Yakov Borisovich Zel'dovich (Russian:Яков Борисович Зельдович) (March 8, 1914 – December 2, 1987) was a prolific Soviet physicist. He played an important role in the development of Soviet nuclear and thermonuclear weapons, and made important contributions to the fields of adsorption and catalysis, shock waves, nuclear physics, particle physics, astrophysics, cosmology, and general relativity. March 8 is the 67th day of the year in the Gregorian Calendar (68th in Leap years). ... 1914 (MCMXIV) is a common year starting on Thursday. ... December 2 is the 336th day (337th in leap years) of the year in the Gregorian calendar. ... 1987 (MCMLXXXVII) is a common year starting on Thursday of the Gregorian calendar. ... A physicist is a scientist trained in physics. ... The mushroom cloud of the atomic bombing of Nagasaki, Japan, 1945, rose some 18 km (11 mi) above the hypocenter. ... In chemistry, adsorption of a substance or adsorbate is its concentration on a particular surface of adsorbent. ... Generic graph showing the effect of a catalyst in an hypotetical exothermic chemical reaction. ... In fluid dynamics, a shock wave is a nonlinear or discontinuous pressure wave. ... Nuclear physics is the branch of physics concerned with the nucleus of the atom. ... Particles erupt from the collision point of two relativistic (100GeV) gold ions in the STAR detector of the Relativistic Heavy Ion Collider. ... Spiral Galaxy ESO 269-57 Astrophysics is the branch of astronomy that deals with the physics of the universe, including the physical properties (luminosity, density, temperature and chemical composition) of astronomical objects such as stars, galaxies, and the interstellar medium, as well as their interactions. ... Cosmology, from the Greek: κοσμολογία (cosmologia, κόσμος (cosmos) world + λογια (logia) discourse) is the study of the universe in its totality and by extension mans place in it. ... General relativity (GR) is the geometrical theory of gravitation published by Albert Einstein in 1915. ...

He was born in Minsk (now Belarus). Four months later his family moved to Saint Petersburg (Leningrad from 1924–1991). They remained there until August 1941, when together with the institute where Zel'dovich worked, they were evacuated to Kazan to avoid the Axis Invasion of the Soviet Union. They remained in Kazan until the summer of 1943, when Zel'dovich moved to Moscow. Victory Square, the central place of Minsk Minsk or Miensk (Belarusian: ; Russian: ) is the capital and a major city of Belarus with a population of 1. ... Saint Petersburg  listen (Russian: Санкт-Петербу́рг, English transliteration: Sankt-Peterburg), colloquially known as Питер (transliterated Piter), formerly known as Leningrad (Ленингра́д, 1924–1991) and Petrograd (Петрогра́д, 1914–1924), is a city located in Northwestern Russia on the delta of the river Neva at the east end of the Gulf of... Kazan (Tatar Qazan, Казан, Russian Казань) is the capital city of Tatarstan and one of Russias largest cities. ... The Eastern Front1 was the theatre of combat between Nazi Germany and its allies against the Soviet Union during World War II. It was somewhat separate from the other theatres of the war, not only geographically, but also for its scale and ferocity. ... Moscow (Russian: Москва́, Moskva, IPA: (?)) is the capital of Russia, located on the river Moskva. ...

In May 1931, at age seventeen, Zel'dovich became a laboratory assistant at the Institute of Chemical Physics of the USSR Academy of Sciences. He was associated with the Institute until the end of his life. In 1936 he defended his dissertation,which was on the adsorption and catalysis on heterogeneous surfaces, for his Candidate of Science (equal to PhD). The most important point of it was the research on the Freundlich (or classical) adsorption isoterm. Zel'dovich discovered the theoretical foundation of this empirical observation. In 1939 he received the degree of Doctor of Science (Physics and Mathematics), the doctor dissertation being on the oxidation of nitrogen. Zel'dovich discovered its mechanism, known in physical chemistry as Thermal NO Mechanism or Zel'dovich Mechanism. Russian Academy of Sciences (Росси́йская Акаде́мия Нау́к) is the national academy of Russia. ... In chemistry, adsorption of a substance or adsorbate is its concentration on a particular surface of adsorbent. ... Generic graph showing the effect of a catalyst in an hypotetical exothermic chemical reaction. ... PhD usually refers to the academic title Doctor of Philosophy PhD can also refer to the manga Phantasy Degree This is a disambiguation page — a list of pages that otherwise might share the same title. ... The most fundamental reactions in chemistry are the redox processes. ... General Name, Symbol, Number nitrogen, N, 7 Chemical series nonmetals Group, Period, Block 15, 2, p Appearance colorless Atomic mass 14. ... Physical Chemistry is the combined science of physics, chemistry, thermodynamics, and quantum mechanics which functions to provide molecular-level interpretations of observed macroscopic phenomena. ...

Between 1937 and 1948 he worked on the theory of ignition, combustion and detonation. From 1939–1940 together with Julii Khariton Zel'dovich achieved important results in the Theory of Nuclear Chain Reactions. In 1943 he began his participation in the Soviet Atomic Project, working along with Igor Kurchatov. His work on nuclear weapons continued until October 1963. Ignition occurs when the heat produced by a reaction becomes sufficient to sustain the reaction, whether it be a fire, an explosion, or nuclear fusion. ... Combustion or burning is an exothermic reaction between a substance (the fuel) and a gas (the oxidizer), usually O2, to release heat. ... A weapons cache is detonated at the East River Range on Bagram Airfield, Afghanistan Detonation is a process of supersonic combustion that involves a shock wave and a reaction zone behind it. ... Julii Borisovich Khariton (Ю́лий Бори́сович Харито́н, February 27, 1904 - December 18, 1996) was a Soviet physicist working in the field of atomic energy. ... The Soviet project to develop an atomic bomb began during World War II in the Soviet Union. ... Igor The Beard Kurchatov Igor Vasilyevich Kurchatov (И́горь Васи́льевич Курча́тов) (January 8, 1903 – February 7, 1960), Soviet/Russian physicist. ...

In 1952 he began work in the field of elementary particles and their transformations. He predicted the beta decay of a p-meson. Together with S. Gershtein he noticed the analogy between the weak and electromagnetic interactions, and in 1960 predicted the muon catalysis (more precisely, the muon-catalysed dt-fusion) phenomenon. In 1977 Zel'dovich together with F. Shapiro was awarded the Kurchatov Medal, the highest award in nuclear physics of the USSR. The citation was "for prediction of characteristics of ultracold neutrons, their detection and investigation". He was elected academician of the USSR Academy of Sciences on June 20 1958. He was a head of division at the Institute of the Applied Mathematics of the USSR Academy of Sciences from 1965 until January 1983. In particle physics, an elementary particle is a particle of which other, larger particles are composed. ... In nuclear physics, beta decay (sometimes called neutron decay) is a type of radioactive decay in which a beta particle (an electron or a positron) is emitted. ... In particle physics, pion (short for the Greek pi meson = P middle) is the collective name for three subatomic particles discovered in 1947: π0, π+ and π−. Pions are the lightest mesons. ... The weak nuclear force or weak interaction is one of the four fundamental forces of nature. ... Electromagnetic interaction is a fundamental force of nature and is felt by charged leptons and quarks. ... The moons shadow, as seen in muons 700m below ground at the Soudan 2 detector. ... Generic graph showing the effect of a catalyst in an hypotetical exothermic chemical reaction. ... Nuclear physics is the branch of physics concerned with the nucleus of the atom. ... Properties In physics, the neutron is a subatomic particle with no net electric charge and a mass of 939. ... The Keldysh Institute of Applied Mathematics of Russian Academy of Sciences is a research institute specializing in computational mathematics. ...

In 1965, at age 49, he started working in astrophysics and cosmology. Since 1965 he was also a professor at the Department of Physics of the Moscow State University, and a head of division of the Relativistic Astrophysics at the Sternberg Astronomical Institute. Zel'dovich worked on the theory of evolution of the hot universe, on the properties of microwave background radiation, on the large-scale structure of the universe, and on the theory of black holes. He prediced, with Rashid Sunyaev, that the cosmic microwave background should undergo gravitational lensing. This is called the Sunyaev-Zel'dovich effect, and measuring it is, at present (2005), one of the biggest observational efforts in cosmology. Spiral Galaxy ESO 269-57 Astrophysics is the branch of astronomy that deals with the physics of the universe, including the physical properties (luminosity, density, temperature and chemical composition) of astronomical objects such as stars, galaxies, and the interstellar medium, as well as their interactions. ... Cosmology, from the Greek: κοσμολογία (cosmologia, κόσμος (cosmos) world + λογια (logia) discourse) is the study of the universe in its totality and by extension mans place in it. ... 1965 (MCMLXV) was a common year starting on Friday (link goes to calendar). ... Moscow State University campus M.V. Lomonosov Moscow State University (Russian: Московский Государственный Университет имени Ðœ.Ð’.Ломоносова, often abbreviated МГУ, MSU, MGU) is the largest and oldest university in Russia, founded in 1755. ... Spiral Galaxy ESO 269-57 Astrophysics is the branch of astronomy that deals with the physics of the universe, including the physical properties (luminosity, density, temperature and chemical composition) of astronomical objects such as stars, galaxies, and the interstellar medium, as well as their interactions. ... Sternberg Astronomical Institute is a research institution in Moscow, Russia, division of Moscow State University. ... In cosmology, the cosmic microwave background radiation (CMB) is a form of electromagnetic radiation discovered in 1964 that radiates throughout the universe in the microwave range. ... A black hole is a concentration of mass great enough that the force of gravity prevents anything from escaping from it except through quantum tunneling behavior. ... Rashid Alievich Sunyaev (Рашид Алиевич Сюняев) was born in Tashkent, Uzbek SSR, on March 1, 1943 and educated at the Moscow Institute of Physics and Technology and Moscow University. ... A gravitational lens is formed when the light from a very distant, bright source (such as a quasar) is bent around a massive object (such as a massive galaxy) between the source object and the observer. ... The Sunyaev-Zeldovich effect (SZ effect or Sunyaev-Zeldovich theory) is due to high energy electrons distorting the cosmic microwave background radiation (CMB) through the inverse Compton effect, in which some of the high energy of the electrons is transferred to the low energy photons. ...

Igor Kurchatov once called him "genius" and Andrei Sakharov named him "a man of universal scientific interests." Stephen W. Hawking once said to Zel'dovich: "before I met you here, I believed you to be a 'collective author', like Bourbaki." Igor The Beard Kurchatov Igor Vasilyevich Kurchatov (И́горь Васи́льевич Курча́тов) (January 8, 1903 – February 7, 1960), Soviet/Russian physicist. ... Andrei Sakharov, 1943 Andrei Dmitrievich Sakharov (Андре́й Дми́триевич Са́харов, May 21, 1921 – December 14, 1989), was an eminent Soviet-Russian nuclear physicist, dissident and human rights activist. ... Hawking as himself on Star Trek: The Next Generation Professor Stephen William Hawking, CH, CBE, FRS, (born January 8, 1942) is one of the worlds leading theoretical physicists. ... Nicolas Bourbaki is the pseudonym under which a group of mainly French 20th-century mathematicians wrote a series of books of exposition of modern advanced mathematics, beginning in 1935. ...

Awards and honors

• Bruce Medal (1983)
• Gold Medal of the Royal Astronomical Society (1984).
• Kurchatov Medal (1977)
• three times Hero of Socialist Labor (1949, 1953, 1957)
• USSR State Prize (1943, 1949, 1951, 1953)
• Lenin Prize (1957)
• three Orders of Lenin (1949, 1962, 1974)
• two Orders of the Red Banner (1945,1964)
• Order of the October Revolution (1962)
• An asteroid 11438 Zeldovich was named in his honor in 2001 [1]

The Catherine Wolfe Bruce gold medal is awarded every year by the Astronomical Society of the Pacific for outstanding lifetime contributions to astronomy. ... The Gold Medal is the highest award of the Royal Astronomical Society. ... Hero of Socialist Labor (Герой Социалистического Труда in Russian, or Geroy Sotsialisticheskogo Truda) was an honorary title in the Soviet Union and the highest degree of distinction for exceptional achievements in national economy and culture. ... Stalin Prize medal State Prize medal The USSR State Prize (Russian:Госуда́рственная пре́мия СССР) was the Soviet Unions highest civilian honour. ... Lenin Prize (Russian: Ле́нинская пре́мия) was one of the highest awards in the Soviet Union. ... The Order of Lenin (ru: Орден Ленина), named after the leader of the Russian Revolution, was the second highest national order of the Soviet Union (Highest was the Order of Victory). ... The Soviet government of Russia established the Order of the Battle Red Banner, better-known as the Order of the Red Banner (in Russian: Орден Крaсного Знамени Orden Krasnogo Znameni) on September 16, 1918 during the Russian Civil War. ... The Order of the October Revolution was instituted on October 31, 1967, in time for the 50th anniversary of the October Revolution. ... An asteroid is a small, solid object in our Solar System, orbiting the Sun. ... 2001: A Space Odyssey. ...

References

• Selected works of Yakov Borisovich Zeldovich, Vol. 1 & 2. Princeton University Press, 1992-1993. ISBN 0691087431
• Overbye, D. Lonely Hearts of the Cosmos: The Scientific Quest for the Secret of the Universe. New York: HarperCollins, 1991.
• Zel'dovich, Ya. B. Physics of Shock Waves and High-Temperature Hydrodynamic Phenomena. Mineola, NY: Dover Publications, 2002. ISBN 0486420027
• Zel'dovich, Ya. B. and Novikov, I. D. Relativistic Astrophysics, Vol. 1: Stars and Relativity. Mineola, NY: Dover Publications, 1996. ISBN 0486694240
• Zel'dovich, Ya. B. and Novikov, I. D. Relativistic Astrophysics, Vol. 2: The Structure and Evolution of the Universe. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press, 1971.
• Zel'dovich, Ya. B. and Raizer, Yu. P. Elements of Gasdynamics and the Classical Theory of Shock Waves. New York: Academic Press, 1968.

External links

• Yakov Borisovich Zeldovich