Evgeny Velikhov

Evgeny Pavlovich Velikhov (born on February 2, 1935; in Russian: "Евгений Велихов") is a physicist and scientific leader in the Russian FederationCitation | title=E. P. Velikhov link at Kurchatov Institute | url = http://www.kiae.ru/rnc1.html] . His scientific interests include plasma physics, lasers, controlled nuclear fusion, power engineering and magnetohydrodynamics (high-power pulsed MHD generators). He is the author of over 1500 scientific publications and a number of inventions and discoveries.

He currently holds the post of president of the Kurchatov Institute (named for Igor Kurchatov) and first Secretary (head) of the Public Chamber of Russia. He is a member of the Russian Academy of Sciences and has been the vice-president of the Soviet Academy of Sciences.

Career

Evgeny Velikhov graduates from the faculty of physics at M.V. Lomonosov Moscow State University (MSU) in 1958, and specializes in theoretical physics. From 1958 till 1961 he studies in graduate school. He then starts to work as a junior researcher at the "Institute of Atomic Energy", that will later become the Russian Research Centre (RRC) "Kurchatov Institute". He will make all his scientific career rising through the grades in this famous federal government scientific agency.

His early work regarding fluid and plasma instabilities led to the discovery of the magnetorotational instability in 1959cite journal
last = Velikhov
first = E. P.
year = 1959
title = Stability of an Ideally Conducting Liquid Flowing Between Cylinders Rotating in a Magnetic Field
journal = Soviet Physics JETP
volume = 36
issue =
pages = 1398-1404] and the electrothermal instability in 1962 [cite conference
author = E.P. Velikhov
year = 1962
title = Hall instability of current-carrying slightly-ionized plasmas
conference = 1^st International Conference on MHD Electrical Power Generation, Paper 47
booktitle = Newcastle-upon-Tyne, England] .

In 1964 he defends his thesis then receives his Doctor of Science degree in physics and mathematics.

In 1968 he obtains the rank of Professor of atomic physics, plasma physics and microelectronics at Physics Department of Moscow State University, and gets Head of the Department from 1973 to 1988.

From 1971 to 1978, he is director of the Magnetic Laboratory (later known as the TRINITY State Scientific Center), a branch of the USSR Academy of Sciences in 1956, and subdivision of Kurchatov Institute since 1961, at Troitsk, Moscow Oblast.

In 1972 he founds an energy and space plasma research department at Moscow Institute of Physics and Technology (MIPT, more known as "Phystech"), with a base in this branch of the Kurchatov Institute of Atomic Energy (KIAE).

In 1975, he organizes another new department at Phystech about the problems of physics and energy, and gets a chair of plasma energy. The next year he is appointed as the first dean of the "Faculty of Physics For Energy" (FPFE), a R&D department of fusion energy specialized in plasma and high pressure physics, quantum optics, laser and space technologies. Ten years later, in 1986, he is promoted as the scientific director of FPFE.

From 1988 he is named director of Kurchatov Institute and chairman of the international programme (Russia, USA, European Union and Japan) for the creation of the thermonuclear experimental tokamak ITER, and is president of Kurchatov Institute since 1992 until now.

He is also president of the joint stock company Rosshelf (Russian offshore development company to develop seafloor-based oil and gas production complex), Gazprom's subsidiary; and co-chairman of Relcom board of directors.

Evgeny Velikhov currently resides in Moscow.

Awards

Evgeny Velikhov is well-known in the world scientific and engineering community for his diverse activities, for which he was honored with such titles and ranks as:

* Correspondent of the USSR Academy of Sciences (1968); Member of the USSR Academy of Sciences (1974); Vice-President of the Academy of Sciences of the USSR (1978-1991) and the Russian Academy of Sciences (1991-1996).

* Academician-secretary of the Office of information technologies and computer engineering and automatics division of Russian Academy of Sciences (since 1983).

* Hero of Socialist Labor (1985); USSR State Prize laureate (1977); winner of the Lenin Prize (1984); the Prize MD Millionschikova of USSR Academy of Sciences (1986); the State Prize of the Russian Federation (2003); the prize "Global Energy" (2006); as well as the American Physical Society Szilárd's Prize and the World Scientist Federation "Science and Peace" Prize.

* Honorary member of the Royal Swedish Academy of Engineering Sciences.

* Honorary member of Ioffe Physico-Technical Institute, Saint Petersburg.

* Doctor Honoris Causa at the University of Notre Dame, Indiana; at William Howard Taft University, California, USA; and at the University of London, UK.

* Honorary Citizen if Rino, USA; and Plovdiv, Bulgaria.

References