Cosmonaut career

After his graduation from the Moscow Aviation Institute, Lebedev worked for 23 years at the Central Design Bureau "Energy" (SPU "Energy") of the Soviet Scientific Production Union^[2] as an engineer, senior research fellow, and a methodology instructor in the cosmonaut's detachment.

In 1967 Lebedev participated in an expedition of the Eighth Naval Squadron to locate, rescue, and rehabilitate the spaceship Zond after its landing in the Indian Ocean.

In 1968 Lebedev led the specialists in Bombay supporting Zond 5, which flew around the Moon and returned to Earth. He continued leading technical detachments in the flying, design, testing and control of the spaceship Soyuz and Soyuz T, and the orbiting space stations Salyut 4, Salyut 5, and Salyut 6.

Valentin Lebedev trained as a cosmonaut from 1971–1973, at the Yuri A. Gagarin Center for Cosmonaut Training. He earned a diploma in 1972, given the title Cosmonaut Investigator, and taken on to the cosmonaut's team ZKBEM. His first space flight was with Peter Klimuk, as a crew engineer aboard Soyuz 13, which orbited Earth from 18–26 December 1973. After this space flight, Lebedev was awarded a gold medal, "Hero of Soviet Union", the Order of Lenin, and promoted to the rank of Pilot Cosmonaut.

In 1982 Lebedev, along with Anatoly Berezovoy, spent 211 days in space (13 May – 10 December) as a crew engineer of the space station Salyut 7. During this mission Lebedev conducted more than 300 scientific experiments and studies. The 211-day flight was a record for that time, and recorded in the Guinness Book of Records. During that flight, an additional entry in to the Guinness Book of Records was filed under "First species of plant to flower in space", when his Arabidopsis flowered in July. After that space flight, Lebedev was awarded a second gold medal, "Hero of Soviet Union", and a second Order of Lenin.

In 2000 he became the first cosmonaut ever elected to the Russian Academy of Science.

Lebedev retired from the space program in 1993.

Scientific career

In the years following his second return from space, Lebedev became renowned as a specialist in the field of cosmonautics and geoinformation.

From 1989 until 1991, Valentin Lebedev worked as Deputy Director of Science at the Institute of Geography AS USSR, completely dedicated to scientific work. At the same time he was acting Director of the Geoinformation Center (GIC), which was part of this institute. In 1991 the Geoinformation Center became an independent organization: the Scientific Geoinformation Center of the Russian Academy of Science. Lebedev continued there as its Director.

Under V. Lebedev's scientific leadership a unified technology was developed for the creation of maps showing the dynamics of ecosystems. This technology enabled the creation of multilayer maps of natural environments, showing changes over time. These maps were instrumental in the creation of the Ecological Geoinformaion System of the Moscow Automobile Ring Road (Russian: GIS EcoMKAD), which monitored changes in land, surface water, ground water, and flora, due to pollution created by traffic on Moscow's Ring Road.^[3]

Together with the Hydrometerological Center of Russia and IWP, as part of a federal program on Reviving the Volga River, the RAS created a new technology for predicting spring floods, based on analysis of runoff from snow blankets, the moisture content of soil (frozen during winter months), and the current state of the landscape.

One of the latest scientific projects of Lebedev and his staff, executed within a program called "Science To Moscow", is a work to remotely monitor Moscow transport traffic flow. Using original methods plus high-resolution aerial image digital processing software, the team obtained reliable data about city transport traffic volume, speed and ecological parameters of transport flow. This data became the basis for modifying street traffic and development of an automated traffic management system called "Start".

The GIS EcoMKAD developed green space for Central and Northeastern Moscow districts. It required developments to establish normalized information environment of megapolis and regions. It created the concept of unified geoinformation space for all of Russia.

Other Positions

CPSU member, 1971–present

Komsomol Central Committee member, 1974–1978

President of USSR Acrobatics Federation, 1975–1991

Member of the national Olympics committee, 1976–1991

Member, RAS President's workgroup on risk assessment and security issues

Member, United RAS Scientific Committee on Geoinformation

Member, Editorial Council, "Herald of Computer and Information Technologies" magazine