The southern part of the Middle Ural, its eastern slopes and the adjoining valleys are called Sinegor'e (the Blue Mountains). In this ancient place, on the southern bank of the lake Sinara the "nuclear" city was founded. It was named Snezhinsk. The city is situated 110 km away from Ekaterinburg and 120 km away from Chelyabinsk, 10 km away from the Ekaterinburg-Chelyabinsk route.
The city was established in 1957 for the dwelling of the staff of the Russian Federal Nuclear Center – All-union scientific research institute of technical physics (the Arzamas-16 alternate).The population of the city is about 50 thousand people. According to the Russian Federation laws it has the status of the closed territorial-administrative formation. 22 thousand people work in the city.
Sights
Museum of nuclear weapons, where one can see the most powerful hydrogen bomb in the history of mankind.
Institutes of higher education
The branch of Moscow state institute of physics and engineering (456700, Snezhinsk, Mira st., 6/8)
City's economy
The main enterprise in the city is the Russian Federal Nuclear Center – All-Union Scientific Research Institute of Technical Physics. The institute was founded in 1955 as the second center of nuclear weapons development (about 14,5 thousand research assistants). Due to the program of nuclear weapons reduction the principal importance for the life of the city and the institute is the development of conversion programs. Several conversion systems, for instance, computer tomography, superdispersed diamonds, cumulative perforators for oil and gas industry, superplastic flatting, etc. are developed. The development of conversion programs is restrained by financial problems. Research of a number of topical applied and fundamental problems is held in the institute in collaboration with specialists from national and, in the last years, foreign scientific centers.
