An experimental physicist who explored fission and nuclear isomerism
Lev Rusinov was a Soviet physicist who expanded the experimental foundations of nuclear physics at the Leningrad Physico-Technical Institute. In 1939, working with Georgy Flerov, he demonstrated that uranium fission releases more than two neutrons per event, a result central to understanding the conditions for a chain reaction. He also investigated nuclear isomerism and the interaction of neutrons and gamma rays with nuclei, and after the war led reactor construction and the organization of nuclear research in Leningrad.
Career Timeline
- 1926–1930Student, Faculty of Physics and Mechanics, Leningrad Polytechnic Institute
- 1930–1944Researcher, Kurchatov laboratory, Leningrad Physico-Technical Institute
- 1939–1940Conducted fission-neutron experiments on uranium with Flerov
- 1944Earned a doctorate in physics and mathematics for research on nuclear isomerism
- 1948Professor of experimental physics
- 1946–1960Participant in the Soviet Atomic Project and research-reactor development
- 1950sScientific director of a research-reactor project with high neutron parameters