Abstract
ON July 17, Sergei Vavilov was elected as the new president of the Academy of Sciences of the U.S.S.R., in succession to Vladimir Komarov, the botanist. Vavilov, who is a comparatively young man—he graduated in 1914—is one of the leading physicists in the U.S.S.R.: he is director of the Lebedev Institute of Physics, named after his former teacher, and directs the research at the State Institute of Optics. His own work has been mainly in various branches of the science of light. On the more academic side he has carried out important researches in the field of luminescence and fluorescence, having not only put forward a theory of luminescence of solutions but also developed a method of analysis, based on luminescence, which is being widely used in the U.S.S.R. On the applied side he has done much to develop in the U.S.S.R. the fluorescent discharge lamps for domestic and factory lighting which are now becoming so popular in Great Britain and the United States. Vavilov has also carried out distinguished work on the influence of the quantum nature of light on vision and on physiological optics in general. Reference to his active interest in the history of science, and in particular to his studies on Newton, is made in the article by Prof. E. N. da C. Andrade on the recent visit of British men of science as guests of the Academy of Sciences, which appears on p. 223 of this issue. In the jubilee celebrations of the Academy, Vavilov played an active part, and his British colleagues who met him will be delighted to hear of the great honour that has accrued to him.
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New President of the Academy of Sciences of the U.S.S.R.: Academician Sergei Vavilov. Nature 156, 230 (1945). https://doi.org/10.1038/156230a0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/156230a0