On December 14, 1989, the great man, Nobel laureate, human rights activist and public figure, Soviet physicist Andrei Dmitrievich Sakharov, died. The academician was buried at the Vostryakovsky cemetery.
His personality is of great interest - after all, we are the creator of the first Soviet hydrogen bomb, so the main milestones of a short biography of Andrei Dmitrievich Sakharov cannot but interest everyone who is interested in the achievements of our country. He is an outstanding physicist, whose father was the luminary of science. Who, if not Sakharov Jr., was destined to forge the country's nuclear shield? From a historical point of view, we face a very important person.
Childhood, family
On May day in Moscow, the luminary of Russian science was born - Andrei Dmitrievich Sakharov. In a brief biography, it can be noted that Andrei Dmitrievich was proud of his origin. He came from an intelligent family of fairly high affluence. His father, Dmitry Ivanovich Sakharov, who lived between 1889 and 1961, was the son of a well-known lawyer and a very gifted person. At one time he received a physical, mathematical and musical education. At Moscow universities, his father taught physics, was a professor at the Lenin Moscow Pedagogical Institute and the author of a physics textbook and other books that gained popularity in those days. Dad “infected” his son, Andrei Dmitrievich Sakharov, with love for this subject.
Where and when was his mother born? She was very serious, by nature a closed lady of noble origin. Her name was Ekaterina Alekseevna, as a girl Sophiano, she lived from 1893 to 1963, and grew up in a military family. Her appearance was inherited by her son, as well as some traits of her character, such as dislike for contacts with the outside world and obstinacy in the good sense of the word.
Education, where and when was born
Andrei Dmitrievich Sakharov, born May 21, 1921, spent his childhood in the Moscow large apartment, in which the traditional "family spirit" reigned.
The first five years he studied at home, thanks to which such qualities as the ability to concentrate on work and independence were brought up in him. Of the minuses, it can be noted that this formed in him the isolation and lack of sociability, from which Sakharov suffered all his life.
From the seventh grade, he began studying at school. Together with Sakharov, his friend Oleg Kudryavtsev walked side by side, thanks to which a great humanitarian beginning was made to Sakharov’s worldview, and many branches of knowledge and art opened up with the filing of a friend to Andrei Dmitrievich.
Andrei Sakharov graduated with honors from school in 1938. His talent is especially evident in physics, and he enters the physics department of Moscow State University. The outbreak of World War II did not stop him from graduating from high school with honors in 1942, being evacuated in Ashgabat, Turkmenistan.
Start of activity
Andrei Dmitrievich Sakharov immediately after graduation was distributed to the People's Commissariat of Arms, from where he was sent to a military factory in Ulyanovsk. Until 1945, he worked there as an engineer-inventor, he owns a number of developments in the field of product control.
During the war years - 1943 and 1944 - a talented inventor created several scientific works that were sent to him at the Lebedev Physical Institute, the Lebedev Institute of Physics. In the year the war ends, Sakharov enters the graduate school of this university, and his future adviser is Igor Tamm, the future Nobel Peace Prize laureate. In November 1947, Sakharov became a candidate, and in 1953 he defended his doctoral dissertation and was elected a member of the USSR Academy of Sciences.
Development
Andrei Dmitrievich was included in the research group in 1948. In the course of the activity, fusion weapons were developed, and to which Sakharov devoted his time until 1968. The group was led by Igor Tamm, who once appreciated the work of Sakharov sent by Andrei Dmitrievich to the Lebedev Physical Institute. As part of his work in the Sakharov group, he made a project proposal for a bomb. It, in fact, consisted of layers of deuterium and natural uranium, which are concentrated around an ordinary atomic charge. The work of the group was successful - the first Soviet hydrogen bomb by Andrei Dmitrievich Sakharov was tested in 1953, on August 12.
Further, the group improved its development, and in parallel, Sakharov and Tamm began to make calculations in the field of thermonuclear fusion, which can be controlled. In 1961, Andrei Dmitrievich proposed the idea of using laser compression. This facilitated the production of a controlled thermonuclear reaction and served as the basis for global research in the field of thermonuclear energy.
The young promising academician Andrei Dmitrievich Sakharov with his enthusiasm impressed even the military, experienced colonels and generals. Just think: heavy-duty nuclear weapons for underwater explosions that provoke devastating tsunamis. Wash off the entire US coast in an instant - someone lost peace and sleep …
Humanist, peacemaker, human rights activist
Around the end of the fifties, Sugars, like many other domestic and foreign partners, whose activities were related to atomic physics, came to the conclusion that their activities are immoral. We must fight for peace, decided Andrei Dmitriyevich, and not bring him to the threshold of war. Disarmament and a fair world order - that is what should underlie human life on earth. Therefore, precisely in these years, as the biography of Andrei Dmitrievich Sakharov testifies, he begins to engage in active human rights activities.
Two articles by the scientist about the harmful effects of radioactivity due to nuclear explosions were published in 1958. They emphasized that radiation affects the average life expectancy, reducing it, and heredity. In the same year, the academician, together with Kurchatov, advocated the extension of the moratorium on nuclear tests, declared by the USSR.
Epistolary genre
At this time, he writes letters in defense of public figures, opposes the rehabilitation of Stalinism, supports conflicting with the Soviet government because of political views.
A letter from 25 figures of Soviet science, literature and art to L.I. Brezhnev, which was directed against the rehabilitation of I.V. Stalin, was also signed by this scientist in 1966.
An atomic scientist, three times Hero of Socialist Labor, who hates Soviet power — what a powerful weapon the anti-Soviet propaganda received in its hands! The West firmly and amiably “hugged” Sakharov, welcoming him, cajoling with honors and regalia. At the same time, the non-dormant Soviet authorities took Andrei Dmitrievich “under the microscope” - he posed a potential danger to the country, and with the slightest carelessness, an imminent death awaited him. The life of Andrei Dmitrievich Sakharov, we can say, hung literally in the balance.
Nevertheless, in the period from 1967 to 1980, Sakharov published more than fifteen scientific papers, and since 1969 he again conducted research as a researcher at the Institute of Physics and Sciences.
Further biography
In 1963, he acted as one of the initiators of the conclusion of the Treaty on the Prohibition of Tests in Space, in Water and in the Atmosphere, the document was signed in Moscow. In 1967, Sakharov took part in the Committee for the Protection of Lake Baikal.
The academician in 1968 created the manifesto "Reflections on Progress, Peaceful Coexistence and Intellectual Freedom". In it, Sakharov published a call for cooperation between the USSR and the USA in the fight against the global threat of hunger, environmental pollution and overpopulation of the planet. The disadvantage of the work was his ideas and thoughts, which seemed untrue, divorced from the realities of real life.
Andrei Dmitrievich Sakharov in 1970 became a co-founder of the Moscow Committee for Human Rights. He spoke out sharply against the death penalty, fought for the rights of people to emigrate, and he sharply condemned the treatment of "dissenters" in insane asylums: humanity should be at the heart of human relations, each person should have freedom of opinion.
In 1971, Sakharov addressed the Soviet government with a “Memorial Note” in which the academician covered urgent questions regarding state policy.
While abroad, in 1974 he published an article entitled “Peace in Half a Century”. In it, he sets out his thoughts on the future of scientific and technological progress, and also shares his point of view on the structure of the world.
A year later, the biography of Andrei Dmitrievich Sakharov, in addition to receiving the Nobel Peace Prize, was filled with yet another work entitled "On the Country and the World." In 1976, Sakharov was elected vice president of the International League for Human Rights.
Sakharov repeatedly protested against the entry of Soviet troops into Afghanistan.
Gaining incredible world popularity, in the West he appeared to be a fighter against the oppression of the Soviet regime, and in his native USSR he was presented as an enemy of the people, because he simply destroyed words that gave him all his native country.
Warnings and link
In January 1997, after a terrorist attack in the metro, Sakharov made an official statement that this was most likely a provocation of repressive organs. He received a warning from the authorities - for such a dangerous slander, the academician will overtake punishment with the repeated action of the academician. The scientist did not sign the notice.
But they did not touch him, they simply asked him not to annoy the higher echelons of Soviet power, but his associates in the dissident movement were punished.
But no matter how much the rope …
It arrived on January 8, 1980. As a result of the Decree of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR, as evidenced by the biography of Andrei Dmitrievich Sakharov, a turning point occurred in the life of the great Russian academician - he was deprived of all government prizes and awards, as well as the title of the thrice Hero of Socialist Labor. In January of the same year he was exiled to Nizhny Novgorod. They did not dare to let him go abroad - the man knew a lot about nuclear secrets, they simply sent him to Gorky. But during these six years of isolation, the academician did not stop fighting the regime. During this period, Sakharov spent three long hunger strikes.
Back to Moscow
At the end of 1986, by order of Mikhail Sergeyevich Gorbachev, academician Andrei Dmitrievich Sakharov returned to Moscow from exile and continued to work at the Physics Institute. P.N. Lebedev.
Sakharov went abroad for the first time in 1988. There he met with George W. Bush, Ronald Reagan and Margaret Thatcher, as well as with François Mitterrand.
In 1988, Andrei Sakharov was elected to the post of honorary chairman of the Memorial society, in March 1989 he became a people's deputy of the USSR.
Andrei Sakharov has gained incredible popularity abroad. He was an honorary member of many scientific organizations, in particular in America - the National Academy of Sciences, the Academy of Arts and Sciences and the National Society of Physics. Sakharov also had membership in European scientific organizations: at the Institute of France, at the Italian Academy of Day Linchea and the Venice Academy, as well as in Holland and other countries of the world. His activities received world prizes. In addition to the Nobel, he was awarded the Eleanor Roosevelt Prize, the American Prize "House of Freedom", the Human Rights League (at the UN), and the Physics - named after Benjamin Franklin. He was awarded the L. Szillard and Tamall Prizes in Physics, as well as the important Albert Einstein World Prize.
Personal
The full biography of Andrei Dmitrievich Sakharov should undoubtedly be supplemented with personal information. Moreover, the meeting with the second wife was crucial for the scientist.
In 1943, Sakharov married Claudia Vikhireva, she was a laboratory chemist who worked at the Ulyanovsk Military Plant. In this marriage two daughters and a son were born. Unfortunately, the wife died in 1969.
It is likely that Sakharov would have had a completely different fate if not for his acquaintance with the dissident Elena Bonner, who lived from 1923 to 2011.
According to Sakharov, she helped him in everything, was his brain center. They got married in 1972, and the haters claimed that Bonner was the real last name of Andrei Dmitrievich Sakharov. It was under her influence that he joined the ranks of human rights defenders and critics of the fatherland. He began by condemning certain shortcomings of the Soviet system, and then he criticized him with might and main, not hesitating, contrasting him with the "correct" capitalism that reigns in the "civilized world."
Awards, honors, heritage
In 1988, the European Parliament instituted a Sakharov Prize called For Freedom of Thought.
Andrei Dmitrievich Sakharov - three times Hero of Socialist Labor, holder of the Order of Lenin, Prizes of Stalin and Lenin, numerous scientific regalia.
In early 1990, the government decided to perpetuate the achievements of Academician Sakharov by organizing the Academician Foundation. In 1994, the Academician Sakharov Archive was opened in the capital of our country, and 2 years later in 1996, the Museum and the public center named after the scientist were founded.
But places of memory were created not only in Moscow. In Nizhny Novgorod in 1991, the Sakharov Museum was launched. Since 1992, an International Art Festival has been regularly held in his honor there.
There are interesting facts in the biography of Andrei Dmitriyevich Sakharov - the name of the academician has been bearing both the Altai mountain peak and the asteroid since 1992. Since 1995, the Russian Academy of Sciences began to award the award - the Sakharov Gold Medal. It is issued by domestic and foreign scientists for outstanding achievements and work in physics.
In St. Petersburg there is a square, a monument and a park bearing the name of a scientist.
The name of the great physicist is on streets and avenues not only in Russia but also in foreign countries.
The cities of Dubna and Riga, Kazan and Chelyabinsk, as well as Lviv, Sukhumi, Haifa and Odessa, contain streets named after Sakharov. In Jerusalem there are even gardens named after the scientist.
The International State Ecological University bears the name of the great Russian physicist.
Sakharov Square is in Yerevan, with a monument to the scientist. City secondary school number 69 bears his name.
In Barnaul, right in the center of the city, there is a square bearing the name of Sakharov, City Day is held here every year, and city events of a mass nature are organized.
