Igor Kurchatov

Igor Kurchatov
Игорь Курчатов
Kurchatov in 1948
Born	Igor Vasilyevich Kurchatov (1903-01-12)January 12, 1903[1] Simsky Zavod, Ufa, Russia (now the town of Sim, Chelyabinsk Oblast, Russia)[1]
Died	7 February 1960(1960-02-07) (aged 57)[1] Moscow, Soviet Union[1]
Resting place	Kremlin Wall Necropolis
Citizenship	Soviet Union
Alma mater	Leningrad Polytechnical Institute
Known for	Soviet atomic bomb project
Awards	Lenin Prize Stalin Prize Hero of Socialist Labour
Scientific career
Fields	Physics
Institutions	Arzamas-16 Ioffel Physico-Technical Institute Azerbaijan Polytechnic Institute
Website	I.V. Kurchatov by PBS

Igor Vasilyevich Kurchatov (Russian: Игорь Васильевич Курчатов; 12 January 1903 – 7 February 1960), was a Soviet physicist who played a central role in organizing and directing the former Soviet program of nuclear weapons.^[2]

As many of his contemporaries in Russia, Kurchatov, initially educated as a naval architect, was an autodidact in nuclear physics and was brought by Soviet establishment to accelerate the feasibility of the "super bomb". Aided by effective intelligence management by Soviet agencies on American Manhattan Project, Kurchatov oversaw the quick development and testing of the first Soviet nuclear weapon, which was roughly based on the first American device, at Semipalatinsk in the Kazakh SSR in 1949.

Kurchatov, a recipient of many former Soviet honors, had an instrumental role in modern nuclear industry in Russia. His rapid decline in health is mainly attributed to a 1949 radiation accident in Chelyabinsk-40 (a more serious event than Chernobyl in 1986).^{: 107–108 [3]} Kurchatov died in Moscow in 1960, aged 57.^[1]