It has been almost two years since Russia first invaded Ukraine, and during that time the country’s research community has been completely destroyed.
That’s the conclusion of new research published this month in the journal Humanities and Social Science Communication. In 2020, Ukraine contributed to one in 20 of the top 10% most cited academic research articles in the world. The Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development said Ukraine’s scientific output is above average in key fields such as computer science and energy, while the engineering sector and earth and planetary sciences are among the best in the world.
However, this has changed in the years since the start of the war with Russia; a bloody saga that left hundreds of thousands dead and millions displaced. The Humanities and Social Sciences Communication study found that Ukraine has lost nearly 20% of its total scientific capacity.
“[Some] couldn’t do experiments due to power outages,” says de Rassenfosse. “Others’ universities were destroyed. Others were completely displaced. “There were major disruptions”
In total, about 18.5% of scientists in Ukraine have left the country, according to the survey of 2,559 people. A colleague of De Rassenfosse is actually among those displaced (although he was not involved in data collection or analysis). Olena Iarmosh had been working as an associate professor in the eastern Ukrainian city of Kharkiv for 16 years before the Russian invasion. Kharkiv is just under 40 kilometers from the Russian border; Iarmosh immediately felt unsafe and has since fled to Switzerland.
“Ukrainians are pretty heartbroken people,” says Iarmosh. “They are always full of ideas and ready to start good things.” Although Iarmosh was a relatively high-ranking member of the academic world in Ukraine before the occupation, he struggled to find suitable work in Switzerland and is now working on a temporary contract at the University of Lausanne in Switzerland. Their situation is not unique: only 14% of Ukrainian researchers surveyed for the Humanities and Social Sciences Communication research managed to sign a long-term contract in the new host country.
The situation is not so good for those left behind. In total, about 15% of survey respondents who said they remained within Ukraine were no longer working on research. “When you look closely at what I call the silent majority, actually the majority of scientists who remain in Ukraine, you realize that many of them leave academia and research first,” says De Rassenfosse. “Some didn’t but focused primarily on teaching because they could do it online.”
Many of those who remain have lost access to the equipment needed to conduct their research, while one in five are no longer able to enter workplaces because it is either destroyed or access is too dangerous. The stress and strain of war is also having an impact: The average time a scientist spends each week on research work has dropped from 13 hours to 10 hours. “It may not seem like much, but when multiplied by the number of weeks and thousands of researchers, it looks like hundreds of thousands of hours of research have gone into it,” de Rassenfosse says.
De Rassenfosse adds that those who can continue their work will be key to Ukraine’s eventual recovery. “We know that a country’s long-term growth will be achieved through science and innovation,” he says.