Kovalchuk pointed out the importance of the Russian icebreaking fleet in developing relations with the United States.

The Russian nuclear icebreaking fleet plays a special role in the context of developing relations with the United States. This was announced on January 27 by Mikhail Kovalchuk, President of the Kurchatov Institute National Research Center.

"The icebreaking fleet is especially relevant today against the background of our developing relations with America. <...> We only have nuclear icebreakers and many decades of [operational] experience. And why? Because special Arctic steels have been created," he said, speaking at the III International Forum of New Materials, Chemistry and Technologies in Various Industries AMTEXPO 2026.

Kovalchuk pointed out that Russia is the only country that has been building submarines entirely out of titanium for decades.

"No one in the world can do this, no one does, because no one can weld two pieces of titanium so that the seam strength does not differ from the material that you connect," he stressed.

Kovalchuk put Russia on a par with the leading technological powers — the United States, Great Britain and France — in the field of creating critical technologies such as turbojet engines and composite materials. According to him, the scientific base, which includes a number of chemical institutes within the Kurchatov Institute, was originally created for the needs of the space industry and today remains the foundation for the materials science industry.

The ice has broken: construction of a new nuclear icebreaker Stalingrad has begun in Russia

At the ceremony, the President noted the importance of developing the Transarctic corridor from St. Petersburg to Vladivostok and named Russia's key priorities in the Arctic.

Andrey Puchkov, General Director of the United Shipbuilding Corporation (USC), announced on November 18 last year during the laying ceremony of the nuclear icebreaker Stalingrad that Russia had begun construction of the largest series of seven icebreakers in world history. According to him, over the past two years, under the leadership of Russian President Vladimir Putin, the nuclear-powered ship Chukotka has been launched and the icebreaker Leningrad has been laid down.

All important news is on the Izvestia channel in the MAX messenger.