The Russian State Library (the RSL) is a unique repository of originals of dissertations on all the subjects and specializations except Medicine and Pharmacy beginning with 1944. The All - Russian (up to 1991 - the All - Union) fund of dissertations was started by the order of the All - Union Committee of Higher Education Affairs at the CNC of the USSR in 1944. Nowadays the funds of the Department of Dissertations (in Khimki) contain the collection of more than 900000 volumes. This number increases by 30000 annually - including 20000 dissertations of Master's Degree and 10000 PhD dissertations.

In 2003 the directors of the Russian State Library admitted the fact of the necessity to secure wide accessibility and preservation of the fund's resources on the basis of modern technologies, which prompted the idea to create the Digital Dissertations Library of the RSL.