From the H-bomb to the tokamak: theoretical physicist of two nuclear ages
After the first successful H-bomb test in 1953, Tamm left weapons work and returned to Moscow, devoting his remaining eighteen years to the peaceful use of fusion.
Igor Tamm was a Soviet theoretical physicist who, with Ilya Frank, explained Cherenkov radiation, earning the 1958 Nobel Prize in Physics. From 1934 until his death he headed theoretical physics at FIAN, the center of Soviet theory; his contributions include Tamm surface states, predicting the neutron's magnetic moment, and the Tamm-Dancoff approximation. Recruited by Igor Kurchatov in 1948, he led the H-bomb theory group at Arzamas-16 (1949–1953), whose Sloika design succeeded in the first Soviet thermonuclear test, August 1953. In 1951, with Andrei Sakharov, Tamm proposed the tokamak (toroidal magnetic plasma confinement), now the basis for all major fusion reactor designs. In his later years he signed the Letter of the Three Hundred against Lysenkoism (1955) and the letter of 25 opposing Stalin's rehabilitation (1966).
Career Timeline
- 1918Graduated from Moscow State University
- 1924–1930Lecturer → chair of theoretical physics, Moscow State University
- 1934–1971Head of theoretical department, Lebedev Physical Institute (FIAN)
- 1949–1953Head of theoretical group, thermonuclear bomb project, Arzamas-16
- 1951Proposed the tokamak concept with Sakharov
- 1953Full member, USSR Academy of Sciences
- 1958Nobel Prize in Physics (explanation of Cherenkov radiation)
- 1966Signed letter of 25 against Stalin's rehabilitation
Related historical events
The Tamm School — Training Soviet Theoretical Physics
From the 1920s onward, Igor Tamm chaired the theoretical physics course at Moscow State University's Physics Faculty and, over nearly half a century, trained the core cadre of Soviet theoretical physics. His students formed more than a lecture-hall connection: they became a distinct academic community known as the 'Tamm school.'
His most widely known student was Andrei Sakharov, whom Tamm personally recruited to the hydrogen bomb project in 1948 and with whom he later proposed the tokamak concept. Vitaly Ginzburg, who won the 2003 Nobel Prize in Physics, developed his theory of superconductivity under Tamm's guidance. Leonid Keldysh, known as the father of the chemical laser, Dmitri Blokhintsev, who designed the world's first nuclear power plant at Obninsk, Moisey Markov, a pioneer of Soviet neutrino physics, Vladimir Kadyshevsky in quantum field theory, and condensed-matter theorists Semyon Altshuller and David Kirzhnits all came of age in Tamm's lectures and the FIAN theory department seminar.
Tamm's weekly seminar was legendary in Moscow physics circles. He subjected every speaker to relentless questioning, but beneath the severity lay a commitment to intellectual honesty and physical intuition above all. Ginzburg later recalled: 'Tamm never relied on authority to settle an argument; every dispute was directed solely toward the truth.' The FIAN theory department today bears the name 'I.E. Tamm Memorial Department of Theoretical Physics,' carrying this tradition forward.