Academy of Medical Sciences of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics

the highest scientific institution in Soviet medicine, uniting the most prominent medical scientists. Founded in June 1944, it is located in Moscow. As of Nov. 1, 1969, the staff of the academy consisted of 110 full members and 156 corresponding members. Beginning in 1961, foreign members have also been elected to its staff. V. D. Timakov has been president of the academy since 1968.

The main tasks of the academy are to work out the basic problems of medical theory and practice, to organize joint research between the scientific institutions of the academy and scientific institutions of other countries, and to train highly qualified workers in the medical and biological sciences.

The supreme governing body of the academy is the general assembly, consisting of full and corresponding members, which is convened at least once a year. Between sessions of the general assembly, all the activities of the academy are guided by the presidium, consisting of nine persons chosen by the general assembly for a four-year term.

The academy is composed of three divisions. The first is the division of hygiene, microbiology, and epidemiology, which has seven institutes: the D. I. Ivanovskii Virology Institute, an institute of hygiene and work-related diseases, the A. N. Sysin Institute on General and Communal Hygiene, a nutrition institute, an institute for poliomyelitis and viral encephalitis, an institute for discovering new antibiotics, and the N. F. Gamaleia Institute for Epidemiology and Microbiology. The second division, the division of clinical medicine, consists of 13 institutes: institutes for obstetrics and gynecology, for gerontology, for medical radiology, and for neurology, the A. L. Miasnikov Cardiology Institute, the N.N. Burdenko Institute for Neurosurgery, a pediatrics institute, a psychiatric institute, a rheumatism institute, the A. N. Bakulev Institute for Cardiovascular Surgery, the A. V. Vishnevskii Institute of Surgery, an institute for experimental and clinical oncology, and a tissue and organ transplant institute with a laboratory for such transplants. The third division is the division of medical and biological sciences, with nine institutes: for biological and medical chemistry, for human morphology, for normal and pathological physiology, for pharmacology and chemotherapy, for medical genetics, for experimental medicine, for experimental pathology and therapy, and for experimental endocrinology and the chemistry of hormones, and a brain institute along with laboratories for allergology, experimental-biological models, and experimental physiology in the revival of organisms and immunobiology.

The academy awards 28 memorial prizes for outstanding scientific works and discoveries in medicine. It publishes two journals, Vestnik AMN SSSR (since 1946) and the Biulleten’ eksperimental’ noi biologii i meditsiny (since 1936).

Presidents of the academy have been N. N. Burdenko (1944–46), N. N. Anichkov, (1946–53), A. N. Bakulev (1953–60), N. N. Blokhin (1960–68), and V. D. Timakov (since 1968).