How an atomic shield was created in the USSR to protect the country from nuclear aggression: Kurchatov's feat

2024 Author: Richard Flannagan | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-15 23:55

A nugget from the provinces, the largest figure in Soviet and world science - Igor Vasilievich Kurchatov. His scientific genius and incredible organizational skills served the country at the most dramatic moment in world history. Like Peter I, he was a man of breakthrough, a giant leap that solved key problems. Possessing a powerful intellect and remarkable health, Kurchatov, like a giant, pushed science forward in several directions at once. A stately, handsome, incredibly charming, he was focused on the main thing and knew how to consolidate others for the benefit of science and his country. Thanks to his contribution to the development of physics, the USSR was protected from nuclear aggression, and today parity is possible between the powers that possess atomic weapons.

How did the Ural provincial become Ioffe's favorite student, and a few years later - the head of the Atomic Project?

The outstanding scientist was born in the village of Sim, Ufa province in 1903. Wanting to improve the financial situation of the family and give a good education to children, his father in 1908 moved the family to Simbirsk (now the city of Ulyanovsk), and later, due to his daughter's illness, to the Crimea, to Simferopol. After graduating from the Simferopol state gymnasium with a gold medal, in 1920 Igor Vasilyevich became a student of the Faculty of Physics and Mathematics. Kurchatov combined his studies at the university with work. Two years later, he managed to get a job as a preparator in a university laboratory, which will be useful to him in the future for his scientific activities.

Possessing outstanding abilities, which were immediately noticed by the leading professors of the university S. N. Usatyi and N. S. Koshlyakov, Kurchatov graduated from the university ahead of schedule and in 1923 entered the shipbuilding department at the Polytechnic Institute of Petrograd. In 1924, he was already completely absorbed in scientific interests. After research work in Pavlovsk, Feodosia, Baku, he returned in 1925 to Leningrad, where he became a research associate of the Physics and Technology Institute, created at the dawn of Soviet power.

The general leadership in it was carried out by Academician A. F. Ioffe. It was a large scientific institution of a new type, equipped with modern physical equipment. It brought together the largest scientists and talented youth from all over the country. Scientific enthusiasm, bold creative solutions, current topics and problems, the opportunity to contact representatives of world science - all this ensured the rapid growth of the young physicist. I. V. Kurchatov quickly gained prestige in the scientific community, from 1927 to 1929 Igor Vasilievich, in addition to research activities, was also engaged in pedagogical work - he taught a course in dielectric physics at the Faculty of Engineering and Physics.

In 1930, he already became the head of a large laboratory - by this time he was only 27 years old. And in 1934 he became a doctor of physical and mathematical sciences. This degree was awarded to him without defending a dissertation for his research in the physics of dielectrics. In addition to working on this topic, in 1932 Kurchatov began research in nuclear physics. The main task facing Soviet atomic scientists was to create a powerful source of fast particles that cause nuclear reactions. The discovery of the isomerism of artificially radioactive nuclei is Kurchatov's greatest achievement. Until now, the main method for studying the lowest excited states of nuclei is the study of their isomerism. From 1935 to 1940, without abandoning the previous topic, Kurchatov conducted research in the field of neutron physics.

After the discovery made by the French physicist F. Joliot-Curie (the reaction of fission of uranium nuclei as a result of their bombardment with neutrons), talk began in the scientific world that a chain reaction could develop, accompanied by an explosive release of a huge amount of energy. In 1940, nuclear articles disappeared from American scientific journals. The military orientation in the research of colleagues from the United States is becoming obvious to Soviet scientists. Scientists turn to the Soviet leadership with a proposal to start work on the atomic bomb. But the outbreak of war posed other urgent tasks for physicists - Kurchatov and a group of scientists were sent to Sevastopol to work on protecting ships from enemy magnetic mines.

The main vector of activities of the top-secret laboratory No. 2

In 1942, in a letter to Stalin, one of Kurchatov's employees, GN Flerov, again spoke of the urgent need to start creating atomic weapons. The General Secretary summoned Academicians Ioffe, Khlopin, Vernadsky, Kapitsa. They confirmed that this is possible. When Stalin asked who could lead the work, Ioffe replied that, without a doubt, IV Kurchatov. In 1943 he was appointed head of the atomic project. Lavrenty Beria became the curator of nuclear research.

Studying the intelligence data on this topic provided at the Lubyanka, Kurchatov was surprised at what a powerful concentration of scientific and engineering forces was thrown in the United States to develop atomic weapons. Until the end of the war, Soviet physicists did not succeed in creating such a thing. But in America, a test was successfully passed - the explosion of the world's first atomic bomb in the Alamogordo desert, which Stalin learned from Harry Truman at the 1945 Potsdam conference. In August of that year, the US President approved the atomic bombing of two Japanese cities - Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

The first Soviet atomic bomb and the Semipalatinsk explosion, or how Soviet physicists liquidated the US atomic monopoly

A special design bureau was created near Arzamas, in which they were engaged in the development of the Soviet atomic bomb. It was created in an atmosphere of the most severe tension of moral and physical forces.

This time the work was supervised by the physicist Yu. B. Khariton, but Kurchatov came to the Kremlin with reports. In 1949, a formidable weapon created by a secret design bureau was successfully tested at a training ground near Semipalatinsk (Kazakhstan). The creation of the first Soviet atomic bomb made it possible to eliminate the US atomic monopoly.

Tsar Bomba and other achievements of the Kurchatov team

The next task of the design bureau in Arzamas was to create thermonuclear weapons - even more powerful than the previous one. The RDS-6s hydrogen bomb was created in 1953. The power of the thermonuclear weapon was 400 kt.

A year later, the Kurchatov team developed the AN602 thermonuclear bomb. She received a loud name - Tsar Bomba, and for good reason! After all, the power of thermonuclear weapons amounted to a record 52,000 kilotons.

Further, Kurchatov and his KB collaborators are investigating the problem of controlled thermonuclear fusion, and the idea of the peaceful use of the atom is being developed.

Science is good physics, only life is short

Even despite his naturally strong health, Kurchatov lived for only 57 years. The incredible and systemic loads and dangerous radiation doses affected. In 1960, Igor Vasilyevich came to "Barvikha" (a sanatorium in the Moscow region) to visit Khariton. They went for a walk, sat down to talk on a park bench. Khariton was talking about the results of the experiments carried out recently, when he suddenly realized that his interlocutor was too silent. Kurchatov died - a blood clot came off and blocked the heart artery.

In such a short life, the Soviet physicist probably did not realize even half of his ideas in science, including the development of the peaceful atom. The culmination of his tremendous efforts was the security of the Motherland, guaranteed to be protected by an atomic shield.

Fortunately, the USSR never used nuclear weapons for military purposes, unlike the United States. In photographs of Hiroshima and Nagasaki all the horrific consequences of such a decision are visible.