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Studies of spatial-temporal variability of the upper boundary of the forest on the north-western coast of Lake Baikal (Baikal and Upper Angara Ridges) are performed on the base of the analysis of forests renewal processes and of the dynamics of larch radial increment in the ecotone of the forest upper boundary and out of it. The presence of a large amount of well-developed uplands and circuses with considerable heights drops in the structure of mountain system favours formation of interrupted boundary between forest and subgoltsy belt. The timber stand of the upper forest boundary in the studied area is represented by Daurian larch. Three tree-ring chronologies of larch are obtained. The longest chronology is obtained for mountain taiga belt of Baikal Ridge and is as long as 460 years. Since 1980ies, a sustainable trend of increase of radial trees growth is observed. It is observed the most distinctly in trees of the upper forest boundary on the Baikal Ridge. There is advancing of trees species into subgoltsy belt and into mountain tundra, which depends, respectively, on slopes heights, exposition and tilting, on sites of growth of concrete cenoses. Modern peculiarity of the vegetation of the studied area is presence of abundant viable larch undergrowth (from 2–3 to 25 y.o.) and fir in the ecotone of upper forest boundary and in subgoltsy belt, as well as appearing of single specimens of spruce. Main undergrowth mass (2/3) is presented by trees aged in average 15–25 y.o., i.e., they appeared in late 1980ies. Due to increase of snow cover thickness in winter, the trees young growth obtained great protection from freezing resulting in the increase of ability of young growth to live up to elder age.

Objective: to determine the most important factors of crimes in the sphere of dwelling and communal services in Russian cities (with a population of over 1 million people). Methods: correlation analysis using Pearson coefficient. Results: the initial hypothesis is based on the following assumptions about the determination of crime in the dwelling-communal sector: this crime is proportional to the total criminality of the region economy (the number of all corruption crimes revealed by divisions of the Russian Ministry of Internal Affairs in all spheres of economic activities in the studied cities), production indicators (number of investments and amount of financing in the dwelling-communal sector, volume of construction works, etc.), as well as the degree of monopolization in the dwelling-communal sector in the region (i.e., proportional to the number of municipal utilities). To check the hypotheses, we used data on crime and socio-economic characteristics of the dwelling-communal sector in 15 largest Russian cities in 2012-2013, as well as the data about crime in the sphere of dwelling and communal services and about the corruption crimes in Russian cities in 2012-2014. As a result, the calculations partially confirmed the hypotheses: the dependence of the level of crime in the dwelling-communal sector of Russian cities on the level of corruption crimes in these cities is high (r = 0,63), as well as the dependence on the number of organizations operating in the dwelling-communal sector (r = -0,47). At the same time the correlation was weak between the volume of activity in the dwelling-communal sector in Russian cities and the level of crime in them (absolute value of Pearson coefficient is lower than 0,4). Scientific novelty: for the first time the article investigated the determinants of crime in the sphere of dwelling and communal services in Russian cities on the basis of correlation analysis using Pearson coefficient. Practical significance: the main provisions and conclusions of the article can be used in further economic-criminological analysis when considering the issues of crime in the sphere of dwelling and communal services in Russian cities.

The process of resonant high-energy electron–positron pair production by an ultrarelativistic electron colliding with the field of an X-ray pulsar is theoretically investigated. Resonant kinematics of the process is studied in detail. Under the resonance condition, the intermediate virtual photon in the X-ray pulsar field becomes a real particle. As a result, the initial process of the second order in the fine structure constant effectively reduces into two successive processes of the first order: X-ray-stimulated Compton effect and X-ray-stimulated Breit–Wheeler process. For a high-energy initial electron all the final ultrarelativistic particles propagate in a narrow cone along the direction of the initial electron momentum. The presence of threshold energy for the initial electron which is of order of 100 MeV for 1-KeV-frequency field is shown. At the same time, the energy spectrum of the final particles (two electrons and a positron) highly depends on their exit angles and on the initial electron energy. This result significantly distinguishes the resonant process from the non-resonant one. It is shown that the resonant differential probability significantly exceeds the non-resonant one.

This article, through words and pictures, tells the story of how and why a small piece of Japanese cultural heritage – a genuine Japanese garden – was established in the heart of Asia in Irkutsk through a partnership between two sister-universities and a long lasting friendship between Russo-Japanese communities in both countries. The first Japanese garden was created in the greenhouse of the Botanic Garden of Irkutsk State University in 2012 to provide a new cross-disciplinary ethnobotanical and cultural facility for students and the local public. The 35-sq.m garden (7m x 5 m) was developed to provide an opportunity for visitors to experience one of the great horticultural art forms of the world without leaving Irkutsk.

This paper presents information on the vegetation of concrete environments - zonal, interzonal, interheight belts and extrazonal ones as a result of studies done by numerous vegetation researchers for different regions during many years. As this information is separate statistics in the characteristics of the vegetation cover for environmental zones and height belts, it is necessary to take it into account while characterizing the heterogeneity of vegetation structure under different physical-geographic conditions of the vast Baikal Region: this is an important aspect of such studies. Taking into account of opinions of different researchers concerning the characteristics of the structure of different territories favors the understanding of structural peculiarities of the coenoses under concrete physical-geographic conditions at a concrete territory. Stating of typological diversity of phytocoenoses as of proxies of vegetation modern state and formation trends allows to perform in a more concrete way assessments and forecasts of the development of different environments at a regional-topologic level of their spatial and temporal organization. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In order to find out the causes of universities’ waning popularity as a place of work, the researcher sets the following tasks: to analyze specific features of an academic career to determine at which stage it starts to lose its appeal; to reveal influences in choice of postgraduate courses as an alternative to introduction to the labour market, as well as to reveal influences in choice of a university as a place of work; to evaluate advantages and disadvantages of taking postgraduate courses and working at a university. The researcher conducted 27 semi-structured inter views with the facult y and postgraduates in th ree Russian higher education institutions and one Canadian one: the National Research University “Higher School of Economics”, Moscow State University of Economics, Statistics and Informatics, Siberian Federal University (Krasnoyarsk) and University of Winnipeg (Winnipeg, Canada). On the basis of the findings maps of career lines are produced as patterns of changes in terms of positions (job positions or geographical ones) during a person’s job cycle; the research also revealed types of careers followers of which are of potential interest for Russian universities in terms of professional personnel reinforcement. The researcher found that motivation to take postgraduate courses is not limited by an interest to scientific work but is mostly connected to alternative objectives (like achieving a certain status, draft evasion) or to absence of any definite goal (reluctance to leave the university because of an attachment to it, a sense of discomfort because of the necessity to search for a job outside it). It is shown in the article that on the whole the academic career structure in Canada is similar to that in Russia, but perception of advantages and disadvantages of a work in an academic setting is different for each country.

The address to A. A. Kabakov’s creative individuality is actual in the context of small amount of works, investigating his prose. The novelty of the research consists in revealing a method of metaphor realization on the material of one of the writer’s little-studied stories.In the paper the mechanism of action of the comprehensive metaphor «Project “Babylon”» is revealed, which embodies non-existence, based on the story with the same name by the modern writer A. A. Kabakov. The metaphor semantics manifests itself by means of interaction of a canonical (stable) sense of the expression «Babel», referring to the biblical story, and a secular (daily) meaning of the situation of the «pillar creation» – an élite tower house. A renewed metaphorical meaning of the idiom «Babel» is proposed. The state of «non-existence» is determined by motives of death and disappearance of the human kind, its devil’s temptation and the Apocalypse, senselessness and an existential frustration of people, a cultural degradation of the society and the ecumenical chaos.The paper is based on a historical and literary approach, whose academic base is N. D. Arutyunova’s work on the metaphor theory.The theoretical significance of the paper lies in the consideration of the phenomenon of poetics of the post-modernist prose. The practical significance is determined by the possibility of using its observations in university courses, devoted to actual problems of the modern Russian literature.