Odessa National University

Odesa I. I. Mechnikov National University (Odesa National University)

Одеський національний університет імені І. І. Мечникова
Type	Public
Established	1865
Rector	Igor Koval
Administrative staff	1800
Students	7,500
Location	Odessa, Ukraine
Campus	Urban
Website	www.onu.edu.ua

Odesa I. I. Mechnikov National University (Ukrainian: Одеський національний університет імені І. І. Мечникова, Russian: Одесский национальный университет имени И. И. Мечникова), located in Odessa, Ukraine, is one of the country's major universities, named after the scientist Élie Metchnikoff (who studied immunology, microbiology, and evolutionary embryology), a Nobel prizewinner in 1908. The university was founded in 1865, by an edict of Tsar Alexander II of Russia reorganizing the Richelieu Lyceum of Odessa into the new Imperial Novorossiya University. In the Soviet era, the University was renamed Odesa I. I. Mechnikov National University (literally, "Odesa National University named after I. I. Mechnikov").

During the century and a half of its existence, the University has earned the reputation of being one of the best educational institutions in Ukraine. The excellence of the University is also recognized outside Ukraine; Odesa National University is one of the highest-ranked universities in the world, occupying 48th place in one rating of universities worldwide.

Odesa I. I. Mechnikov National University comprises four institutes, ten faculties, and seven specialized councils. The University is famous for its scientific library, the largest and oldest of any university in Ukraine (3,600,000 million volumes, ranging from the 15th century to the present day).

Odesa I. I. Mechnikov National University is one of the oldest in Ukraine. It was founded in 1865, when by Edict of the Russian Tsar Alexander II the Richelieu Lyceum (Рішелівський ліцей, which had existed in Odessa since 1817) was reorganized into the Imperial Novorossiya (New Russia) University. All academic and scientific life of the university - from the day of its foundation - was directed by the Statute of 1863 that formed the liberal-democratic tradition of the Higher Institution which has been preserved in spite of all the disturbances in the social and political life of the country. From the very first years of its existence, the Imperial Novorossiya University became an important center of science and for training the scientific and educational cadres of the northern Black Sea coastal region.