Saratov - largest city in the south-east of European Russia, the administrative center of Saratov region, which has the status of urban district (the official name - the municipality "City of Saratov" [2]).

Located on the right bank of the Volgograd Reservoir, approximately equidistant from the Volgograd and Samara.

Founded as a fortress guarding to protect the southern borders of the Russian state in 1590, during the reign of Fedor Ivanovich. In the second half of XVIII century, a major transshipment point and center of trade in fish and salt, and the XIX century - the grain. Provincial capital since 1780, at the beginning of the XX century - the largest by population city on the Volga. Since 1909, there is the university.

During the industrialization of the 1930s were built large machine-building plants, and after the war - and radio-electronic instrument-making enterprises of the defense structure. The city became an important scientific and production center.