This book is the first comprehensive description of development of the
Acipenserid fish published in the English language. It con- tains the
results of more than 40 years of studies by the authors and their
colleagues. My own life in science has been intimately related both with
the authors and the fish, which are the subject of this book. Therefore,
it gives me a great pleasure to present to the English reader an
expanded version of the book. Those interested in the history of biology
must be well aware of the fact that genetics in the USSR was practically
demolished by Lysenko at the session of the Lenin All-Union Academy of
Agricultural Sciences in 1948. However, it is much less well- known that
other fundamental branches of biology were also persecuted at that time,
experimental embryology (developmental mechanics) among them. As a
result, many embryologists, in- cluding the authors of this book, were
forced to turn to more ap- plied problems, this being the only way to
continue research. They had to abandon amphibians and concentrate their
efforts on sturgeon.