for which he had drawn up the plans. Appointed a councillor by the Academy in 1757, he undertook reforms to make the university an intellectual centre closely linked with the life of the country. He wrote several scholarly works which constituted an important contribution both to science and to the development of commerce and the exploitation of mineral wealth.

He continued to lead a simple and industrious life, surrounded by his family and a few friends. He left his house and the laboratory erected in his garden only to go to the Academy. He was a member of the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences and of that of Bologna. The publication of his " Complete Works" in 1950-83 by Soviet scholars has revealed the full contributions of Lomonosov, who has long been misunderstood by historians of science.

Exercise 15. Answer the questions:

1. Who is Lomonosov??
2. What was Lomonosov’s father occupied with?
3. Why did the Russian scientist leave his village for Moscow?
4. When and why was Lomonosov placed under arrest?
5. Enumerate the results of Lomonosov’s scientific work.
6. Did the great scientist contribute to the development of Moscow State University?

Exercise 16. Give the English equivalents to the following expressions:

Грамматик, реформатор, носить чьё-либо имя, рыбак, удовлетворить жажду чего-либо, присоединиться к образованным людям, горькая борьба, скрывать, производство стекла, несправедливость, освобождение, определённый поэтический престиж, взять на себя много задач, тесно связанный с жизнью страны, минеральное богатство, вести простую и прилежную жизнь, историк.

Exercise 17. Give the Russian equivalents to the following expressions:

Natural sciences, coloured glass mosaics, to educate oneself, to transform the country into a modern nation, to be admitted, firsthand, love of verse, amount of activity, abstract and applied science, encouraged by the success, solidity and fluidity of bodies, conservation of matter and energy, scholarly works.

Exercise 18. Define what parts of speech the italicized words belong to. Translate the sentences into Russian. Use the dictionary if necessary.

1) Priestley's work was published in 1774. 2) The students of our group work hard at their English.3) He experiments on this substance to make its composition clear. 4) Sheele”s experiments had probably been performed even earlier than Priestley'. 5) Oxygen plays an important role in combustion. 6) The plays by A.P. Chekhov are known all over the world. 7) She looks fine today. 8) His fine work gave good results.

Dmitriy Ivanovich Mendeleev

Vocabulary of the text

To credit - приписывать

To relocate -переселиться

Tuberculosis - туберкулёз

Restored health – восстановленное здоровье

Capillarity of liquids – капиллярность жидкостей

Tenure – пребывание в должности на длительный срок

Influenza - грипп

Crater - кратер

To be named after smb – быть названным в честь кого-либо

Valence – валентность

Atomic weight – атомный вес

To some extent – в некоторой степени

Chemical properties – химические свойства

To be diffused – быть рассеянным (о свете), распространяться

Magnitude – величина, размеры, важность, значимость

To be amended by – улучшаться, исправляться

Contiguous – соприкасающийся, смежный, прилегающий

To be foretold – быть предсказанным

Adjacent – примыкающий, смежный

Solution - раствор

 

Dmitriy Ivanovich Mendeleev was a Russian chemist. He is credited as being the primary creator of the first version of the periodic table of elements. Mendeleev was born in Tobolsk, Siberia. Mendeleev was the 13th surviving child of 17 total, but the exact number differs among sources. At the age of 13 Mendeleev attended the Gymnasium in Tobolsk. In 1849, the now poor Mendeleev family relocated to St. Petersburg, where he entered the Main Pedagogical Institute in 1850. After he graduated, an illness that was diagnosed as tuberculosis caused him to move to the Crimean Peninsula on the northern coast of the Black Sea in 1855. While there he became chief science master of the local gymnasium. He returned with fully restored health to St. Petersburg in 1857.

Between 1859 and 1861, he worked on the capillarity of liquids and the workings of the spectroscope in Heidelberg. Mendeleev became Professor of Chemistry at the Saint Petersburg Technological Institute and the University of St. Petersburg in 1863, achieved tenure in 1867, and by 1871 had transformed St. Petersburg into an internationally recognized center for chemistry research. In 1865 he became Doctor of Science for his dissertation " On the Combinations of Water with Alcohol". In 1893, he was appointed Director of the Bureau of Weights and Measures. As a result of his work, in 1894 new standards for vodka were introduced into Russian law and all vodka had to be produced at 40% alcohol by volume.

Mendeleev also investigated the composition of oil fields, and helped to found the first oil refinery in Russia.

After becoming a teacher, he wrote the definitive two-volume textbook at that time: Principles of Chemistry. On March 6, 1869, Mendeleev made a formal presentation to the Russian Chemical Society, which described elements according to both weight and valence.

The elements, if arranged according to their atomic mass, exhibit an apparent periodicity of properties. Elements which are similar as regards to their chemical properties have atomic weights which are either of nearly the same value or which increase regularly. The arrangement of the elements in groups of elements in the order of their atomic weights, corresponds to their so-called valencies, as well as, to some extent, to their distinctive chemical properties. The elements which are the most widely diffused have small atomic weights. The magnitude of the atomic weight determines the character of the element, just as the magnitude of the molecule determines the character of a compound body.

The atomic weight of an element may sometimes be amended by a knowledge of those of its contiguous elements. Certain characteristic properties of elements can be foretold from their atomic weights.

The Russian chemist and science historian L.A. Tchugayev has characterized him as " a chemist of genius, first-class physicist, a fruitful researcher in the fields of hydrodynamics, meteorology, geology, certain branches of chemical technology (explosives, petroleum, and fuels, for example) and other disciplines adjacent to chemistry and physics, a thorough expert of chemical industry and industry in general, and an original thinker in the field of economy." Mendeleev was one of the founders, in 1869, of the Russian Chemical Society. He worked on the theory and practice of protectionist trade and on agriculture. Mendeleev devoted much study, and made important contributions to, the determination of the nature of such indefinite compounds as solutions. Mendeleev is given credit for the introduction of the metric system to the Russian Empire.

He invented pyrocollodion, a kind of smokeless powder based on nitrocellulose. Mendeleev studied petroleum origin and concluded that hydrocarbons are abiogenic and form deep within the earth.

Mendeleev died in 1907 in St. Petersburg, Russia from influenza. The Mendeleev crater on the Moon, as well as element number 101, the radioactive mendelevium, are named after him.

Exercise 19. Answer the questions:

1. Where was Mendeleev born?
2. What institute did Mendeleev enter in St. Petersburg?
3. What made the Russian chemist move to the Crimean peninsula?
4. Can you name the theme of Mendeleev’s dissertation?
5. When did Mendeleev make a presentation to the Russian chemical society?
6. Speak about the periodical table of elements.
7. Enumerate all the achievements of the great chemist in different scientific fields.
8. What is pyrocollodion?

Exercise 20. Give the English equivalents to the following expressions:

Химик, периодическая система элементов, точное число, болезнь, полуостров, местный, химическое исследование, новые стандарты, нефтяные месторождения, валентность, атомная масса, периодичность свойств, химические свойства, регулярно увеличиваться, так называемые, определять, характер элемента, историк, гениальный химик, плодотворный исследователь, взрывчатые вещества, в общем, основатель, вклад, империя, кратер, посвятить, метрическая система.

Exercise 21. Give the Russian equivalents to the following expressions:

the primary creator, the first version, surviving child, chief science master, to achieve tenure,

doctor of Science, to investigate, oil refinery, similar, the same value, the arrangement of the elements, compound body, certain branches, thorough expert, thinker, indefinite compounds,

smokeless powder, petroleum origin, within the earth.

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