In accordance with the instructions of the President of the Russian Federation, the implementation of the Russian Federation's conventional obligations in the field of chemical disarmament assumes, after the completion of the destruction of chemical weapons, the involvement of former chemical weapons destruction facilities (CWDFs) in the economic turnover in the interests of the industries, connected with defense and state security, and other industries. The aim of this work is to consider the optimal technologies of the destruction of former CWDFs. In order to obtain objective information about the effectiveness and sufficiency of heat treatment of scrap metal products and spent sorbents, potentially contaminated with toxic substances, the FSBE «FUBKHUHO» experts conducted an experimental study of the possibility of using only regular production facilities for thermal neutralization of emptied cases of chemical ammunition and other waste, located at the CWDFs «Maradykovsky», «Leonidovka» and «Pochep». It is established during this study, that the use of standard heat treatment complexes allows to ensure the sanitary and epidemiological safety of the neutralized materials when using their design modes in the temperature range 500–700 °C. This approach allows to reduce the time required for full implementation of liquidation activities at the CWDFs at the expense of the refusal from the creation of new and/or reconstruction of existing facilities of heat treatment, necessary for the neutralization of potentially dangerous fragments of metal constructions and other solid waste, and to increase the efficiency of using financial, material and human resources to ensure the implementation of abandonment operations in general. A timely solution to the problem of the elimination of the consequences of CWDFs' activities will create safe conditions for the development of traditional and new industries on the basis of former CWDF complexes and increase their investment attractiveness.

The catastrophic spread of COVID-19 pandemic, uncontrolled by modern medical science, regardless of whether it is artificial or not, clearly shows the limits of human mind and knowledge to resist this and other similar challenges. The purpose of this work is to show the danger of dual-use biotechnologies in the development of fundamentally new approaches to biological damage to humans. The forecasts of the development of biotechnologies, made by the experts of the American organization JASON and other specialists 23 years ago, are analyzed. It is shown in the article, that in general these forecasts and assessments turned out to be true. The technologies that, most probably, can be used for the development of new means of biological destruction are: binary bioweapons – these are two-component systems that are relatively safe to handle but become deadly when the two components come together on deployment; designer genes – where specific unnatural gene sequences are built into viruses or other life forms to incorporate into the genome of the unsuspecting host, which later becomes the victim; gene therapy – today a medical (partial) reality; the technology that allows medicine to repair or replace defective genes in a diseased individual might be subverted to introduce pathogenic sequences into healthy individuals; stealth viruses – viruses that could be fashioned by a researcher to infect the host but remain silent until activated by some physiological or environmental trigger; host-swapping diseases – new zoonotic agents which might be developed specifically for bioweapon purposes by modifying existing pathogens to seek human hosts; designer diseases – where the detailed knowledge of biochemical signaling pathways could conceivably be used to create designer diseases. In addition to those predicted by JASON, another dualuse technology has emerged recently – synthetic biology. It is a very powerful interdisciplinary branch of biology. Specific examples of the use of these technologies to create new means of biological warfare are given in the article. The author believes that it is necessary not only to track new dual-use biotechnologies, but also to improve conventional and scientific methods of monitoring their use.

Reusable biosensors for the detection of biochemical analytes are widely used in clinical and laboratory practice. However, biosensors for the detection of pathogenic microorganisms are still under development or implementation. One of these devices is CANARY biosensor (Cellular Analysis and Notification of Antigen Risks and Yields), used by the US Army to indicate pathogenic biological agents. The aim of this article is to consider operating principles and molecular-biological foundations of CANARY biosensor, to analyze the possible directions of work and the prospects for creating domestically made biosensors based on eukaryotic cells. The concept of CANARY is that its receptor component is a B-lymphocyte, modified using genetic engineering, which carries specific IgM-like B-cell receptors on the surface of the cytoplasmic membrane. These cells are able to specifically recognize the target antigen and generate a photosignal through the aequorin protein. Currently, biosensors are already created for the detection of causative agents of plague (100–1000 CFU / ml), tularemia (100 CFU / ml), anthrax (100–500 spores / ml), smallpox (<500 CFU / ml), some toxins (ricin – 3 ng / ml, botulinum toxin – 16 pg / ml). They are based on the CANARY biosensor. Due to high sensitivity and specificity of this method, the relative simplicity and high speed of analysis of one sample, the possibility of analyzing aerosol samples, this technology should be considered as a promising basis for the creation of domestically made biological sensors to detect hazardous biological agents in biological samples, water, food, ecological samples and in aerosols. The deterioration of the global epidemic situation caused by the spread of various strains of SARS-CoV-2 makes sensors based on CANARY technology especially relevant. To create a domestic analogue of such a biosensor, close cooperation with scientific institutions that specialize in molecular genetics and manufacturers of laboratory equipment is required.

The use of biological weapons (BW) by the American army during the war on the Korean Peninsula (25.06.1950–27.07.1953) is an almost forgotten episode in the military history of the twentieth century. After the appearance of the first reports about the outbreak of biological warfare, the World Peace Council, at the initiative of the PRC, appointed the special International Scientific Commission for the Investigation of the Facts Concerning Bacterial Warfare in Korea and China (hereinafter – the Commission), which in 1952 prepared the «Report of the International Scientific Commission for the Investigation of the Facts Concerning Bacterial Warfare in Korea and China», (hereinafter – Report). The report has been repeatedly criticized for being prepared by the communists. However, the analysis of this document revealed that there remained a large amount of information that has never been criticized and remained unrefuted by anyone to date. This information is the main subject of our analysis. The purpose of this work is to show how biological warfare has been conducted during the hostilities on the Korean Peninsula in 1952. During the war, the Americans studied the effectiveness of various types of biological munitions: improved Japanese munitions (spreading infected insects and animals), special aerial bombs designed to spray liquid bacterial formulations. Combat aircraft equipped with aerosol generators were used for the first time to spray dry formulations. Water sources have been intentionally infected with pathogens of dangerous diseases. Outbreaks of plague, anthrax, cholera, dysentery and probably other infections have been caused artificially among the Korean and Chinese population. In the United States, many ideas about BW, based on the analysis of the Japanese experience and on their own field experiments in the 1940s, have been revised after the Korean War. The creation of the ammunition for the dissemination of fine aerosols and blood-sucking insects became the main direction of the development of the American BW. The report itself is the first attempt to create a new section of epidemiology – «abnormal epidemiology», i.e. the systems of scientific knowledge that allows the experts to recognize the artificial outbreaks (epidemics) of infectious diseases. Unfortunately, after the war the report was not properly evaluated. It was forgotten for political reasons. Therefore, the work on the creation of this section of epidemiology should be continued on the basis of new knowledge about contemporary biological threats.

Modern personal protective equipment for military personnel against the damaging factors of chemical and biological weapons (CBW) does not always allow to achieve an acceptable combination of body armor, protective helmet, respiratory and skin protective equipment from vapors and aerosols of toxic substances (TS) and biological agents (BA) in one set of equipment. The purpose of the work is to propose a promising form of personal protective equipment for Ground Forces servicemen against the damaging factors of chemical and biological weapons. The main characteristic feature of the existing gas masks is the invariable level of protection against the damaging factors of CBW. However, they do not provide protection for the head of servicemen from bullets and shrapnel. Based on the fact that danger levels for military personnel in case of a CBW attack differ and depend on the type of agent and on the time elapsed after the attack, the authors propose to combine a gas mask and a helmet in one product and to install disk filtering and sorbing elements (PSE) in the temporal region of the protective helmet with an air-duct, connected with an elastic half mask. The first universal PSE (sorbing-filtering) has the characteristics of a gas mask (shortness of breath) for protection from poisonous substances and biological agents in conditions of uncertainty of their use. It is transferred to the firing position simultaneously with the lowering of the visor. The second PSE possesses the parameters of a respirator (sorbing-filtering for easier breathing) for protection against TS. The second PSE should be used after the establishment of the fact of chemical, biological or radioactive contamination within an hour after the use of weapons of mass destruction. Thus, the main part of the soldier's head will be protected against bullets and shrapnel, as well as against TS and BA. To protect the lower part of the soldier's face (the chin, jaws and neck), it is proposed to use a circular elastic strip with a nasolabial device (screen) in the form of a half mask.

The lecture is intended for the improvement of the professional skills and knowledge of the students and graduates of military schools in the field of foreign chemical, biological and radiological detection equipment. Three problems are considered in the lecture: 1) the principal trends of the development of radiological detection equipment of foreign countries; 2) the principal trends of the development of chemical detection equipment of foreign countries; 3) the principal trends of the development of biological detection equipment of foreign countries. It is shown in the artice, that all the research and development in the field of radiological, chemical and biological reconnaissance tools are aimed at broad unification and miniaturization of the devices. They are also aimed at the creation of new and modernization of existing means of detection and identification of radioactive and toxic substances and biological pathogens.