Background
Pavel Alekseyevich Cherenkov was born on July 15, 1904, in the small village of Novaya Chigla. This town is in present-day Voronezh Oblast, Russia.
Pavel Alekseyevich Cherenkov
USSR State Prize
Nobel Prize in Physics
Hero of Socialist Labour
Voronezh State University
Cherenkov radiation is named for his discovery of the phenomenon; pictured here glowing is the core of the Advanced Test Reactor.
USSR State Prize
Nobel Prize in Physics
Hero of Socialist Labour
Pavel Alekseyevich Cherenkov was born on July 15, 1904, in the small village of Novaya Chigla. This town is in present-day Voronezh Oblast, Russia.
In 1928, Pavel Alekseyevich graduated from the Department of Physics and Mathematics of Voronezh State University.
In 1930, Pavel Alekseyevich took a post as a senior researcher in the Lebedev Physical Institute. He was promoted to section leader, and in 1940 was awarded the degree of Doctor of Physico-Mathematical Sciences. In 1953, he was confirmed as Professor of Experimental Physics. Starting in 1959, he headed the institute's photo-meson processes laboratory. He remained a professor for fourteen years. In 1970, he became an Academician of the USSR Academy of Sciences.
Pavel Alekseyevich died in Moscow on January 6, 1990, and was buried in Novodevichy Cemetery.
In 1934, while working under S. I. Vavilov, Pavel Alekseyevich observed the emission of blue light from a bottle of water subjected to radioactive bombardment. This phenomenon, associated with charged atomic particles moving at velocities greater than the phase velocity of light, proved to be of great importance in subsequent experimental work in nuclear physics, and for the study of cosmic rays. Eponymously, it was dubbed the Cherenkov effect, as was the Cherenkov detector, which has become a standard piece of equipment in atomic research for observing the existence and velocity of high-speed particles. The device was installed in Sputnik 3.
Pavel Alekseyevich also shared in the development and construction of electron accelerators and in the investigation of photo-nuclear and photo-meson reactions.
Pavel Alekseyevich was awarded two Stalin Prizes, the first in 1946, sharing the honor with Vavilov, Frank and Tamm, and another in 1952. He was also awarded the USSR State Prize in 1977. In 1958, he was awarded the Nobel Prize in Physics for the discovery of the Cherenkov effect. He was also awarded the Soviet Union's Hero of Socialist Labour title in 1984.
Pavel Alekseyevich married Maria Putintseva, daughter of A.M. Putintsev, a Professor of Russian Literature. They had a son, Alexey, and a daughter, Yelena.
