2023 Volume 6 Issue 1 (Published 29 December 2023)

Dear colleagues,  

The first 2023 issue is being released now, almost ten months later than scheduled, which brings a certain amount of urgency into our work process. On the other hand, the lag had diminished, not grown, which means we're back to the normal speed, it' just that we can't catch up in one go. For that reason, we intend to continue our work as planned, and make up for the lag by means of releasing additional themed issues, seeing as 2024 will host several major conferences dedicated to significant events, such as the 125^th anniversary of our founder the full member of the Academy of Sciences of the Soviet Union A. N. Nesmeyanov, the 120^th anniversary of the full member of the Academy of Sciences of the Soviet Union K. A. Andrianov, as well as a truly cosmic event—the 300^th anniversary of the Russian Academy of Sciences. We hope to see an influx in publications thanks to these and other events planned for 2024. There is a significant number of those, including the prominent Mendeleev Congress. If the rule holds that a conference presentation is at least a brief report, an oral presentation is an article, and a plenary lecture makes up for a comprehensive review, then indeed we can catch up to our pre-covid level.

At the same time, the Editorial board intends to increase its participation in organizing the contest with the same name, since one of the options for submitting a work for the contest is publishing it as an original article or a highlight. The editorial board will exercise its right to submit works for the contest. We hope this will help us to reduce our publication lag in half in 2024.

The end of 2023 was signified by many important scientific events. In the course of the RAS General Assembly, the award ceremony for the UNESCO–Russia International Mendeleev Prize was held. The prize has been awarded for the second time, and this time, the winners were two well-known scientists, our good colleagues—the full member of the RAS Irina Petrovna Beletskaya and Prof. Klaus Müllen (Germany). Both of them have visited INEOS RAS multiple times during major international conferences, as well as for taking part in ongoing projects. At the ceremony, both winners gave inspiring presentations on their research. We are very proud of our colleagues' achievements and congratulate them wholeheartedly with the well-deserved prize.

The elections of the INEOS RAS director became another important event. Despite the unnecessary and even damaging nature of this procedure (a personal opinion), the elections were held in an easy mode, and became a vote of trust for our director for his next term, and his younger colleague had received an advance vote of trust for the future. Therefore, we can congratulate our team for having successfully navigated the elections reefs, and for now embarking on a new five-year journey for knowledge and scientific achievements to serve our country. Not everyone has been so fortunate. One of our flag ships (you know which one) became the victim of election intrigues courtesy of the bored youth (I had warned the INEOS RAS youth about that during the pre-elections debates). The only thing to be said here is that democratic procedures usually lead to electing those who the voters deserve. It's a pity for the institute. The only remaining hope is for the wisdom and influence of the scientific leader.

This new year is very special. The anniversary dates have been mentioned earlier. It's important to not only remember the dates, but to try to understand and build on the enormous legacy that had been left to us by our predecessors. In that sense, our Institute is very lucky indeed. Our founders stood at the very beginning of many modern fields of knowledge that struggle today. However, the potent visionary charge that they had left is still awaiting worthy followers. Is that not a good enough reason to look closely at the depths of our collective memory?

Happy Anniversary Year! Let it be the year of not only glamorous celebrations, but also of reassessing our directions and values, and of searching for our own original vector for further growth for this most extraordinary Institute, designed that way by our founder.