Yakov Zeldovich

Born on 8 March 1914 in Minsk (in present-day Belarus), Yakov Zeldovich was a prolific Soviet physicist who made major contributions in particle physics, astrophysics and cosmology, and nuclear physics. He graduated high school at age 15. Despite never pursuing higher education, he joined the chemical physics department of the Soviet Physical–Technical Institute in 1931 and successfully defended his doctoral thesis in 1939. Much of Zeldovich’s early work was focused on the physics of combustion and explosions, including flame propagation and the ignition of gunpowder. He developed the technique of shock compression to explore the properties of materials under high pressure. During and after World War II, he joined other leading Soviet physicists in developing atomic and thermonuclear weapons. In the 1950s Zeldovich shifted his attention to particle physics. He published papers on ultracold neutrons and anticipated future discoveries regarding electroweak interactions. With a new decade came a new endeavor, and in the 1960s Zeldovich performed award-winning research on astrophysics and cosmology. He and Rashid Sunyaev proposed the Sunyaev–Zeldovich effect, which has enabled astrophysicists to identify galaxy clusters and other density perturbations in the universe. Zeldovich also studied neutron stars and black holes, and he expanded upon Stephen Hawking’s description of black hole evaporation. Along with many Soviet science awards, Zeldovich received the Dirac Medal of the ICTP, the Bruce Medal, and the Gold Medal of the Royal Astronomical Society. He died in 1987.

For more on Zeldovich’s many physics achievements, read the obituary by Vltalii Goldanskii in Physics Today‘s December 1988 issue. (Photo credit: AIP Emilio Segrè Visual Archives, Physics Today Collection)

Date in History: 8 March 1914