UDC 94:574.4
https://doi.org/10.24158/fik.2017.6.22
Tkachenko Yury Leonidovich
candidate technical sciences, Associate Professor, Associate Professor of the Moscow State technical university named after N.E. Bauman
Morozov Sergey Dmitrievich
Senior Lecturer
Moscow State Technical
University named after N.E. Bauman
FROM THE HISTORY OF THE CREATION OF ARTIFICIAL ECOSYSTEMS
Tkachenko Yuri Leonidovich
PhD in Technical Science, Assistant Professor, Bauman Moscow State Technical University
Morozov Sergey Dmitrievich
Senior Lecturer, Bauman Moscow State Technical University
GLIMPSES OF HISTORY OF ARTIFICIAL ECOSYSTEMS" CREATION
Annotation:
The article discusses documentary facts creation of artificial ecosystems intended for use in space and terrestrial conditions. The pioneering role of K.E. Tsiolkovsky, who was the first to develop the concept of creating a closed habitat for people in space, and the influence of V.I. Vernadsky devoted to the biosphere, on approaches to the construction of artificial ecosystems. The decisive contribution of S.P. Korolev to the first practical implementation of Tsiolkovsky's projects for the construction of prototypes of space settlements. The most important historical stages of this process are described: experiments "Bios" (USSR), "Biosphere-2" (USA), "OEEP" (Japan), "Mars-500" (Russia), "Yuegun-1" (China).
Keywords:
artificial ecosystem, space settlements, closed habitat, K.E. Tsiolkovsky, S.P. Korolev, V.I. Vernadsky.
The article describes the documentary facts of artificial ecosystems" creation designed for space and terrestrial applications. The study shows the pioneering role of K.E. Tsiolkovsky who was the first to develop the concept of closed ecological systems for people in space and the influence of V.I. Vernadsky" s biosphere works on the approaches to construct artificial ecosystems. The article presents the crucial contribution of S.P. Korolev to the first practical implementation of building the space habitat prototypes according to K.E. Tsiolkovsky's projects. The article describes the major historical stages of this process that are such experiments as BIOS (the USSR), Biosphere 2 (the USA), CEEF (Japan), Mars-500 (Russia), Yuegong-1 (China ).
artificial ecosystem, space habitats, closed ecological system, K.E. Tsiolkovsky, S.P. Korolev, V.I. Vernadsky.
Introduction
The idea of the need to create an artificial closed human habitat was born simultaneously with the emergence of the dream of space flights. People have always been interested in the ability to move in air and outer space. In the XX century. practical space exploration started, and in the 21st century. Astronautics has already become an integral part of the world economy. Herald of astronautics, philosopher-cosmist K.E. Tsiolkovsky in "Monism of the Universe" (1925) wrote: "The technology of the future will make it possible to overcome the earth's gravity and travel throughout the solar system. After the settlement of our solar system, other solar systems of our Milky Way will begin to be populated. With difficulty a man will be separated from the earth. By "technique of the future" Tsiolkovsky meant not only rocket technology, using the principle of jet propulsion, but also a system of human habitation in space, built in the image and likeness of the earth's biosphere.
The birth of the concept of "space biosphere"
K.E. Tsiolkovsky was the first to express the idea of using nature-like principles and biospheric mechanisms for the reproduction of oxygen, nutrition, fresh water and disposal of the resulting waste for the life support of the crew of their "jet device". This question was considered by Tsiolkovsky in almost all of his scientific papers, philosophical and fantastic works. The possibility of creating such an environment is substantiated by the works of V.I. Vernadsky, who revealed the basic principles of the construction and functioning of the Earth's biosphere. Between 1909 and 1910, Vernadsky published a series of notes on observations of the distribution of chemical elements in earth's crust, and made a conclusion about the leading importance of living organisms for creating a cycle of matter on the planet. Having become acquainted with these works of Vernadsky and other works in the field of a then new scientific direction - ecology, Tsiolkovsky wrote in the second part of the article "The study of world spaces with jet devices" (1911): "As the earth's atmosphere is purified by plants with the help of the Sun, so can
renew our artificial atmosphere. Just as plants on Earth absorb impurities with their leaves and roots and provide food in return, so can plants taken on our journeys continuously work for us. How everything that exists on earth lives on the same amount of gases, liquids and solids so we can live forever on the stock of matter we have taken.
The authorship of Tsiolkovsky also belongs to the project of a space settlement for a large number of inhabitants, for whom the renewal of the atmosphere, water and food resources is organized due to the closed cycle of chemicals. Tsiolkovsky describes such a "cosmic biosphere" in a manuscript that he kept until 1933, but was never able to finish:
“The community contains up to a thousand people of both sexes and all ages. Humidity is controlled by the refrigerator. He also collects all the excess water evaporated by people. The hostel communicates with the greenhouse, from which it receives purified oxygen and where it sends all the products of its excretions. Some of them in the form of liquids permeate the soil of greenhouses, others are directly released into their atmosphere.
When a third of the surface of the cylinder is occupied by windows, it turns out 87% most light, and 13% is lost. Passages are inconvenient everywhere...” (At this point the manuscript breaks off).
First experimental installations
The unfinished manuscript of Tsiolkovsky, entitled "Life in the Interstellar Environment", was published by the Nauka publishing house after more than 30 years - in 1964. The initiator of the publication was the general designer of space technology, Academician S.P. Korolev. In 1962, he, already having the experience of a successful space flight, carried out by the first cosmonaut Yu.A. Gagarin on April 12, 1961, set a fundamentally new vector for the development of the space project: “We should start developing the “greenhouse according to Tsiolkovsky”, with gradually increasing links or blocks, and we should start working on “space harvests”. Which organizations will carry out these works: in the area of crop production and issues of soil, moisture, in the area of mechanization and "light-heat-solar" technology and its control systems for greenhouses? .
The creation of the world's first closed artificial ecosystem for space purposes began with the meeting of S.P. Korolev and Director of the Institute of Physics of the Siberian Branch of the USSR Academy of Sciences (IP SB AS USSR) L.V. Kirensky, at which Korolev conveyed to Kirensky his proposals for a "space greenhouse". After that, a series of meetings were held at the Institute of Physics of the Siberian Branch of the USSR Academy of Sciences, where the question of which department would become the base for the development of work on the space program was decided. The task set by Korolev to create an artificial ecosystem in a sealed capsule, in which a person could stay for a long time in environmental conditions close to the earth, was entrusted to the department of protozoa. This unusual decision, as it turned out later, turned out to be correct: it was the simplest microalgae that were able to fully provide the crew with oxygen and clean water.
It is significant that in the same year - 1964, when the last manuscript of Tsiolkovsky saw the light, work began on the practical development of the first ever closed artificial ecological system, which includes human metabolism in the internal cycle of matter. In the Department of Biophysics of the Institute of Biophysics of the Siberian Branch of the USSR Academy of Sciences, later transformed into an independent Institute of Biophysics of the Siberian Branch of the USSR Academy of Sciences, the construction of the Bios-1 experimental facility began in Krasnoyarsk, in which I.I. Gitelzon and I.A. Terskov, who became the founders of a new direction in biophysics. The main task was to organize the provision of human oxygen and water. The first installation consisted of two components: a pressurized cabin with a volume of 12 m3, inside which a person was accommodated, and a special cultivator tank with a volume of 20 liters for growing common chlorella. The 7 experiments of various duration (from 12 hours to 45 days) showed the possibility of completely closing the gas exchange, that is, to ensure the production of oxygen and the utilization of carbon dioxide by microalgae. Through the vital processes of chlorella, a water cycle was also established, during which the water was purified in the amount necessary for drinking and meeting other needs.
In "Bios-1" experiments lasting more than 45 days did not work out, since the growth of microalgae stopped. In 1966, in order to develop an artificial ecosystem containing both lower and higher plants, Bios-1 was upgraded to Bios-2 by connecting an 8 m3 phytotron to the pressurized cabin. Phytotron is a special technical device for growing higher plants: vegetables and wheat under artificial lighting and microclimate conditions. Higher plants served as a source of food for the crew and provided air regeneration. Since higher plants also gave oxygen, it was possible to carry out experiments with the participation of two testers, which lasted 30, 73 and 90 days. The plant operated until 1970.
"Bios-3" was put into operation in 1972. This hermetic structure the size of a 4-room apartment, which is still operational, with a volume of 315 m3, was arranged in the basement of the Institute of Biophysics of the Siberian Branch of the Russian Academy of Sciences in Krasnoyarsk. Inside, the installation is divided by airtight bulkheads with locks into four compartments: two greenhouses for edible plants grown in phytotrons using a hydroponics method that does not require soil, a compartment for breeding chlorella that produces oxygen and clean water, and a compartment for crew members. In the living compartment there are sleeping places, a kitchen and dining room, a toilet, a control panel, devices for processing plant products and waste disposal.
In phytotrons, the crew grew specially bred dwarf wheat varieties containing a minimum of inedible biomass. Vegetables were also bred: onions, cucumbers, radishes, lettuce, cabbage, carrots, potatoes, beets, sorrel and dill. The Central Asian oil plant "chufa" was selected, which served as a source of vegetable fats indispensable for the human body. The crew received the necessary proteins by eating canned meat and fish.
Ten experimental colonizations were carried out in Bios-3 during the 1970s and early 1980s. Three of them lasted several months. The longest experience of continuous complete isolation of a crew of three lasted 6 months - from December 24, 1972 to June 22, 1973. This experiment had a complex structure and was carried out in three stages. Each stage had its own composition of researchers. M.P. were alternately inside the installation. Shilenko, N.I. Petrov and N.I. Bugreev, who worked for 4 months each. Participant of the experiment V.V. Terskikh stayed in Bios-3 for all 6 months.
Phytotrons "Bios-3" produced a sufficient harvest of grain and vegetables per day. Most of the time the crew spent on growing edible plants from seeds, harvesting and processing it, baking bread and cooking. In 1976-1977. passed an experiment that lasted 4 months, in which two testers were involved: G.Z. Asinyarov and N.I. Bugreev. From the autumn of 1983 to the spring of 1984, a 5-month experiment was conducted with the participation of N.I. Bugreeva and S.S. Alekseev, which completed the work of "Bios". N.I. Bugreev thus set an absolute record at that time for staying in a closed artificial environment, having lived in the installation for a total of 15 months. In the late 1980s, the Bios program was put on hold as its government funding stopped.
"Biosphere" behind glass
The baton in creating a closed habitat was picked up by the Americans. In 1984, Space Biospheres Ventures began building Biosphere 2, an enclosed experimental facility on a site in the US Arizona Desert.
The ideologists of Biosphere-2 were Mark Nelson and John Allen, who were imbued with the ideas of V.I. Vernadsky, uniting about 20 scientists abroad on the basis of the doctrine of the biosphere. In the USSR, the publishing house "Thought" in 1991 published a book by this group of authors "Catalogue of the Biosphere", which told about the upcoming experiment. Allen and Nelson wrote about their task of creating "cosmic biospheres" in the following way: "Armed with the great ideas, ideas and models of Vernadsky and other scientists, humanity is now willingly considering not only possible ways of interacting with the biosphere, but also ways of assisting its "mitosis" , adapting our earthly life for full participation in the fate of the Cosmos itself by creating the opportunity to travel and live in outer space.
"Biosphere-2" is a capital structure made of glass, concrete and steel, located on the territory of 1.27 hectares. The volume of the complex amounted to more than 200 thousand m3. The system was sealed, that is, it could be completely separated from the external environment. Inside it, aquatic and terrestrial ecosystems of the biosphere were artificially recreated: a mini-ocean with an artificial reef made of corals, a tropical forest - jungle, savannah, woodlands of thorny plants, desert, freshwater and saltwater swamps. The latter took the form of a winding riverbed flooded by an artificial ocean - an estuary planted with mangroves. Biological communities of ecosystems included 3800 species of animals, plants and microorganisms. Inside the "Biosphere-2" residential apartments were arranged for the participants in the experiment and agricultural sites, which made up a whole ranch called Sun Space.
On September 26, 1991, 8 people were isolated inside the complex of facilities - 4 men and 4 women. Experimenters - "bionauts", among whom was the ideologist of the project Mark Nelson, were engaged in traditional agriculture - rice growing. For this, rural and livestock farms were used, highly reliable tools were used, which had to be driven only by the muscular strength of a person. Grass, shrubs and trees were planted inside the installation. The researchers cultivated rice and wheat, sweet potatoes and beets, bananas and papaya, and other crops, which together produced 46 varieties of plant foods. The meat diet was provided by animal husbandry. Chickens, goats and pigs lived on the livestock farm. In addition, the bionauts raised fish and shrimp.
Difficulties began almost immediately after the start of the experiment. A week later, the Biosphere-2 technician reported that the amount of oxygen in the atmosphere was gradually decreasing and the concentration of carbon dioxide was increasing. It also turned out that the farm provided only 83% of the researchers' required diet. In addition, in 1992, breeding pest moths destroyed almost all rice crops. Throughout the winter of this year, cloudy weather persisted, which led to a decrease in oxygen production and plant nutrition. The artificial ocean became acidic due to the dissolution of a large amount of carbon dioxide in its water, due to which the coral reef died. The extinction of animals in the jungle and savannah began. Within two years, the oxygen concentration behind the glass dropped to 14% instead of the original 21% by volume.
"Bionauts" came out in September 1993, after a two-year stay "behind the glass." It is believed that "Biosphere-2" failed. Due to the small scale of the model, the "environmental catastrophe" in it occurred very quickly and showed all the perniciousness of the modern way of managing a person that creates environmental problems: lack of nutrition, removal of biomass, pollution of the atmosphere and hydrosphere, and a decrease in species diversity. The experience of "Biosphere-2" was of great ideological significance. One of the "bionauts" - Jane Pointer, giving lectures after the end of the experiment in "Biosphere-2", said: "It was only here that I realized for the first time how much a person is dependent on the biosphere - if all plants die, then people will have nothing to breathe and there will be nothing to eat. If all the water is contaminated, people will have nothing to drink.” The Biosphere-2 complex is still open to the public, as its authors believe that they have created a fundamentally new basis for public education in the field of environmental protection.
Prototypes of inhabited space stations
The installations created since the second half of the 1990s initially had a clear purpose - modeling the life support system of a spacecraft or a habitable base for flight conditions and exploration of Mars or the Moon. From 1998 to 2001, research was conducted in Japan at the CEEF (Closed Ecological Experimental Facility) facility, which is a closed artificial ecosystem. The purpose of the experiments was to study closed cycles of gas exchange, water circulation and nutrition while simulating the conditions of a Martian habitable base. The complex included a phytotron unit for growing plants, a compartment for breeding domestic animals (goats), a special geohydrospheric unit simulating terrestrial and aquatic ecosystems, and a habitable module for a crew of two. The area of plant plantings was 150 m2, livestock module - 30 m2, residential - 50 m2. The authors of the project were employees of the Tokyo Aerospace Institute K. Nitta and M. Oguchi. The object is located on the island of Honshu in the city of Rokkasho. There are no data on carrying out long-term experiments to isolate people in this installation; the results of modeling the consequences of global climate warming and studies of the migration of radionuclides in internal flows of matter have been published.
Modeling of a closed habitat in simulating long-term space flights is carried out at the Institute of Biomedical Problems (IMBP) of the Russian Academy of Sciences (Moscow), founded by M.V. Keldysh and S.P. Korolyov in 1963. The basis of this work is the study of people staying in isolated conditions for a long time inside the Mars-500 complex. The experiment on 520-day isolation of the crew began in June 2010 and ended in November 2011. Male researchers took part in the experiment: A.S. Sitev, S.R. Kamolov, A.E. Smoleevsky (Russia), Diego Urbina (Italy), Charles Romain (France), Wang Yue (China). One of the modules of the complex includes a greenhouse for growing vegetables. Planting area does not exceed 14.7 m2 in a volume of 69 m3. The greenhouse served as a source of vitamins, supplementing and improving the diet of the participants in the experiment. The Mars-500 complex is based on physico-chemical, rather than biological, processes for providing the crew with oxygen and clean water using canned food reserves, therefore it differs significantly from the Bios-3 installation.
The most conceptually close to the Bios project is the Chinese complex Yuegun-1 (Lunar Palace). The complex reproduces the conditions of the lunar base. Yuegong-1 was developed at Beijing University of Aeronautics and Astronautics by Professor Li Hong. Scientists from Moscow and Krasnoyarsk advised the creators of the Chinese complex.
The Yuegong-1 complex occupies an area of 160 m2 with a volume of 500 m3 and consists of three semi-cylindrical modules. The first module is residential, which contains a saloon, cabins for three crew members, a waste processing system and a personal hygiene room. The other two modules house greenhouses for the production of plant foods. Grown plants accounted for more than 40% of the crew's diet. In terms of water and air, the closed environment of the installation was 99%.
The construction of the Yuegong-1 installation was completed on November 9, 2013. From December 23 to December 30, 2014, the testers, who were two university students, conducted a trial settlement of the Lunar Palace. The experiment itself was carried out for 105 days - from February 3 to May 20, 2014. A crew of three people took part in it: a man, Xie Beizhen, and two women, Wang Minjuan and Dong Chen. The experiment ended successfully and was widely reported in the Chinese media. Conclusion
The presented history of the creation of closed artificial ecosystems is a fragment of the global historical process of human development. Man, thanks to his ability to think, created practical astronautics and proved his ability to go beyond the planet. A deep study of the biospheric mechanisms of building and functioning of the habitat will allow people to create favorable conditions on the planets and their satellites, asteroids, and other space bodies. This activity will allow realizing the meanings of human existence.
IN AND. Vernadsky wrote about the spread of life over the Earth and outer space. Only a man with his mind is capable of leading the expansion of our biosphere further, up to the development of the studied boundaries of the Cosmos. Mankind needs to extend the biosphere to asteroids and nearby space bodies in order to go further, beyond the studied limits of the Universe. This is important for the preservation of not only our biosphere, but also the very biological species of man. As a result of the exploration of the near-Earth space, the Solar System, and then the outer space, foreseen by Tsiolkovsky, dynamic populations of mankind can be formed - that is, part of the people will permanently live on space bases outside the Earth. History as a science, thus, will go beyond the planetary framework and become truly the history of not only the Earth, but also the Cosmos.
1. The world of philosophy. In 2 vols. T. 2. M., 1991. 624 p.
2. Tsiolkovsky K.E. Industrial space exploration: collection of works. M., 1989. 278 p.
3. Photocopies of manuscripts by K.E. Tsiolkovsky [Electronic resource]. URL: http://tsiolkovsky.org/wp-content/up-loads/2016/02/ZHizn-v-mezhzvezdnoj-srede.pdf (accessed 25.04.2017).
4. Grishin Yu.I. Artificial space ecosystems. M., 1989. 64 p. (New in life, science, technology. Cosmonautics, astronomy series. No. 7).
5. Gitelzon I.I., Degermendzhi A.G., Tikhomirov A.A. Closed life support systems // Science in Russia. 2011. No. 6. S. 4-10.
6. Degermendzhi A.G., Tikhomirov A.A. Creation of artificial closed ecosystems for terrestrial and space purposes // Bulletin of the Russian Academy of Sciences. 2014. V. 84, No. 3. S. 233-240.
7. Catalog of the biosphere. M., 1991. 253 p.
8. Nelson M., Dempster W.F., Allen J.P. "Modular Biospheres" - New Testbed Platforms for Public Environmental Education and Research // Advances in Space Research. 2008 Vol. 41, no. 5. R. 787-797.
9. Nitta K. The CEEF, Closed Ecosystem as a Laboratory for Determining the Dynamics of Radioactive Isotopes, Ibid. 2001 Vol. 27, no. 9. R. 1505-1512.
10. Grigoriev A.I., Morukov B.V. "Mars-500": preliminary results // Earth and Universe. 2013. No. 3. S. 31-41.
11. Paveltsev P. "Yuegun-1" - the successor of the BIOS-3 project // Cosmonautics News. 2014. V. 24, No. 7. S. 63-65.
1 slide
Every living organism in nature is found only where it finds all the conditions for life: warmth and light, protection from enemies, enough food, water. This is his habitat. In it, a living organism feels at home, and in another place it can easily die. Bear - in the forest Cactus - in the desert Shark - in the sea Sundew - in the swamp TO WHOM WHERE CONVENIENT
2 slide
Different living beings inhabiting the same habitat are connected by close relationships. Many of them cannot do without each other. Organisms living together and a piece of land where they feel at home together form an ecological system, or simply an ecosystem. The ecosystem is arranged extremely wisely: there is everything that is needed for life, and there is nothing superfluous. The secret of an ecosystem lies in the nutritional relationships of its inhabitants. In nature, organisms of one species serve as food for organisms of another species.
3 slide
The main role in the ecosystem belongs to plants. They supply organic matter to all the inhabitants of the ecosystem. Since plants from light, air, water and minerals create organic matter. Plants serve as a source of food for the rest of the inhabitants of the ecosystem, which is why they are called "breadwinners". In addition, plants purify the air by releasing oxygen necessary for breathing by living organisms.
4 slide
Animals cannot transform minerals into organic. They feed on plants or other animals, get the necessary organic substances with food. Therefore, animals are called "eaters" - this is their main role in the ecosystem. In addition, animals breathe by taking in oxygen from the air and releasing carbon dioxide.
5 slide
If there were only "breadwinners" and "eaters" among living beings, then a lot of garbage would accumulate in the ecosystem: last year's grass, fallen leaves and branches, animal remains. But they do not accumulate, but are quickly destroyed by fungi, microscopic bacteria, as well as small animals that live under fallen leaves. All of them recycle natural waste and turn it back into minerals that can be reused by plants. Therefore, these living organisms are called "scavengers". The destroyed remains of plants and animals give fertility to the top layer of the earth, which is called soil.
6 slide
Substances in an ecosystem pass from one organism to another in a circle. Substances are recycled, change their properties, but do not disappear, but are used again and again. The ecosystem needs nothing but sunlight. Thanks to this, she can live a very long time, if nothing interferes. Plants do not need to be watered, fertilized or weeded. Animals don't need to be fed. No need to clean up after them waste - this is done by "scavengers".
7 slide
An ecosystem is such a "commonwealth" of animate and inanimate nature, in which all inhabitants feel at home. Organisms in an ecosystem perform three roles: "breadwinners", "eaters", "scavengers". The ecosystem has everything that is needed for the life of its inhabitants. They receive only light from space from the sun. There is nothing superfluous, unnecessary in the ecosystem: everything that is produced is fully used by its inhabitants. An ecosystem can exist for as long as you like without outside help.
Mankind needed all the knowledge collected by scientists over hundreds of years to start space flights. And then a person faced a new problem - for the colonization of other planets and long-distance flights, it is necessary to develop a closed ecosystem, including - to provide astronauts with food, water and oxygen. Delivering food to Mars, which is 200 million kilometers from Earth, is expensive and difficult, it would be more logical to find ways to produce food that are easy to implement in flight and on the Red Planet.
How does microgravity affect seeds? What vegetables would be harmless if grown in heavy-metal-rich soil on Mars? How to set up a plantation aboard a spaceship? Scientists and astronauts have been looking for answers to these questions for more than fifty years.
In the illustration - Russian cosmonaut Maxim Suraev hugs plants in the Lada installation aboard the International space station, year 2014.
Konstantin Tsiolkovsky wrote in The Purposes of Astronautics: “Let us imagine a long conical surface or funnel, the base or wide opening of which is covered with a transparent spherical surface. It is directly facing the Sun, and the funnel rotates around its long axis (height). On the opaque inner walls of the cone there is a layer of moist soil with plants planted in it. So he proposed to artificially create gravity for plants. Plants should be selected prolific, small, without thick trunks and parts that do not work in the sun. Thus, colonizers can be partially provided with biologically active substances and microelements and regenerate oxygen and water.
In 1962, the chief designer of OKB-1, Sergei Korolev, set the task: “We should start developing the “Greenhouse (OR) according to Tsiolkovsky”, with gradually increasing links or blocks, and we should start working on “space crops”.
Manuscript K.E. Tsiolkovsky "Album of space travel", 1933.
The USSR launched the first artificial Earth satellite into orbit on October 4, 1957, twenty-two years after Tsiolkovsky's death. Already in November of the same year, the mongrel Laika was sent into space, the first of the dogs that were supposed to open the way to space for people. Laika died of overheating in just five hours, although the flight was scheduled for a week - this time would have been enough oxygen and food.
Scientists have suggested that the problem arose due to the genetic orientation - the seedling should reach for the light, and the root - in opposite side. They improved the Oasis, and the next expedition took new seeds into orbit.
The bow has grown. Vitaly Sevastyanov reported to Earth that the arrows had reached ten to fifteen centimeters. “What arrows, what kind of bow? We understand that this is a joke, we gave you peas, not onions, ”they said from the Earth. The flight engineer replied that the astronauts took two bulbs from the house to plant them over the plan, and reassured the scientists - almost all the peas sprouted.
But the plants refused to bloom. At this stage, they died. The same fate awaited tulips, which bloomed in the Buttercup installation at the North Pole, but not in space.
But onions could be eaten, which was successfully done in 1978 by cosmonauts V. Kovalenok and A. Ivanchenkov: “They did a good job. Maybe now we will be allowed to eat the onion as a reward.
Technique - youth, 1983-04, page 6. Peas in the Oasis plant
Cosmonauts V. Ryumin and L. Popov in April 1980 received the Malachite installation with blooming orchids. Orchids thrive in tree bark and hollows, and scientists thought they might be less susceptible to geotropism, the ability of plant organs to orient and grow in a specific direction relative to the center of the globe. The flowers fell off after a few days, but at the same time, new leaves and aerial roots formed in the orchids. A little later, the Soviet-Vietnamese crew from V. Gorbatko and Pham Tuay brought with them a grown Arabidopsis.
The plants didn't want to bloom. The seeds sprouted, but, for example, the orchid did not bloom in space. Scientists needed to help plants cope with weightlessness. This was done, among other things, with the help of electrical stimulation of the root zone: scientists believed that the Earth's electromagnetic field could affect growth. Another method involved the plan described by Tsiolkovsky to create artificial gravity - plants were grown in a centrifuge. The centrifuge helped - the sprouts were oriented along the centrifugal force vector. Finally, the astronauts got their way. Arabidopsis bloomed in Svetoblok.
On the left in the image below is the Fiton greenhouse aboard the Salyut-7. For the first time in this orbital greenhouse, Talya's rezukhovidka (Arabidopsis) went through a full development cycle and gave seeds. In the middle - "Svetoblok", in which Arabidopsis bloomed for the first time on board the Salyut-6. On the right is the onboard greenhouse "Oasis-1A" at the station "Salyut-7": it was equipped with a system of metered semi-automatic irrigation, aeration and electrical stimulation of the roots and could move the growing vessels with plants relative to the light source.
"Fiton", "Svetoblok" and "Oasis-1A"
Installation "Trapezia" for the study of growth and development of plants.
Seed kits
Flight log of the Salyut-7 station, sketches by Svetlana Savitskaya
The world's first automatic greenhouse "Svet" was installed at the Mir station. Russian cosmonauts conducted six experiments in this greenhouse in the 1990s-2000s. They grew lettuces, radishes and wheat. In 1996-1997, the Institute of Biomedical Problems of the Russian Academy of Sciences planned to grow plant seeds obtained in space - that is, to work with two generations of plants. For the experiment, a hybrid of wild cabbage about twenty centimeters high was chosen. The plant had one minus - the astronauts had to deal with pollination.
The result was interesting - the seeds of the second generation were received in space, and they even sprouted. But the plants grew to six centimeters instead of twenty-five. Margarita Levinskikh, Researcher at the Institute of Biomedical Problems of the Russian Academy of Sciences, tells that the American astronaut Michael Fossum performed the jewelry work on pollination of plants.
Roscosmos video about growing plants in space. At 4:38 - plants at Mir station
In April 2014, the Dragon SpaceX cargo ship delivered a Veggie green growing facility to the International Space Station, and in March, astronauts began testing an orbital plantation. The installation controls the light and the supply of nutrients. In August 2015 on the astronauts menu , grown in microgravity.
Lettuce grown on the International Space Station
This is what a space station plantation might look like in the future
The Lada greenhouse operates in the Russian segment of the International Space Station for the Plants-2 experiment. At the end of 2016 or the beginning of 2017, the Lada-2 version will appear on board. The Institute of Biomedical Problems of the Russian Academy of Sciences is working on these projects.
Space crop production is not limited to experiments in zero gravity. In order to colonize other planets, a person will have to develop Agriculture on the ground, which is different from the earth, and in the atmosphere, which has a different composition. In 2014, biologist Michael Mautner asparagus and potatoes on meteorite soil. In order to obtain soil suitable for cultivation, the meteorite was ground into powder. By experience, he was able to prove that bacteria, microscopic fungi and plants can grow on soil of extraterrestrial origin. The material of most asteroids contains phosphates, nitrates, and sometimes water.
Asparagus grown on meteor soil
In the case of Mars, where there is a lot of sand and dust, rock grinding is not needed. But there will be another problem - the composition of the soil. There are heavy metals in the soil of Mars, the increased amount of which in plants is dangerous for humans. Dutch scientists have mimicked Martian soil and have grown ten crops of several plant species on it since 2013.
As a result of the experiment, scientists found that the content of heavy metals in peas, radishes, rye and tomatoes grown on simulated Martian soil is not dangerous for humans. Scientists continue to explore potatoes and other crops.
Researcher Wager Vamelink inspects plants grown on simulated Martian soil. Photo: Joep Frissel/AFP/Getty Images
Metal content in crops harvested on Earth and in soil simulations on the Moon and Mars
One of the important tasks is to create a closed life support cycle. Plants take in carbon dioxide and waste products from the crew, give off oxygen in return, and produce food. Scientists have the possibility of using chlorella single-celled algae containing 45% protein and 20% fat and carbohydrates as food. But this theoretically nutritious food is not absorbed by humans due to the dense cell wall. There are ways to solve this problem. It is possible to split cell walls by technological methods, using heat treatment, grinding crayons or other methods. You can take with you enzymes developed specifically for chlorella, which the astronauts will take with food. Scientists can also bring out GMO chlorella, the wall of which can be broken down by human enzymes. Chlorella is no longer used for nutrition in space, but is used in closed ecosystems to produce oxygen.
The experiment with chlorella was carried out on board the Salyut-6 orbital station. In the 1970s, it was still believed that being in microgravity did not have a negative effect on the human body - there was too little information. They also tried to study the effect on living organisms with the help of chlorella, the life cycle of which lasts only four hours. It was convenient to compare it with chlorella grown on Earth.
The IFS-2 device was intended for growing fungi, tissue cultures and microorganisms, and aquatic animals.
Since the 1970s, experiments on closed systems have been carried out in the USSR. In 1972, the work of "BIOS-3" began - this system is still in operation. The complex is equipped with chambers for growing plants in controlled artificial conditions - phytotrons. They grew wheat, soybeans, chufu lettuce, carrots, radishes, beets, potatoes, cucumbers, sorrel, cabbage, dill and onions. Scientists have been able to achieve almost a 100% closed cycle for water and air, and up to 50-80% for nutrition. The main goals of the International Center for Closed Ecological Systems are to study the principles of functioning of such systems of varying degrees of complexity and develop the scientific basis for their creation.
One of the high-profile experiments simulating a flight to Mars and returning to Earth was. For 519 days, six volunteers were in a closed complex. The experiment was organized by Rokosmos and the Russian Academy of Sciences, and the European Space Agency became a partner. On the “board of the ship” there were two greenhouses - lettuce grew in one, peas in the other. In this case, the goal was not to grow the plants in close to space conditions, but to find out how important the plants are to the crew. Therefore, the greenhouse doors were sealed with an opaque film and a sensor was installed to record each opening. In the photo on the left, a member of the Mars-500 crew, Marina Tugusheva, works with greenhouses as part of an experiment.
Another experiment aboard the Mars-500 is GreenHouse. In the video below, expedition member Alexei Sitnev talks about the experiment and shows a greenhouse with various plants.
A person will have many chances. He runs the risk of crashing during landing, freezing on the surface, or simply not flying. And, of course, starve to death. Crop production is essential for the formation of a colony, and scientists and astronauts are working in this direction, showing successful examples of growing some species not only in microgravity, but also in the simulated soil of Mars and the Moon. Space colonists will definitely have an opportunity.
Doctor of Economics Y. SHISKOV
We see the bottomless blue sky, green forests and meadows, we hear the singing of birds, we breathe air, consisting almost entirely of nitrogen and oxygen, we swim in rivers and seas, we drink water or use it, we sunbathe in the gentle rays of the sun - and we perceive all this as natural and ordinary. It seems that it cannot be otherwise: it has always been so, it will be so forever! But this is a profound delusion, born of everyday habit and ignorance of how and why the planet Earth became the way we know it. Planets arranged differently than ours not only can exist, but actually exist in the Universe. But are there planets somewhere in the depths of space with ecological conditions more or less close to those of the earth? This possibility is highly hypothetical and minimal. The earth, if not unique, then, in any case, a "piece" product of nature.
The main ecosystems of the planet. Mountains, forests, deserts, seas, oceans - still relatively pure nature - and megacities - the focus of life and activity of people who can turn the Earth into a continuous dump.
So beautiful is seen from space Earth - a unique planet that gave rise to life.
Science and life // Illustrations
The figure shows the stages of the evolution of the planet Earth and the development of life on it.
Here are just some of the negative consequences caused by the activities of mankind on Earth. The waters of the seas and oceans are polluted with oil, although there is more than one way to collect it. But the waters are also clogged with banal household waste.
There is no inhabited continent where factories and plants would not smoke, changing the surrounding atmosphere not for the better.
Science and life // Illustrations
A picture typical of anyone big city Lands: endless lines of cars, from the exhaust gases of which people get sick, trees die ...
Science and life // Illustrations
Science and life // Illustrations
Science and life // Illustrations
Science and life // Illustrations
Environmentally friendly production is the only thing that will make it possible, if not to make the planet cleaner, then at least leave it the way we got it.
Long formation of the Earth's ecosystem
First of all, let us recall how the evolution of the solar system proceeded. Approximately 4.6 billion years ago, one of the many vortex clouds of gas and dust within our Galaxy began to condense and turn into the solar system. Inside the cloud, the main spherical, then still cold, rotating clot, consisting of gas (hydrogen and helium) and cosmic dust (fragments of atoms of heavier chemical elements from previously exploded giant stars), was formed - the future Sun. Around it, under the influence of growing gravity, smaller clots of the same cloud began to circulate - future planets, asteroids, comets. The orbits of some of them turned out to be closer to the Sun, others - farther, some were built from large clumps of interstellar matter, others - from smaller ones.
It didn't really matter at first. But over time, the forces of gravity increasingly condensed the Sun and the planets. And the degree of compaction depends on their initial mass. And the more these clumps of matter were compressed, the more they warmed up from the inside. At the same time, heavy chemical elements(first of all - iron, silicates) melted and sank to the center, and light (hydrogen, helium, carbon, nitrogen, oxygen) remained on the surface. When combined with hydrogen, carbon turned into methane, nitrogen into ammonia, oxygen into water. Cosmic cold then reigned on the surface of the planets, so all compounds were in the form of ice. Above the solid part was a gaseous layer of hydrogen and helium.
However, the mass of even such large planets as Jupiter and Saturn turned out to be insufficient for the pressure and temperature in their centers to reach the point when a thermonuclear reaction begins, and such a reaction begins inside the Sun. It became hot and about four billion years ago turned into a star, sending into space not only wave radiation - light, heat, X-rays and gamma rays, but also the so-called solar wind - streams of charged particles of matter (protons and electrons).
Tests have begun for the forming planets. The streams of thermal energy of the Sun and the solar wind fell upon them. The cold surface of the protoplanets warmed up, clouds of hydrogen and helium rose above them, and the ice masses of water, methane and ammonia melted and began to evaporate. Driven by the solar wind, these gases were carried away into space. The degree of such "undressing" of the primary planets determined the distance of their orbits from the Sun: those closest to it evaporated and were blown by the solar wind most intensively. As the planets "thinned", their gravitational fields weakened, and evaporation and blowing intensified, until the planets closest to the Sun completely dissipated in space.
Mercury - the closest extant planet to the Sun - relatively small, very dense heavenly body with a metal core, but a barely noticeable magnetic field. It is practically devoid of atmosphere, and its surface is covered with sintered rocky rocks, which in the daytime are heated by the Sun to 420-430 ° C, and therefore there can be no liquid water here. More distant from the Sun, Venus is very similar in size and density to our planet. It has almost the same large iron core, but due to its slow rotation around its axis (243 times slower than the Earth), it lacks a magnetic field that could protect it from the solar wind, which is destructive to all living things. Venus, however, retained a fairly powerful atmosphere, 97% carbon dioxide (CO 2) and less than 2% nitrogen. Such a gas composition creates a powerful greenhouse effect: CO 2 prevents solar radiation reflected by the Venusian surface from escaping into space, due to which the surface of the planet and the lower layers of its atmosphere are heated to 470 ° C. In such hell, liquid water, and therefore, living organisms, is out of the question.
Our other neighbor, Mars, is almost half the size of Earth. And although it has a metal core and rotates around its axis at almost the same speed as the Earth, it does not have a magnetic field. Why? Its metal core is very small, and most importantly, it is not melted and therefore does not induce such a field. As a result, the surface of Mars is constantly bombarded by charged fragments of hydrogen nuclei and other elements that are continuously ejected by the Sun. The atmosphere of Mars is similar in composition to that of Venus: 95% CO 2 and 3% nitrogen. But because of the weak gravity of this planet and the solar wind, its atmosphere is extremely rarefied: the pressure on the surface of Mars is 167 times lower than on Earth. At that pressure, there can't be liquid water either. However, it is not on Mars due to the low temperature (in the daytime, on average, minus 33 ° C). In summer at the equator, it rises to a maximum of plus 17 ° C, and in winter at high latitudes it drops to minus 125 ° C, when atmospheric carbon dioxide also turns into ice - this explains the seasonal increase in the white polar caps of Mars.
The large planets, Jupiter and Saturn, do not have a solid surface at all - their upper layers consist of liquid hydrogen and helium, and the lower ones are made of molten heavy elements. Uranus is a liquid ball with a core of molten silicates, above the core lies a hot water ocean about 8 thousand kilometers deep, and above all this is a hydrogen-helium atmosphere 11 thousand kilometers thick. Equally unsuitable for the origin of biological life are the most distant planets - Neptune and Pluto.
Only the Earth is lucky. A coincidence of circumstances (chief among them - the initial mass at the protoplanet stage, the distance from the Sun, the speed of rotation around its axis and the presence of a semi-liquid iron core, which gives it a strong magnetic field that protects it from the solar wind) allowed the planet to become what we are used to over time to see her. The long geological evolution of the Earth has led to the emergence of life only on it.
First of all, the gas composition has changed earth's atmosphere. Initially, it apparently consisted of hydrogen, ammonia, methane and water vapor. Then, interacting with hydrogen, methane turned into CO 2, and ammonia into nitrogen. There was no oxygen in the Earth's primary atmosphere. As it cooled, the water vapor condensed into liquid water and formed oceans and seas that covered three-quarters of the earth's surface. The amount of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere decreased: it was dissolved in water. During the continuous volcanic eruptions, characteristic of the early stages of the Earth's history, part of CO 2 was bound in carbonate compounds. The decrease in carbon dioxide in the atmosphere weakened the greenhouse effect it created: the temperature on the Earth's surface decreased and became radically different from that which existed and exists on Mercury and Venus.
The seas and oceans have played a decisive role in the biological evolution of the Earth. Atoms of various chemical elements dissolved in water, interacting, formed new, more complex inorganic compounds. From them, under the influence of electric lightning discharges, radioactive radiation of metals, eruptions of underwater volcanoes in sea water, the simplest organic compounds arose - amino acids, those initial "bricks" that make up proteins - the basis of living organisms. Most of these simple amino acids decayed, but some of them, becoming more complex, became primary unicellular organisms such as bacteria, capable of adapting to their environment and multiplying.
So about 3.5 billion years ago in geological history The earth has entered a qualitatively new stage. Its chemical evolution was supplemented (or rather, relegated to the background) by biological evolution. No other planet in the solar system knew this.
Another one and a half billion years passed before chlorophyll and other pigments appeared in the cells of some bacteria, capable of carrying out photosynthesis under the influence of sunlight - converting molecules of carbon dioxide (CO 2) and water (H 2 O) into organic compounds and free oxygen (O 2). Now the light radiation of the Sun began to serve the endless growth of biomass, the development of organic life went much faster.
And further. Under the action of photosynthesis, which absorbs carbon dioxide and releases unbound oxygen, the gas composition of the earth's atmosphere changed: the proportion of CO 2 decreased, and the proportion of O 2 increased. The forests that covered the land accelerated this process. And about 500 million years ago, the simplest waterfowl vertebrates appeared. After about 100 million years, the amount of oxygen reached a level that allowed some vertebrates to come to land. Not only because all land animals breathe oxygen, but also due to the fact that in the upper atmosphere at an altitude of 25-30 kilometers a protective layer of ozone (O 3) appeared, absorbing a significant part of the ultraviolet and X-rays Sun, destructive to land animals.
The composition of the earth's atmosphere by this time had acquired exceptionally favorable properties for the further development of life: 78% nitrogen, 21% oxygen, 0.9% argon, and very little (0.03%) carbon dioxide, hydrogen and other gases. With such an atmosphere, the Earth, receiving a lot of thermal energy from the Sun, about 40% of it, unlike Venus, reflects into space, and the earth's surface does not overheat. But that's not all. Thermal solar energy, almost unhindered coming to Earth in the form of short-wave radiation, is reflected into space already as long-wave infrared radiation. It is partially delayed by water vapor, carbon dioxide, methane, nitric oxide and other gases in the atmosphere that create a natural greenhouse effect. Thanks to it, a more or less stable moderate temperature is maintained in the lower layers of the atmosphere and on the surface of the Earth, which is about 33 ° C higher than it could be if the natural greenhouse effect did not exist.
So, step by step, a unique ecological system suitable for life was formed on Earth. A large, half-molten iron core and the rapid rotation of the Earth around its axis create a sufficiently strong magnetic field that makes the streams of solar protons and electrons flow around our planet without causing significant harm to it even during periods of increased solar radiation (be it a smaller and harder core, but the rotation of the Earth - slower, it would remain defenseless against the solar wind). And thanks to its magnetic field and significant own mass, the Earth has retained a fairly powerful layer of the atmosphere (about 1000 km thick), which creates a comfortable thermal regime on the surface of the planet and an abundance of liquid water - an indispensable condition for the origin and evolution of life.
For two billion years, the number various kinds There are about 10 million plants and animals on the planet. Of these, 21% are plants, almost 76% are invertebrates, and slightly more than 3% are vertebrates, of which only a tenth are mammals. In each natural and climatic zone, they complement each other as links in the trophic, that is, food chain, forming a relatively stable biocenosis.
The biosphere that emerged on Earth gradually fit into the ecosystem and became its integral component, participating in the geological cycle of energy and matter.
Living organisms are active components of many biogeochemical cycles that involve water, carbon, oxygen, nitrogen, hydrogen, sulfur, iron, potassium, calcium and other chemical elements. From the inorganic phase they pass into the organic phase, and then in the form of waste products of plants and animals or their remains again return to the inorganic phase. It has been calculated, for example, that a seventh of all carbon dioxide and 1/4500 of oxygen annually pass through the organic phase. If the process of photosynthesis on Earth were to stop for some reason, then free oxygen would disappear from the atmosphere within about two thousand years. And at the same time, all green plants and all animals would disappear, with the exception of the simplest anaerobic organisms (certain types of bacteria, yeasts and worms).
The Earth's ecosystem is also self-supporting thanks to other circulations of substances that are not related to the functioning of the biosphere - let us recall the water cycle in nature known from school. The whole set of closely interconnected biological and non-biological cycles forms a complex self-regulating ecological system that is in relative balance. However, its stability is very fragile and vulnerable. Proof of this is the repeated planetary catastrophes, the cause of which was either the fall of large cosmic bodies to Earth, or powerful volcanic eruptions, due to which the flow of sunlight to the earth's surface decreased for a long time. Each time, such catastrophes carried away from 50 to 96% of the earth's biota. But life was reborn again and continued to develop.
Aggressive Homo sapiens
The appearance of photosynthetic plants, as already mentioned, marked a new stage in the development of the Earth. Such a radical geological shift was generated by relatively simple living organisms that do not have a mind. From a human being - a highly organized organism endowed with a powerful intellect - it is reasonable to expect a much more tangible impact on the Earth's ecosystem. The distant ancestors of such a creature - hominids - appeared, according to various estimates, from about 3 to 1.8 million years ago, Neanderthals - about 200-100 thousand, and modern Homo sapiens sapiens - only 40 thousand years ago. In geology, even three million years is within the chronological error, and 40,000 is only one millionth of the age of the Earth. But even during this geological moment, people managed to thoroughly shake the balance of its ecosystem.
First of all, for the first time in history, the growth of the Homo sapiens population was not balanced by natural constraints: neither a lack of food, nor predators devouring people. With the development of tools (especially after the industrial revolution), people practically dropped out of the usual trophic chain and were able to multiply almost indefinitely. Two thousand years ago there were about 300 million of them, and by 2003 the earth's population had increased 21 times, to 6.3 billion.
Second. Unlike all others species, having a more or less limited habitat, people settled over the entire earth's surface, regardless of the soil-climatic, geological, biological and other conditions. That is why the degree of their influence on nature is not comparable with the influence of any other creatures. And, finally, thanks to their intellect, people do not so much adapt to the natural environment as they adapt this environment to their needs. And such an adaptation (until recently they proudly said: "the conquest of nature") is becoming more and more offensive, even aggressive.
For many millennia, people almost did not feel the restrictions from the environment. And if they saw that in the nearest district the amount of game exterminated by them decreased, the cultivated soils or meadows for grazing livestock were depleted, then they migrated to a new place. And everything repeated. Natural resources seemed inexhaustible. Only occasionally did such a purely consumerist approach to the environment end badly. More than nine thousand years ago, the Sumerians, in order to feed the growing population of Mesopotamia, began to develop irrigated agriculture. However, the irrigation systems they created eventually led to waterlogging and salinization of the soil, which was the main reason for the death of the Sumerian civilization. Another example. The Maya civilization, which flourished in what is now Guatemala, Honduras, and southeastern Mexico, collapsed about 900 years ago, mainly due to soil erosion and silting of rivers. The same reasons caused the fall of the ancient agricultural civilizations of Mesopotamia in South America. The cases cited are only exceptions to the rule that said: draw from the bottomless well of nature as much as you can. And people scooped from it, not looking back at the state of the ecosystem.
To date, a person has adapted about half of the earth's land for his needs: 26% - for pastures, 11% for arable land and forestry, the remaining 2-3% - for housing construction, industrial facilities, transport and services. As a result of deforestation, agricultural land has increased six times since 1700. Of the available sources of fresh fresh water, humanity uses more than half. At the same time, almost half of the planet's rivers have become significantly shallow or polluted, and about 60% of the 277 largest water arteries have been blocked by dams and other engineering structures, which has led to the creation of artificial lakes, changing the ecology of reservoirs and river mouths.
Humans have degraded or destroyed the habitats of many representatives of flora and fauna. Since 1600 alone, 484 animal species and 654 plant species have disappeared on Earth. More than an eighth of 1183 bird species and a fourth of 1130 mammal species are now threatened with extinction from the face of the Earth.
The world's oceans suffered less from man. People use only eight percent of its original productivity. But here, too, he left his unkind "trace", catching two-thirds of marine animals to the limit and violating the ecology of many other inhabitants of the sea. During the 20th century alone, almost half of all coastal mangrove forests were destroyed and a tenth of coral reefs were irretrievably destroyed.
And, finally, another unpleasant consequence of the rapidly growing humanity is its industrial and household waste. Of the total mass of extracted natural raw materials, no more than a tenth of it turns into the final consumer product, the rest goes to landfills. Humanity, according to some estimates, produces 2000 times more waste of organic origin than the rest of the biosphere. Today, the ecological "footprint" of Homo sapiens outweighs the negative impact on the environment of all other living beings combined. Mankind has come close to an ecological impasse, or rather, to the edge of a cliff. Since the second half of the 20th century, the crisis of the entire ecological system of the planet has been growing. It is generated by many reasons. Consider only the most important of them - pollution of the earth's atmosphere.
Technological progress has created many ways to pollute it. These are various stationary installations that convert solid and liquid fuels into thermal or electrical energy. These are vehicles (cars and planes are undoubtedly in the lead) and agriculture with its rotting waste from farming and animal husbandry. These are industrial processes in metallurgy, chemical production, etc. These are municipal waste and, finally, the extraction of fossil fuels (remember, for example, constantly smoking torches in oil and gas fields or waste heaps near coal mines).
The air is poisoned not only by primary gases, but also by secondary ones, which are formed in the atmosphere during the reaction of the former with hydrocarbons under the influence of sunlight. Sulfur dioxide and various nitrogen compounds oxidize the water droplets that collect in clouds. Such acidified water, falling in the form of rain, fog or snow, poisons the soil, water bodies, and destroys forests. In Western Europe, lake fish are dying out around large industrial centers, and forests are turning into cemeteries of dead, bare trees. Forest animals in such places almost completely die.
These catastrophes caused by anthropogenic pollution of the atmosphere, although they are of a universal nature, are nevertheless spatially more or less localized: they cover only certain areas of the planet. However, some types of pollution acquire a planetary scale. We are talking about emissions of carbon dioxide, methane and nitrogen oxides into the atmosphere, which enhance the natural greenhouse effect. Emissions of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere create about 60% of the additional greenhouse effect, methane - about 20%, other carbon compounds - another 14%, the remaining 6-7% is contributed by nitrogen oxide.
Under natural conditions, the content of CO 2 in the atmosphere over the past few hundred million years has been about 750 billion tons (approximately 0.3% of the total weight of air in the surface layers) and is maintained at this level due to the fact that its excess mass is dissolved in water and absorbed plants during photosynthesis. Even a relatively small disturbance of this balance threatens significant shifts in the ecosystem, with consequences that are difficult to predict both for the climate and for the plants and animals that have adapted to it.
Over the past two centuries, humanity has made a significant "contribution" to the violation of this balance. Back in 1750, it emitted only 11 million tons of CO 2 into the atmosphere. A century later, the volume of emissions increased 18 times, reaching 198 million tons, and after another hundred years it increased 30 times and amounted to 6 billion tons. By 1995, this figure had quadrupled to 24 billion tons. The content of methane in the atmosphere has approximately doubled over the past two centuries. And it is 20 times more than CO 2 in its ability to enhance the greenhouse effect.
The consequences were not slow to affect: in the 20th century, the average global surface temperature increased by 0.6 ° C. It would seem - a trifle. But even such a rise in temperature is enough for the 20th century to be the warmest in the last millennium, and the 1990s to be the warmest in the last century. The snow cover of the earth's surface has decreased by 10% since the late 1960s, and the ice thickness in the Northern Arctic Ocean over the past few decades has decreased by more than a meter. As a result, the level of the World Ocean over the past hundred years has risen by 7-10 centimeters.
Some skeptics refer to anthropogenic climate warming as a myth. Say, there are natural cycles of temperature fluctuations, one of which is observed now, and the anthropogenic factor is far-fetched. Natural cycles of temperature fluctuations in the near-Earth atmosphere do exist. But they are measured in many decades, some in centuries. The climate warming observed in the last two and a half centuries not only does not fit into the usual natural cycle, but also occurs unnaturally quickly. The Intergovernmental Commission on Climate Change, collaborating with scientists around the world, reported in early 2001 that anthropogenic changes were becoming more evident, that warming was accelerating and its consequences were far worse than previously thought. It is expected, in particular, that by 2100 the average temperature of the earth's surface in different latitudes may increase by another 1.4-5.8°C with all the ensuing consequences.
Climate warming is unevenly distributed: in the northern latitudes it is more pronounced than in the tropics. Therefore, in this century, winter temperatures will increase most noticeably in Alaska, northern Canada, Greenland, northern Asia and Tibet, and summer temperatures in Central Asia. Such a distribution of warming entails a change in the dynamics of air flows, and therefore a redistribution of precipitation. And this, in turn, gives rise to more and more natural disasters - hurricanes, floods, droughts, forest fires. In the 20th century, about 10 million people died in such disasters. Moreover, the number of major disasters and their devastating consequences are increasing. There were 20 large-scale natural disasters in the 1950s, 47 in the 1970s, and 86 in the 1990s. The damage caused by natural disasters is enormous (see graph).
The first years of this century were marked by unprecedented floods, hurricanes, droughts and wildfires.
And this is just the beginning. Further climate warming in high latitudes threatens to thaw permafrost in northern Siberia, on the Kola Peninsula and in the subpolar regions of North America. This means that foundations under buildings in Murmansk, Vorkuta, Norilsk, Magadan and dozens of other cities and towns standing on frozen ground will float (signs of an approaching catastrophe have already been noted in Norilsk). However, this is not all. The shell of permafrost is thawed, and an outlet is opened for huge accumulations of methane stored under it for millennia - a gas that causes an increased greenhouse effect. It has already been recorded that methane in many places in Siberia begins to seep into the atmosphere. If the climate here warms up a little more, then the release of methane will become massive. The result is an increase in the greenhouse effect and even greater global warming.
According to the pessimistic scenario, due to climate warming by 2100, the level of the World Ocean will rise by almost one meter. And then the southern coast of the Mediterranean, the western coast of Africa, South Asia (India, Sri Lanka, Bangladesh and the Maldives), all the coastal countries of Southeast Asia and the coral atolls in the Pacific and Indian Oceans will become the scene of a natural disaster. In Bangladesh alone, the sea threatens to flood about three million hectares of land and force the displacement of 15-20 million people. In Indonesia, 3.4 million hectares could be flooded and at least two million people displaced. For Vietnam, these figures would be two million hectares and ten million migrants. And the total number of such victims around the world can reach about a billion.
According to UNEP experts, the costs caused by the warming of the Earth's climate will continue to grow. The cost of protecting structures from rising sea levels and high storm surges could amount to one billion dollars a year. If the concentration of CO 2 in the atmosphere doubles compared to pre-industrial levels, global agriculture and forestry will lose up to $42 billion annually due to droughts, floods and fires, and the water supply system will face additional costs by 2050 (about $47 billion).
Man more and more drives nature and himself into a dead end, from which it is more and more difficult to get out. Academician N. N. Moiseev, an outstanding Russian mathematician and ecologist, warned that the biosphere, like any complex non-linear system, may lose stability, as a result of which its irreversible transition to a kind of quasi-stable state will begin. It is more than likely that in this new state, the parameters of the biosphere will not be suitable for human life. Therefore, it will not be a mistake to say that humanity is balancing on a razor's edge. How long can it balance like this? In 1992, the two most authoritative scientific organizations in the world - the British Royal Society and the American National Academy of Sciences jointly declared: "The future of our planet hangs in the balance. Sustainable development can be achieved, but only if the irreversible degradation of the planet is stopped in time. The next 30 years will be decisive. In turn, N. N. Moiseev wrote that "such a catastrophe can happen not in some indefinite future, but perhaps already in the middle of the coming XXI century."
If these predictions are correct, then by historical standards, there is very little time left to find a way out - from three to five decades.
How to get out of the impasse?
For many hundreds of years, people were absolutely convinced that man was created by the Creator as the crown of nature, its ruler and transformer. Such narcissism is still supported by the major world religions. Moreover, such a homocentric ideology was supported by the outstanding domestic geologist and geochemist V. I. Vernadsky, who formulated in the 1920s the idea of the transition of the biosphere into the noosphere (from the Greek noos - mind), into a kind of intellectual "layer" of the biosphere. “Humanity, taken as a whole, becomes a powerful geological force. And before it, before its thought and work, the question of restructuring the biosphere in the interests of a free-thinking humanity as a whole becomes," he wrote. Moreover, “[a person] can and must rebuild the area of his life with labor and thought, rebuild it radically in comparison with what was before” (emphasis mine. - Yu. Sh.).
In fact, as already mentioned, we have not the transition of the biosphere into the noosphere, but its transition from natural evolution to the unnatural, imposed on it by the aggressive intervention of mankind. This destructive interference applies not only to the biosphere, but also to the atmosphere, hydrosphere, and partly to the lithosphere. What kind of realm of reason is there if humanity, even realizing many (though not all) aspects of the degradation of the natural environment generated by it, is not able to stop and continues to exacerbate the ecological crisis. It behaves in its natural habitat like an elephant in a china shop.
A bitter hangover has come - an urgent need to find a way out. Its search is difficult, because modern humanity is very heterogeneous - both in terms of technical, economic and cultural development, and in mentality. Someone is simply indifferent to the future fate of the world society, and someone adheres to the old-fashioned logic: we didn’t get out of such troubles, we’ll get out this time too. Hopes for "maybe" may well turn out to be a fatal miscalculation.
Another part of humanity understands the seriousness of the impending danger, but instead of participating in a collective search for a way out, it directs all its energy to exposing the perpetrators of the current situation. These people blame either liberal globalization, or selfish industrialized countries, or simply "the main enemy of all mankind," the United States, as being responsible for the crisis. They pour out their own anger on the pages of newspapers and magazines, organize mass protests, participate in street riots and break shop windows with pleasure in cities where forums of international organizations are held. Needless to say, such revelations and demonstrations do not advance a single step towards the solution of a universal problem, but rather hinder it?
Finally, a third, very small part of the world community not only understands the degree of threat, but also concentrates its intellectual and material resources on finding ways out of the current situation. She seeks to see the prospect in the fog of the future and find the best way so as not to stumble and fall into the abyss.
After weighing the real dangers and resources that humanity has in early XXI century, we can say that there are still some chances to get out of the current impasse. But an unprecedented mobilization of common sense and the will of the entire world community is required to solve many problems in three strategic directions.
The first of them is the psychological reorientation of the world society, a radical change in the stereotypes of its behavior. “In order to get out of the crises generated by technogenic civilization, society will have to go through a difficult stage of spiritual revolution, as in the Renaissance,” Academician V. S. Stepin believes. “We will have to develop new values ... as a field for reworking and plowing." Such a psychological upheaval is impossible without significant complication logical thinking each individual and the transition to new model behavior of the majority of mankind. But, on the other hand, it is also impossible without fundamental changes in relations within society - without new moral norms, without a new organization of micro- and macro-society, without new relationships between different societies.
Such a psychological reorientation of humanity is very difficult. We will have to break the stereotypes of thinking and behavior that have developed over the millennia. And above all, a fundamental revision of the self-esteem of man as the crown of nature, its reformer and master is needed. This homocentric paradigm, preached for thousands of years by many world religions, reinforced in the 20th century by the doctrine of the noosphere, should be sent to the ideological dustbin of history.
In our time, a different system of values is needed. The attitude of people to animate and inanimate nature should not be based on the opposition - "we" and "everything else", but on the understanding that both "we" and "everything else" are equal passengers of a spaceship called "Earth". Such a psychological upheaval seems unlikely. But let us remember that in the era of the transition from feudalism to capitalism, a revolution of just this kind, although on a smaller scale, occurred in the minds of the aristocracy, which traditionally divided society into "we" (people of blue blood) and "them" (common people and just mob). In today's democratic world, such notions have become immoral. In the individual and public consciousness, numerous "taboos" in relation to nature may well appear and become fixed - a kind of ecological imperative that requires the needs of the world society and each person to be balanced with the capabilities of the ecosphere. Morality has to go beyond interpersonal or international relations and include norms of behavior in relation to animate and inanimate nature.
The second strategic direction is the acceleration and globalization of scientific and technological progress. “Since the brewing ecological crisis, threatening to develop into a global catastrophe, is caused by the development of productive forces, the achievements of science and technology, a way out of it is unthinkable without the further development of these components of the civilization process,” wrote N. N. Moiseev. “In order to find a way out , it will take the utmost effort of the creative genius of mankind, countless inventions and discoveries. Therefore, it is necessary to liberate the personality as soon as possible, to create opportunities for revealing one's creative potential to any person capable of this."
Indeed, humanity will have to radically change the structure of production that has developed over the centuries, reducing to the maximum the share of the extractive industry in it, which pollutes the soil and groundwater of agriculture; move from hydrocarbon energy to nuclear; to replace automobile and air transport running on liquid fuel with some other, environmentally friendly one; fundamentally restructure the entire chemical industry in order to minimize the pollution of its products and waste products of the atmosphere, water and soil ...
Some scientists see the future of mankind in the departure from the technogenic civilization of the 20th century. Yu. V. Yakovets, for example, believes that in the post-industrial era, which appears to him as a "humanistic society", "the technogenic nature of the late industrial society will be overcome." In fact, to prevent an ecological catastrophe, the maximum intensification of scientific and technical efforts is required in order to create and implement environmental technologies in all spheres of human life: agriculture, energy, metallurgy, the chemical industry, construction, everyday life, etc. Therefore, the post-industrial society becomes not post-technogenic, but, on the contrary, super-technogenic. Another thing is that the vector of its technogenicity is changing from resource absorption to resource saving, from environmentally dirty technologies to environmental ones.
It is important to keep in mind that such qualitatively new technologies are becoming more and more dangerous, since they can be used both for the benefit of humanity and nature, and to harm them. Therefore, steadily growing prudence and caution are required here.
The third strategic direction is to overcome or at least significantly reduce the technical, economic and socio-cultural gap between the post-industrial center of the world community and its periphery and semi-periphery. After all, cardinal technological shifts should occur not only in highly developed countries with large financial and human resources, but also in the entire developing world, which is rapidly industrializing mainly on the basis of old, environmentally hazardous technologies and has neither financial nor human resources to implement environmental protection measures. technologies. Technological innovations, which are created so far only in the post-industrial center of the world community, should also be introduced on its industrial or industrializing periphery. Otherwise, outdated, environmentally hazardous technologies will be used on a growing scale and the degradation of the planet's natural environment will accelerate even more. It is impossible to stop the process of industrialization of the developing regions of the world. So, we need to help them do it in a way that minimizes damage to the environment. Such an approach is in the interests of all mankind, including the population of highly developed countries.
All three strategic tasks facing the world community are unprecedented both in their difficulty and in their significance for the future destinies of mankind. They are closely interrelated and interdependent. Failure to solve one of them will not allow you to solve the rest. By and large, this is a maturity test for the Homo sapiens species, which happened to become the "smartest" among animals. It is time to prove that he is really smart and able to save the earth's ecosphere and himself in it from degradation.
1935 A. Tensley introduced the concept of "ecosystem" 1940 V.N. Sukachev - "Biocenosis"
mixed forest ecosystem
1 - vegetation 2 - animals 3 - soil inhabitants 4 - air 5 - soil itself
Ecosystem- an open, but integral, stable system of living and non-living components that has historically developed in a particular territory or water area.
Classification of ecosystems by size All ecosystems are divided into 4 categories
microecosystems
mesoecosystems
Macroecosystems (huge homogeneous spaces stretching for hundreds of kilometers (tropical forests, ocean))
Global ecosystem (biosphere)
Classification according to the degree of openness Open refers to the ability to exchange energy and information with the environment.
Isolated
Closed
Open ∞
The classification is based on such a component as vegetation. It is characterized by static and physiological.
Life form classifications
woody = woody
Herbaceous = meadow and steppe
Semi-shrub = tundra and desert
Ecosystem productivity classification
desert forest
Ecosystem structure
Types of links in an ecosystem
Trophic (food)
Tropical (energy)
Teleological (informational)
food chain- This is a sequence of food links, each of which is a living organism.
grass hare wolf
Trophic level - a group of organisms assigned to any stage of the food pyramid.
elk hawk
grass hare wolf
fox man
the implementation of trophic relationships are 3 functional groups of organisms:
Autotrophs(plants are organisms that synthesize organic substances from inorganic)
Heterotrophs(organisms that are not able to synthesize organic substances from inorganic ones by photosynthesis or chemosynthesis. They eat ready-made substances)
decomposers(Destructors) (organisms (bacteria and fungi) that destroy the dead remains of living beings, turning them into inorganic and simple organic compounds.)
Small (biological) circulation of substances in nature
Energy links (tropical)
obey two laws of ecology
The law of ecological storage energy This is the ability inherent in many ecosystems to concertize the energy received by the body into complex organic substances and accumulate energy in huge quantities.
Law of nutrient flow
Efficiency (human) = 50% Efficiency (nature) = 10%
Information links
In ecosystems, information can be transferred in different ways:
Behavior
(not yet known in plants)
Ecosystem properties
Integrity - the property of an ecosystem to function as a single organism
Resilience - the ability of an ecosystem to resist the system from the outside
Composition constancy - the ability of an ecosystem to maintain a relatively unchanged composition of species.
Self-regulation is the ability of an ecosystem to automatically regulate the number of species through biological organs.
Biosphere. Structure and functions
Biosphere- in 1875, the Austrian biologist Suess.
This is the lower part of the atmosphere, the entire hydrosphere, its upper part of the earth's lithosphere, inhabited by living organisms.
Theory of the origin of life
Cosmological This hypothesis is based on the idea that life was brought from space
Theological
Theory of A.I. Oparina
Oparin took a bottle with a solution of sugars for his experiment.
The coacervates of the drop absorbed the sugar. A semblance of a cell membrane appeared.
In 1924, Oparin published the monograph "The Origin of Life". In 1926, "Biosphere" by V.I. Vernadsky. Vernadsky's monograph highlights 2 postulates
The planetary biochemical role in nature belongs to living organisms.
The biosphere has a complex organization.
The composition of the biosphere
In the composition of the biosphere, Vernadsky singles out 7 types of substance:
inert- a substance that exists in nature before the appearance of the first living organisms (water, rocks, volcanic lava)
biokosnoe- a substance of organic origin, possessing the properties of inanimate. Result joint activities living organisms (water, soil, weathering crust, sedimentary rocks, clay materials) and inert (abiogenic) processes.
Biogenic- a substance of organic origin, released into the environment in the course of their life. (atmospheric gases, coal, oil, peat, limestone, chalk, forest floor, soil humus, etc.)
radioactive
Scattered atoms - 50 km
A substance of cosmic origin
Living matter- all living organisms that live in nature
Properties of organisms
The ubiquity of life is the ability of living organisms to live everywhere
Carrying out redox reactions
The ability to carry out the migration of chemical elements
Ability to migrate gases
The ability to carry out a small cycle of substances in nature
The ability to accumulate in their tissues and concert chemical elements
