ECOLOGICAL PHYSIOLOGY IN RUSSIA - DMITRY ANDREEVICH BIRYUKOV
Academician of the Academy of Medical Sciences of the USSR Dmitry Andreevich Biryukov is the creator of an original scientific direction - ecological physiology of nervous activity. He drew the attention of natural scientists to the existence of natural and increasing spread of artificial physical factors - infrared radiation, ionizing radiation, ultrasonic vibrations, air ions, electromagnetic fields etc. The role of these factors in the formation and development of functions and an organism as a whole required the development of new research methods that provide a study of the mechanisms of continuous interaction the body and the environment. Particular attention was paid to the importance of the biological laboratory (ecologically adequate) stimuli, allowing assess the role environmental factors during the formation of functions. Under his leadership, systematic medical and physiological observations were begun in Soviet Antarctic expeditions - studied the mechanisms of extreme factors influence on the human body. Dmitry Andreevich supported the development of quantitative and instrumental methods, mathematical analysis, he understood the prospects of their application in eco-physiological studies, and electronics has enabled the implementation of automated experiment. Modernization of research methods, implemented by D. A. Biryukov, made it possible to begin studying and modeling of information processing mechanisms, self-regulation processes, intraand intersystem relationships underlying the individual adaptation, human sustainability to extreme environmental conditions, professional activities in «human-machine» system. D. A. Biryukov established domestic physiological school, which gave our country more than 30 doctors of science and exerted a powerful influence on the development of a number of scientific areas - human ecology, ecological and evolutionary physiology, immunophysiology, cellular neurophysiology, neurocybernetics, a person in the control system, adaptive biocontrol, ergonomics, engineering psychology (1 figure, bibliography: 1 ref.).