He graduated in 1950 from Moscow State University, Department of Mechanics and Mathematics. He received his Doctor of Philosophy in 1953 from Moscow State University under the supervision of A. North. Kolmogorov. He also received a Doctor of Science from Moscow State University in 1957.
He is a Professor in Residence at the Department of Mathematics of the University of California, Berkeley and Mathematician at Department of Mathematics, Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory. He was G. I. Taylor Professor of Fluid Mechanics at the University of Cambridge from 1992 to 1994 and he has been Emeritus G. I. Taylor Professor of Fluid Mechanics since then His areas of research are: Fracture mechanics The theory of fluid and gas flows in porous media The mechanics of a non-classical deformable solids Turbulence Self-similarities, nonlinear waves and intermediate asymptotics.
1975 – Foreign Honorary Member, American Academy of Arts and Sciences 1984 – Foreign Member, Danish Center of Applied Mathematics & Mechanics 1988 – Foreign Member, Polish Society of Theoretical & Applied Mechanics 1989 – Doctor of Technology Honoris Causa at the Royal Institute of Technology, Stockholm, Sweden 1992 – Foreign Associate, United States. National Academy of Engineering 1993 – Fellow, Cambridge Philosophical Society 1993 – Member, Academia Europaea 1994 – Fellow, Gonville and Caius College, Cambridge. (since 1999, Honorary Fellow) 1995 – Lagrange Medal, Accademia Nazzionale dei Lincei 1995 – Modesto Panetti Prize and Medal 1997 – Foreign Associate, United States. National Academy of Sciences 1999 – G. I. Taylor Medal, United States. Society of Engineering Science 1999 – J. C. Maxwell Medal and Prize, International Congress for Industrial and Applied Mathematics 2000 – Foreign Member, Royal Society of London 2005 – Timoshenko Medal, American Society of Mechanical Engineers, "for seminal contributions to nearly every area of solid and fluid mechanics, including fracture mechanics, turbulence, stratified flows, flames, flow in porous media, and the theory and application of intermediate asymptotics.".
Royal Society; Academia Europaea. National Academy of Sciences. American Academy of Arts and Sciences.
