The paper describes in detail the history of the Department of Geomorphology over 75 years, its present-day state, and considers trends of its development in future.

The paper covers principal streams in scientific researches, educational and productive activities of the Department team within the Petrograd -- Leningrad - Sanct-Petersburg University during 75 years. Particular emphasis has been placed on problems of theory and methodology of geomorphology, Quaternary geology, and applied geomorphological studies; in the authors opinion, the problems are of prime importance in the complicated present period.

The geomorphology is seen as a science concerned not only with relief and relief-forming processes, but also with morphology of geofields controlled by topography and reflected in it, and with geocomplexes (configuration, location and structure of their elementaryand complex components).

The North-West of the Russian Plain is a specific region typified by extremely well pronounced traces of ice sheets and meltwater in the relief. The latter, in turn, depends on buried Pre-Quaternary topography modeled by fluvial and glacial erosion and denudation. Tectonic processes were not particularly important because of short duration of the last period of the relief formation, and control primarily drainage pattern on the plain.

The paper describes the relief of Mongolia and main stages of its evolution (Early-Middle Jurassic, Late Jurassic, Neocomian, Aptian-Albian, Late Cretaceous, Paleogene, Neogene, Pleistocene). An extreme youthfulness of the Mongolian topography is stressed, as well as importance of the neotectonic and climatic control. Evidences of former epochs of relief-formation are found in the present-day topography.

The author considers ecological-geomorphological systems of the arid and humid zones on the regional, local and detailed levels of studies. The studies provided evidences for multi-aspected possibilities of the geomorphological analysis in definition of regions' geoecological status, location of critical geoecological situations etc.

Methods are outlined of assessment of geomorphosystems' ecological state based on arbitrary quantification of qualitative ecological characteristics. The formal procedure permits to compare contribution from individual characteristics to the ecological state of geomorphosystems. The approach is illustrated by a case study of geomorphosystems of glacial deposition and glaciofluvial sedimentation in the Lembolovo lake basin, the Karelian Isthmus.

A new method of geoecalogical studies is suggester based on identification of representative points of observation (assessment) of ecologically significant parameters. The representative points are those on the day surface which are easily recognized the landscape and placed «one-to-one» unto a map; they by a certain series of geomorphological parameters and holy reliable and comparable information on the state of environments. Some results are given of the technique applied so geoecological studies on the Kola Bay coasts.

The results of hydrological and lithodynamical investigations at the south of the Khatanga Bay are presented. Secondary currents, seasonal, daily and long-term changes of the bar's relief and sedimentation are established. Recommendations are given for improvement of shipping conditions across the Khatanga Bar.

The glacial morpholithegenesis role is estimated in the modeling of the Pre-Quaternary rock surface. Non-uniform structure of the Valdai ice sheet at the find stage and during retreat of the glacier is shown to influence development of the main recoat landforms within the Luca region. Characteristic of the present-day sedimentation are inferred from the granulometry of sea floor sediments.

Вклад Н.Н. Соколова в изучение ледникового рельефа Русской равнины

14 марта 1995 г. исполнилось 85 лет одному из известнейших геоморфологов России - профессору географического факультета МГУ - Алексею Ивановичу Спиридонову.