Trofim Lysenko
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Trofim Lysenko in 1938
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| Born |
Trofim Denisovich Lysenko
29 September 1898 |
| Died | 20 November 1976 (aged 78) |
| Citizenship | Soviet |
| Alma mater | Kiev Agricultural Institute |
| Known for |
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| Scientific career | |
| Fields | |
| Institutions | Soviet Academy of Sciences |
Trofim Denisovich Lysenko (Russian: Трофи́м Дени́сович Лысе́нко, Ukrainian: Трохи́м Дени́сович Лисе́нко, Trokhym Denysovych Lysenko; 29 September [O.S. 17 September] 1898 – 20 November 1976) was a Soviet agronomist and biologist. As a student Lysenko found himself interested in agriculture, where he worked on a few different projects, one involving the effects of temperature variation on the life-cycle of plants. This later led him to consider how he might use this work to convert winter wheat into spring wheat. He named the process "jarovization" in Russian, and later translated it as "vernalization". Lysenko was a strong proponent of soft inheritance and rejected Mendelian genetics in favor of pseudoscientific ideas termed Lysenkoism.
His experimental research in improved crop yields earned him the support of the Soviet leader Joseph Stalin, especially following the famine and loss of productivity resulting from crop failures and forced collectivization in several regions of the Soviet Union in the early 1930s. In 1940, Lysenko became director of the Institute of Genetics within the USSR's Academy of Sciences, and the exercise of political influence and power further secured his anti-Mendelian doctrines in Soviet science and education.
Soviet scientists who refused to renounce genetics were dismissed from their posts and left destitute. Hundreds if not thousands of others were imprisoned. Several were sentenced to death as enemies of the state, including the botanist Nikolai Vavilov. Scientific dissent from Lysenko's theories of environmentally acquired inheritance was formally outlawed in the Soviet Union in 1948. Though Lysenko remained at his post in the Institute of Genetics until 1965, his influence on Soviet agricultural practice had declined after the death of Stalin in 1953.
Early rise
The son of Denis and Oksana Lysenko, Trofim Lysenko was born into a peasant family of Ukrainian ethnicity in Karlivka, Poltava Governorate (present-day Poltava Oblast, Ukraine) on 29 September 1898.
As a young man working at the Kiev Agricultural Institute (now the National University of Life and Environmental Sciences of Ukraine),
Lysenko worked on converting winter wheat into spring wheat. The
conversion of winter wheat into spring wheat was not a new discovery.
Scientific experiments had been done by Nikolai Vavilov.
It was Vavilov who initially supported Lysenko and encouraged him on
his work. Lysenko had a difficult time trying to grow various crops
(such as peas and wheat), through the harsh winters. However, when he
announced success, he was praised in the Soviet newspaper Pravda
for his claims to have discovered a method to fertilize fields without
using fertilizers or minerals, and to have shown that a winter crop of peas could be grown in Azerbaijan, "turning the barren fields of the Transcaucasus
green in winter, so that cattle will not perish from poor feeding, and
the peasant Turk will live through the winter without trembling for
tomorrow."
Lysenko speaking at the Kremlin in 1935. At the back (left to right) are Stanislav Kosior, Anastas Mikoyan, Andrei Andreyev and the Soviet leader, Joseph Stalin
Lysenko argued that there is not only competition, but also mutual assistance among individuals within a species, and that mutual assistance also exists between different species.
According to Lysenko,
The organism and the conditions required for its life are an inseparable unity. Different living bodies require different environmental conditions for their development. By studying these requirements we come to know the qualitative features of the nature of organisms, the qualitative features of heredity. Heredity is the property of a living body to require definite conditions for its life and development and to respond in a definite way to various conditions.
Work in agriculture
Lysenko
worked with different wheat crops to try to convert them to grow in
different seasons. Another area Lysenko found himself interested in was
the effect of heat on plant growth. He believed that every plant needed a
determinate amount of heat throughout its lifetime. He attempted to
correlate the time and the amount of heat required by a particular plant
to go through various phases of development. To get his data he looked
at the amount of growth, how many days went by, and the temperature on
those days. In trying to determine the effects, he made a small
statistical reasoning error. This is a general trend that can be seen
throughout the majority of his works and his major "findings". He was
confronted by Maksimov, who was an expert on thermal plant development.
Lysenko did not take well to this or any criticism. After this
encounter, Lysenko boldly claimed that mathematics had no place in
biology.
Vernalization
In 1927, at the age of 29, working at an agricultural experiment station in Azerbaijan, Lysenko embarked on the research that would lead to his 1928 paper on vernalization, which drew wide attention because of its potential practical implications for Soviet agriculture. Severe cold and lack of winter snow had destroyed many early winter-wheat seedlings. By treating wheat
seeds with moisture as well as cold, Lysenko induced them to bear a
crop when planted in spring. Lysenko coined the term "Jarovization"
(яровизация) to describe this chilling process, which he used to make
the seeds of winter cereals behave like spring cereals. (Because spring
cereals are called Jarovoe in Russian – from jarovój, an
archaic adjective meaning spring, especially in relation to crops).
However, this method had already been known by farmers since the 1800s,
and had recently been discussed in detail by Gustav Gassner in 1918. Lysenko himself translated Jarovization as "vernalization" (from the Latin vernum meaning Spring).
Lysenko's claims for increased yields were based on plantings over a
few hectares, and he believed that the vernalized transformation could
be inherited, that the offspring of a vernalized plant would themselves
possess the capabilities of the generation that preceded it – that it
too would be able to withstand harsh winters or imperfect weather
conditions.
Lysenko's genetic theory
One of several unsubstantiated Lysenkoist
claims: vegetative hybridisation. The mechanism would imply a
Lamarckian effect of scion on stock when a fruit tree is grafted. No
such effect has ever been reliably observed.
Lysenko rejected Mendelian genetic inheritance theory in favor of his own logic. He believed Gregor Mendel's theory to be too reactionary or idealist. Lysenko's ideas were a mixture of his own and those of Russian agronomist Ivan Vladimirovich Michurin,
indeed Lysenko often referred to his ideas as "Michurinism". They were
not directly derived from established ideas such as Mendelian genetics
theory, Lamarckism or Darwinism.
He shaped his genetic concepts to support the simple practical purpose
of breeding and improving crops. His ideas were also shaped with the
caution to disprove other claims made by his fellow geneticists. His
ideas and genetic claims later began to be termed "Lysenkoism". He
claimed that his ideas were not associated with Lamarckism and that they
were unique but that is not entirely true. It is possible to see that
there are similarities between the two ideas, such as a belief in the inheritance of acquired characteristics. Some of Lysenko's ideas can also seem to be vitalistic.
He claimed that plants are self-sacrificing − they do not die to a lack
of sunlight or moisture but so that healthy ones may live and when they
die they deposit themselves over the growing roots to help the new
generation survive.
Lysenko believed that in one generation of a hybridized
crop, the desired individual could be selected, mated again and
continue to produce the same desired product, not worrying about
separation/segregation in future breeds. For that to work, he had to
assume that after a lifetime of developing (acquiring) the best set of
traits to survive, those were passed down to the next generation.
That assumption disregarded the potential for variation or mutation.
Lysenko did not believe that genes or DNA existed and only spoke about
them to say that they did not exist. He instead believed that any body,
once alive, obtained heredity. That meant that the entirety of the body
was able to pass on the hereditary information of that organism, and was
not dependent on a special element such as DNA or genes.
That puzzled biologists at that time because it went against all
established notions of heredity and inheritance. It also contradicted
the Mendelian principles that most biologists had been using to base
their ideas on.
Most scientists believed that Lysenko's ideas were not credible,
because they did not truly explain the mechanisms of inheritance.
Biologists now consider that his beliefs are pseudo-scientific, with
little relationship to genetics.
Another of Lysenko's theories was that obtaining more milk from
cows did not depend on their genetics but on how they were treated. The
better they were handled and taken care of, the more milk would be
obtained; Lysenko and his followers were well known for taking very good
care of their livestock. Lysenko claimed that the cuckoo
was born when young birds such as warblers were fed hairy caterpillars
by the parent (rather than host) birds; this claim failed to recognise
that the cuckoos he described were brood parasites.
Lysenkoites believed that fertilization was not random, but that there
was specific selection of the best mate. For reasons like these,
Lysenkoism can be viewed as pseudo-scientific.
After World War II ended, Lysenko took an interest in the works of Olga Lepeshinskaya, an older feldsher
and biologist, who claimed to be able to create cells from egg yolk and
non-cellular matter. Lepeshinskaya recognized common ground between her
ideas and Lysenko's. By combining both of their ideas it was possible
to proclaim that cells could grow from non-cellular material and that
the predicted ratios of Mendelian genetics and meiosis were incorrect, thus undermining the basis of modern cytology, as well as genetics.
Consequences of Lysenkoism
Lysenko
forced farmers to plant seeds very close together since, according to
his "law of the life of species", plants from the same "class" never
compete with one another.
Lysenko played an active role in the famines that killed millions of
Soviet people and his practices prolonged and exacerbated the food
shortages.
The Soviet Union's allies suffered under Lysenkoism, too. Communist
China adopted his methods in the late 1950s and endured even bigger
famines. Peasants were reduced to eating tree bark and bird droppings. At least 30 million died of starvation.
Outside the Soviet Union, scientists spoke critically: British
biologist S. C. Harland lamented that Lysenko was "completely ignorant
of the elementary principles of genetics and plant physiology" (Bertram
Wolfe, 2017). Criticism from foreigners did not sit well with Lysenko,
who loathed Western "bourgeois" scientists and denounced them as tools
of imperialist oppressors. He especially detested the American-born
practice of studying fruit flies, the workhorse of modern genetics. He called such geneticists "fly lovers and people haters".
Unable to silence Western critics, Lysenko tried to eliminate all
dissent within the Soviet Union. Scientists who refused to renounce
genetics found themselves at the mercy of the secret police. The lucky
ones simply got dismissed from their posts and were left destitute.
Hundreds if not thousands of others were rounded up and dumped into
prisons or psychiatric hospitals. Several were sentenced to death as
enemies of the state or starved in their jail cells (most notably the
botanist Nikolai Vavilov). Before the 1930s, the Soviet Union had a strong genetics community. Lysenko gutted it, and by some accounts set Russian biology and agronomy back a half-century.
Politics
Trofim Lysenko out in the field working with his wheat. (c. 1920–1930)
During the early and mid twentieth century the Soviet Union went
through war and revolution. Political oppression caused tension within
the state but also promoted the flourishing of science. This was
possible due to the flow of resources and demand for results. Lysenko
aimed to manipulate various plants such as wheat and peas to increase
their production, quality, and quantity. However, Lysenko in particular
more so impressed political officials with his success in motivating
peasants to return to farming.
The Soviet Union's collectivist reforms
forced the confiscation of agricultural landholdings from peasant
farmers and heavily damaged the country's overall food production, and
the dispossessed peasant farmers posed new problems for the regime. Many
had abandoned the farms altogether; many more waged resistance to
collectivization by poor work quality and pilfering. The dislocated and
disenchanted peasant farmers were a major political concern to the
USSR's leadership.
Lysenko became prominent during this period by advocating radical but
unproven agricultural methods, and also promising that the new methods
provided wider opportunities for year-round work in agriculture. He
proved himself very useful to the Soviet leadership by reengaging
peasants to return to work, helping to secure from them a personal stake
in the overall success of the Soviet revolutionary experiment.
Timeline of Genetics and Science in the Soviet Union
Lysenko's success at encouraging farmers to return to working their
lands impressed Stalin, who also approved of Lysenko's poor background,
as Stalin stood with the proletariat. By the late 1920s, the USSR's
leaders had given their support to Lysenko. This support was a
consequence, in part, of policies put in place by the Communist Party to
rapidly promote members of the proletariat
into leadership positions in agriculture, science and industry. Party
officials were looking for promising candidates with backgrounds similar
to Lysenko's: born of a peasant family, without formal academic
training or affiliations to the academic community.
Due to close partnership between Stalin and Lysenko, Lysenko acquired
an influence over genetics in the Soviet Union during the early and mid
twentieth century. Lysenko eventually became the director of Genetics
for the Academy of Sciences, which gave him even more control over
genetics. He remained in the position for several years until some time after the fall of Stalin and later Nikita Khruschchev, when he was relieved of his duties.
Lysenkoism also played well into the Soviet theme occurring at that time, which was to "create the new Soviet man".
The logic was that if people are able to inherit the acquired
characteristics, it could be possible to create a better society. This
led the leaders of the Soviet Union to hope that peasants could be
turned into exceptional citizens. However, this was never one of
Lysenko's intentions; he strongly opposed genetic engineering of humans
and the eugenics movement.
After Stalin
Following Stalin's death in 1953, Lysenko retained his position, with the support of the new leader Nikita Khrushchev.
However, mainstream scientists re-emerged, and found new willingness
within Soviet government leadership to tolerate criticism of Lysenko,
the first opportunity since the late 1920s. In 1962, three of the most
prominent Soviet physicists, Yakov Borisovich Zel'dovich, Vitaly Ginzburg, and Pyotr Kapitsa,
presented a case against Lysenko, proclaiming his work as
pseudoscience. They also denounced Lysenko's application of political
power to silence opposition and eliminate his opponents within the
scientific community. These denunciations occurred during a period of
structural upheaval in Soviet government, during which the major
institutions were purged of the strictly ideological and political
machinations which had controlled the work of the Soviet Union's
scientific community for several decades under Stalin.
In 1964, physicist Andrei Sakharov spoke out against Lysenko in the General Assembly of the Academy of Sciences of the USSR:
He is responsible for the shameful backwardness of Soviet biology and of genetics in particular, for the dissemination of pseudo-scientific views, for adventurism, for the degradation of learning, and for the defamation, firing, arrest, even death, of many genuine scientists.
The Soviet press was soon filled with anti-Lysenkoite articles and
appeals for the restoration of scientific methods to all fields of
biology and agricultural science. In 1965,
Lysenko was removed from his post as director of the Institute of
Genetics at the Academy of Sciences and restricted to an experimental
farm in Moscow's Lenin Hills
(the Institute itself was soon dissolved). After Khrushchev's dismissal
in 1964, the president of the Academy of Sciences declared that
Lysenko's immunity to criticism had officially ended. An expert
commission was sent to investigate records kept at Lysenko's
experimental farm. His secretive methods and ideas were revealed. A few
months later, a devastating critique of Lysenko was made public. Consequently, Lysenko was immediately disgraced in the Soviet Union.
After Lysenko's monopoly on biology and agronomy
had ended, it took many years for these sciences to recover in Russia.
Lysenko died in Moscow in 1976, and was ultimately interred in the Kuntsevo Cemetery, although the Soviet government refused to announce Lysenko's death for two days after the event and gave his passing only a small note in Izvestia.
