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UNESCO Chair on Water Resources

• History
• Staff
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• Education
• Research

The establishment of the Chair was extraordinary event as well for the University, as for the city of Irkutsk, Irkutsk Region, for whole Russia. UNESCO Chairs – the main part of Global program on enforcement of interuniversity cooperation and academic mobility, accepted in 1991 by 26^th Session of UNESCO General Conference and known as University Twinnings (UNITWIN). It must be noted that the term Chair here means not usual ordinary university chair, but qualitatively new phenomenon – international research-education centre of UNESCO.

Now there are 445 Chairs in 188 states – members of UNESCO. They are distributed very irregularly. The largest number of chairs is in Spain, Russia occupies the second place holding 40 UNESCO Chairs. This Chairs cover very wide spectrum of subjects: journalism and communications, social sciences, politics, democracy, human rights, sustainable development, information technologies, university management, new information technologies, intellectual property problems, cultural tourism. In Russia there are UNESCO Chairs in Moscow, Saint-Petersburg, Tver, Novgorod, Ekaterinburg, Kazan, Kemerovo, Barnaul, Vladicaucasis, Nalchik, Novosibirsk, Vladivostok. Irkutsk Chair is the only Chair of water resources in Russia.

The water is the most necessary resource for the life on the planet. It needs constant study. The main reason to select Irkutsk for such Chair was, of course, the lake Baikal. The lake is UNESCO World Heritage Sit since 1996, as the oldest, deepest lake of the planet and the largest reservoir containing 50% of the World’s drinking water and 20% of liquid fresh water of the Earth.

Buryat State University, Institute of Earth Crust of RAN, Institute of Geochemistry RAN, Baikalian Museum RAN participate in the work of the Chair. The Foreign br0ther-partner of the Chair is the University of Savoy (France).

The Programme of the Chair is aimed to promotion of integrated system of investigations, education, information in the field of water resources. The Chair prepares undergraduate and postgraduate students, post-doc training, establishes new directions in the field of water resources management. It organizes field practices at Baikal, Alp lakes. Researches of the chair are oriented to creation of data bank, monitoring of lake Baikal, complex study of surface, underground and atmospheric waters, mathematical modeling.

• Alexander I. SMIRNOV, Prof., Dr. Sci. – Head of the Chair, Rector of the Irkutsk State University
• Grigory M. SPEIZER, Prof., PhD – Executive Director of the Chair, Head of Interinstitutional Regional Laboratory of Ecological Research at the Irkutsk State University
• Lyubov’ R. IZMEST’EVA, Associated Prof., PhD – Research Manager of the Chair; Director of the Research Institute of Biology at the Irkutsk State University.
• Arkady N. MATVEYEV, Associated Prof., Dr.Sci. – Educational Manager of the Chair; Head of Vertebrate Zoology and Ecology Chair of the Irkutsk State University.
• Tatyana V. LISHTOVANNAYA, Associated Prof., PhD – Scientific Secretary of the Chair; Head of the Foreign Languages Chair of International Faculty of the Irkutsk State University.
• Eugene A. SILOW, Dr. Sci. – Professor of the Chair, Professor of Chair of Hydrology of the Irkutsk State University, Principal Research Fellow of the Research Institute of Biology at the Irkutsk State University.
  

Education

Special courses of specialization "Prevention of environment" (pdf, 6 kB)

Research

List of Partners:

1. Chair of Environmental Chemistry, Royal University of Pharmacy, Copenhagen, Denmark (Prof. S. E. Jorgensen)
2. University of Bejing, Bejing, China (Prof. Xu Fu-Liu)
3. Department of Natural Sciences, Pai-Chai University, Taejon, Korea (Prof. Oh In-Hye)
4. Biological Department, Christian-Albrecht Universitaet, Kiel, Germany (Prof. H. Brendelberger)
5. Hydrobiology Institute of Academy of Sciences, Ceske Budejovice, Czech Republic (Prof. V. Straskrabova)
6. Biological Faculty, Wellesley College, Wellesley, USA (Prof. M. V. Moore)

List of Conferences:

1. Third International Symposium: Speciation in Ancient Lakes (SIAL). Irkutsk, 2002.
2. Ecology in a Changing World. – Seoul, 2002. Korea
3. The First International Symposium “Baikal Lake. The current state of the surface and underground hydrosphere in the mountainous areas”. Irkutsk, 2003. Russia.
4. The First International Symposium “Baikal Lake. The current state of the surface and underground hydrosphere in the mountainous areas”. Irkutsk, 2003. Russia
5. SIL XXIX Congress, Lahti, Finland, 8-14 August, 2004.
6. Restoration and Remediation of Aquatic Ecosystems: Tools, Techniques and Mechanisms. – Nanjing: 2005. China
7. Management of Lake Basins for their Sustainable Use: Global Experience. – Nairobi, 2005. Kenia
8. European Conference on Ecological Modelling. Proceedings / The Fifth European Conference on Ecological Modelling – ECEM, 2005, Pushchino, Russia,
9. Aquatic Ecology at the Dawn of XXI Century. – St-Petersburg, 2005.

Grants

• 2007 – 2010 Silow E. A. Baikal REC: Integration of Research and Educational Activities for Complex Geoecological Studies of the UNESCO World Heritage Site – Ministry of Education and Science of Russian Federation & CRDF (USA) – $ 1,000,000. Coauthored with Alexander Arguchintsev, Alla Arguchintseva and Andrey Mantsivoda.
• 2006 – 2008 Speizer G. M. Genesis and formation of composition and resources of mineral substances in tectonically active regions of mountain regions (e.g. Baikal rift zone and neotectonic upliftings of Zabaiklye and Mongolia) – Russian Foundation of Basic Research, $ 20,000.
• 2006 – 2008 Speizer G.M. Study of physical and chemical processes of composition and qualities of natural waters of Baikal Region - Ministry of Education and Science of Russian Federation, – $ 21,000.
• 2006 – 2008 Izmestyeva L. R. Ecology and Evolution of aquatic ecosystems of Baikalian Region - Ministry of Education and Science of Russian Federation, $ 21,000.
• 2006 Silow E, A, The development of integral index for ecosystem state analysis and prognosis on the basis of ecological goal functions and the testing of its applicability (for the lake Baikal and other water bodies of Eastern Siberia) – Ministry of Education and Science of Russian Federation, $ 20,000.
• 2005 – 2006 Silow E. A.The 60-year data set of plankton dynamics in Lake Baikal: Examining facets of the jewel of Siberia (LAKE BAIKAL PLANKTON) – National Center for Ecological Analysis and Synthesis, University of California, Santa Barbara, California, $ 36,030. Coauthored with Marianne Moore and Stephanie Hampton.
• 2005 Silow E. A. Creation of expert system to imitate and analyze the state of the lake Baikal plankton – Ministry of Education and Science of Russian Federation, $ 3,500.
• 2001 – 2003 Silow E. A. The estimation of the state of plankton community of the open Baikal and parameters of organic matter production and destruction in the lake – Russian Foundation of Basic Research, $ 2,000.
• 1999 – 2002 Matveyev A.N. The investigation of biodiversity and ecological mechanisms in creation of form complexes of endemic and scantily explored fishes of Baikal mountain chain. Russian Foundation of Basic Research.
• 2001 – 2004 Matveyev A.N. Regularities of ecological and morphological differentiation of salmonids in Baikal Lake and in waterbodies of Baikal mountain chain. Russian Foundation of Basic Research.
• 2005 – 2007 Matveyev A.N. Investigation of mechanisms of speciation and population structure of salmonids in mountain waterbodies of Lake Baikal bazin. Russian Foundation of Basic.
  

Report

 Expedition