Soviet Constructivism as Social-reforming Way for a Life Reconstructing By Architectural Methods: The Reasons for the Forbidding

The aim of the study was to provide answers to a historical question that still remains a blank spot in Russian historiography - what are the reasons for the banning of the Soviet architectural avant-garde in 1932. The article gives an answer to the question of the reasons why the supreme bodies of Soviet power ceased the development of Soviet constructivism. Reveals the socio-political motives of this decision. Describes the features of the functioning of the totalitarian-command system of management of the nation-wide project complex. It shows that the prohibition of constructivism was a direct consequence of the transformation of the free profession of an architect into a public service. Characterizes the position of the party and state leadership of the USSR in relation to the Soviet architectural avant-garde in general. The result of the study is to prove the fact that, after its official prohibition, constructivism has not disappeared, but has changed. It turned into the so-called ”Soviet functionalism”, which was a response to the need for the management metric criteria for evaluating design decisions. Soviet functionalism took from Soviet constructivism only what ensured the exercise of administrative functions of leadership and control. He took only what was the ”materialization” of meanings, only that which could be felt and measured. At the same time, reasoning about the form, rhythm, plasticity and other ”aesthetic nonsenses” were discarded as unnecessary.   Keywords: Soviet architectural avant-garde, constructivism, Stalin’s empire, architect profession in the USS

Thermal regimes of HTS cylinders operating in devices for fault current limitation

We reveal obstacles related to the application of HTS cylinders in current limiting devices based on the superconducting - normal state transition. It is shown that, at the critical current density achieved presently in bulk materials, and especially in BSCCO-2212, the required thickness of the cylinder wall in a full-scale inductive device achieves several centimeters. A simple mathematical model of the operation of an inductive fault current limiter (FCL) is used to show that such cylinders cannot be cooled in admissible time after a fault clearing and, hence, the inductive FCLs and current-limiting transformers employing BSCCO cylinders do not return to the normal operation in the time required. For the recovery even with a non-current pause in the circuit, the cylinders are needed with the critical current density by an order higher than the existed ones.Comment: 15 pages, 5 figure