Igor Kurchatov
JAN 12, 2016
DOI: 10.1063/PT.5.031131
On this date in 1903, Igor Kurchatov, director of the Soviet atomic bomb project, was born in Simsky Zavod, Russian Empire (now Sim, Russia). In 1943 he was appointed as the director of Soviet Union’s atomic bomb project, which was completed in 1949. He had a small role in the development of the Soviet thermonuclear bomb as well, but by the late 1950s was an advocate against nuclear weapons tests. Under his leadership, the first atomic reactor in Europe was built in 1946, the world’s first nuclear power plant was built in 1954, and the first nuclear-powered surface ship was built in 1959.
Date in History: 12 January 1903
© 2016 American Institute of Physics
