Yulii Khariton | |
|---|---|
Юлий Харитон | |
 Khariton on a Russian stamp issued on the 100th anniversary of his birth | |
| Born | (1904-02-27)27 February 1904 |
| Died | 18 December 1996(1996-12-18) (aged 92) |
| Siglum | Yu.K |
| Citizenship |  Russia |
| Alma mater | Leningrad Polytechnical Institute, Soviet Union University of Cambridge, United Kingdom |
| Known for | Soviet program of nuclear weapons |
| Awards | Hero of Socialist Labour(1949, 1951, 1954) Lenin Prize(1956) |
| Scientific career | |
| Fields | Physics |
| Institutions | Laboratory No. 2 Institute of Chemical Physics |
| Thesis | Scintillation produced by alpha-particles (1928) |
| Doctoral advisor | Ernest Rutherford |
| Other academic advisors | Abram Ioffe |
Yulii Borisovich Khariton (Russian:Юлий Борисович Харитон; 27 February 1904 – 18 December 1996) was aRussianphysicist who was a leading scientist in the formerSoviet program ofnuclear weapons.[1][2]
Since the initiation of the Soviet program of developing theatomic bomb byJoseph Stalin in 1943, Khariton was the "chiefnuclear weapon designer" and remained associated with the Soviet program for nearlyfour decades. In honour of the centennial of his birthday in 2004, his image appeared on a Russian postal stamp by theRussian government.[3]
Yulii Borisovich Khariton was born inSaint Petersburg,Russian Empire, to an ethnic middle classRussian Jewish family, on 27 February 1904.: xii [4] His father, Boris Osipovich Khariton, was apolitical journalist, editor, and publisher who had attained alaw degree fromKiev University in Ukraine.: xlii : xii [4][5] His father worked for the newspaperRech, the main organ of theConstitutional Democratic Party, and was a well known figure in the political circles of Russia.[5] After theRussian revolution dismantled theTsarist autocracy in 1917, Boris Khariton had clashes with theBolsheviks due to his opposition toVladimir Lenin'sSoviet ideology.: xlii [4] His father was exiled to theBaltic states fromRussia in 1922 at the age of forty six along with professors and journalists on one of the so-calledPhilosophers' ships, subsequently working for an emigrant newspaper inLatvia.[6]
His father, Boris Khariton, remained there untilLatvia'sannexation by the Soviet Union in 1940 and, at the age of sixty-four, was then arrested by theNKVD and sentenced to seven years offorced labour in aGulag, where he died.: xlii [4]
Yulii's mother, Mirra Yakovlevna Burovskaya, was a theatre actress who performed at theMoscow Art Theatre. She left Russia in 1910 due to an illness that had to be treated at the European resort.: xlii [4] Yulii was six years old when his mother left him and was taken care by anEstonian woman, hired by his father while in exile in Latvia.: 134 [7] Yulii's mother never returned to Russia and divorced his father, only to marry her psychiatrist, Dr.Max Eitingon.: xli [4]
Having lived in Germany, Mirra moved toTel Aviv inPalestine in 1933, where she remained until her death.: xlii [4] She is buried inJerusalem.: xlii [4]
Yulii was forbidden to contact his parents after he had started classified work in theSoviet Union. His travels were highly restricted by the Soviet Union and later by Russia.[8]
Yulii was home schooled by his Estonian housekeeper, hired by his father, who taught him theGerman language.: xliii [4] At the age of eleven, he began attending regular school.: xliii [4] InSaint Petersburg, he went to attend atrade school which he completed at the age of fifteen and found work at a localmechanical workshop where he learned how to operate various machinery as amachinist.: xlii [4]
In 1920, he enrolled in theLeningrad Polytechnical Institute to studymechanical engineering but later chose to studyphysics, which he found to be more stimulating.: xliii [4] He studied physics under Russian physicists,Abram Ioffe,Nikolay Semyonov, andAlexander Friedmann. Khariton was particularly fascinated with the work of Semyonov whose research used the techniques ofphysics inchemistry, which Semyonov called "chemical physics.".: xliii [4] Khariton's talent was recognised by Semyonov who supported his research project in investigations of the light-emitting ability of phosphorus combined with oxygen, and reported the results in both the German and Russian languages.: xliv [4] In 1926, Khariton completed his degree in physics from theLeningrad Polytechnical Institute and ended his research project as he prepared for his first foreign trip to England.: xlv [4]
Before departing, he was introduced toPyotr Kapitsa by Semyonov who asked the latter to help Yulii secure a fellowship at theCavendish Laboratory in England. In England, Khariton attended theUniversity of Cambridge to do his doctoral in physics underErnest Rutherford in 1926.: xlv [4] At Cambridge, he worked withJames Chadwick on investigating the sensitivity of the eye with respect to weak light impulses and alpha radiation. Khariton earned his PhD in 1928 from Cambridge University.: xlv [4]
In 1928, Khariton decided to take up the residence in (Germany) to be near his mother, but was appalled and frightened by thepolitical propaganda of theNazi Party in Germany; therefore returning to Soviet Union while his mother left for Palestine.: xlv [4]
In 1931, he joined theInstitute of Chemical Physics and eventually headed the explosion laboratory until 1946, working closely with another Russian physicistYakov Zeldovich, on exothermicchemical chain reactions.: xlvi [4]
In 1935, he received his doctorate in physical and mathematical sciences. During this period, Khariton and Zeldovich conducted experiments on thechain reactions of uranium. In August 1939, Zeldovich, Khariton andAleksandr Leipunskii delivered papers on the theoretical process behind nuclear fission chain reactions at a conference inKharkiv,Ukraine; this was the last pre-war discussion of chain reactions in the USSR.[9][10]
DuringWorld War II, Khariton's knowledge of the physics of explosions was used in experimental studies on Soviet and foreign weaponry, while continuing his leadership of the Institute of Chemical Physics.[11]
PhysicistIgor Kurchatov asked Khariton to become part of the Soviet atomic project in 1943, in Laboratory No. 2 of theRussian Academy of Sciences. In May 1945, as part of a team of physicists sent to Berlin to investigate Nazi atomic bomb research, Khariton found 100 tonnes of uranium oxide, which was transported back to Moscow; this reduced development time for domestic plutonium production. After thebombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, a Special Committee was established including Kurchatov and Khariton. Khariton was made scientific director ofKB-11 (design bureau-11) also known as Arzamas-16 and colloquially as the 'Installation', located in the closed city ofSarov,Nizhny Novgorod Oblast to develop Soviet nuclear weapons (the organisation is now known as theAll-Russian Scientific Research Institute of Experimental Physics (VNIIEF). Khariton remained as its scientific director for 46 years. Along with other senior scientists, he was regarded as too important to fly and had his own private train carriage. He was elected as a corresponding member of theAcademy of Sciences of the Soviet Union in 1946, and as a full member in 1953.[11][9]
In 1949, he andKirill Shchelkin reported to the Special Committee on the progress of the first Soviet nuclear weapon, theRDS-1, which was tested on 29 August that year. He was deferential to political superiors but supported the scientists under him in a politic and diplomatic way. Physicist and departmental headAndrei Sakharov referred to him as being "zealous and unsparing of himself.";[10] he spoke for scientists when they changed their focus to a two-stage nuclear device with initial compression from 1954 (theRDS-37) and supported requests not to detonate theRDS-220 (the largest-ever bomb) because of the calculated number of deaths due toradioactive fallout. He would not support similar requests to halt a duplicate test by a second 'Installation' atSnezhinsk which he felt was divisive, and wouldn't intercede in certain politically-charged personal cases.[12]
His diplomacy meant absorbing criticism and put-downs from political leaders who came and went. KB-11 was sometimes sneered at for having a significant number of staff with Jewish backgrounds, Khariton included. The second Installation underYevgeny Zababakhin had fewer, and there had been awkward professional relations; it was comically referred to as "Egypt" by politicians, with obvious comparative implications with KB-11: the dining room at KB-11 was termed 'the synagogue.'[13]
In October 1997 in Sarov, Togliati Street was renamed Akademik Khariton Street in his honour. A bronze bust of him was installed in February 2004 next to the House of Scientists of VNIIEF. In 2004, a Russian stamp was issued to commemorate the 100th anniversary of his birthday.[14]
