NUCLEAR EDUCATION IN RUSSIA
2025-06-20 00:00

Names of the students to go to North Pole have been announced

On June 20 in Moscow, the Atom Museum at VDNKh hosted the finale of the sixth season of the Icebreaker of Knowledge international scientific and educational project, organized with the support of Rosatom. Now, the names of students from 21 countries who will go on Rosatom’s Arctic expedition on the nuclear icebreaker 50 Let Pobedy are known.

The competitive selection of foreign participants was being held online on the goarctic.energy website, in which about four thousand students from 20 countries took part. A record number of entries were received from Bangladesh (841 participants), India (492 participants) and Kyrgyzstan (471 participants). A total of 20 foreign students were selected.

The international competition started on April 28, 2025 took place in three stages. In the first stage, the foreign participants were asked to take a science quiz. In the second stage, they were presented with a series of webinars on Rosatom’s breakthrough technologies, including technologies used for the safe development of Arctic shipping. After watching the videos, participants had to test their knowledge and fill in the notes. In the final round of the competition, the applicants with the most points shared their ideas in video presentations on how nuclear technology can change life in their countries for the better. Creative assignments were evaluated by an international jury, which included experts from the expedition Icebreaker of Knowledge 2024, ITER Project Center, Russian Quantum Center, FSUE Atomflot, etc. The key factors in selecting the winners were content completeness and topic coverage, as well as originality and creativity in presenting the material. Some kids will be the first representatives of their countries to reach the North Pole.

Rosatom’s sixth expedition of the Icebreaker of Knowledge will be dedicated to the 80th anniversary of the Russian nuclear industry and the 500th anniversary of Russia’s beginning to explore the Northern Sea Route. 65 students aged 14–16 years will go to the North Pole: they are the winners of open Russian and international selections, as well as other federal, regional and industry-specific competitions and projects.

A record number of people — more than 63,000 students — took part in the Russian selection process. The finalists of the project were 48 students aged 14–16 from 35 cities of Russia. The finalists passed an intellectual quiz and defended their team cases on three topics: Quantum Technologies, Bionics and Rare Earth Metals. The participants’ solutions were evaluated by a jury comprised of Rosatom representatives and external experts. As a result, 27 Russian students were selected.

The expedition will take place in August 2025.

Full lists of winners of the sixth edition of the Icebreaker of Knowledge international scientific and educational project are posted on the websites polus.atom.online and goarctic.energy websites.
The Icebreaker of Knowledge scientific and educational project is organized by the network of Nuclear Industry Information Centers (NIIC) with the support of Rosatom. It is aimed at promoting natural science disciplines and technologies of the nuclear industry, finding and supporting talented and gifted children, developing their abilities and offering career guidance. The project participants are students aged 14–16 from all over the world; the best of them embark on the Rosatom scientific and educational expedition to the North Pole aboard the 50 Let Pobedy nuclear icebreaker. Since the launch of the project, more than 350 gifted students have participated in Rosatom’s Arctic expeditions.

The project Icebreaker of Knowledge 2025 is part of the action plan for preparing and holding celebrations of the 500th anniversary of Russia’s beginning to explore the Northern Sea Route. The Northern Sea Route (NSR) is the shortest shipping route between the western part of Eurasia and the Asia-Pacific region and a historically developed national transportation artery of Russia. The first mention of the route along the seas of the Arctic Ocean dates back to 1525, when Russian diplomat Dmitry Gerasimov came up with the idea of using it for maritime communication between Russia and China. From this moment began the Russian history of development of the Northern Sea Route, which will be 500 years old in 2025.

Russia is the only country in the world with a nuclear-powered icebreaker fleet. The fleet is operated by FSUE Atomflot, an enterprise of Rosatom. Today there are eight nuclear-powered icebreakers in the icebreaker fleet of FSUE Atomflot.

In 2025, the Russian nuclear industry celebrates its 80th anniversary. The USSR was a pioneer and global leader in the peaceful use of atomic energy: Soviet nuclear engineers built the world’s first nuclear power plant (1954, Obninsk) and made the first nuclear-powered icebreaker to help explorers of the Arctic (1959, Lenin). Today, Rosatom continues developing and implementing advanced technologies in a wide range of industries. The State Corporation not only builds nuclear power plants, providing clean energy to hundreds of millions of people in dozens of countries around the world, but also ensures the logistics of the Northern Sea Route, produces new materials, develops and manufactures pharmaceuticals for nuclear medicine. The anniversary year is defined by three words: pride, inspiration, dreaming. Nuclear engineers are proud of the feat performed by the industry’s founding fathers. They are inspired by the accomplishments of previous generations. They plan to break new grounds, pushing the boundaries of what is possible. The 80th anniversary of the industry will be celebrated with a number of events, the key one being the World Atomic Week international forum to be held in Moscow this fall.
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