The world of Lev Vasil’evič Šubnikov (1901-1937) and fundamental physics in the Soviet Union in the twenties and thirties

In this thesis I discuss the development of Soviet fundamental physics from the 1917 October revolution until the end of the thirties of the twentieth century, using the life and career of the experimental low-temperature physicist Lev Vasil’evič Šubnikov (1901-1937) as a guide through this period. After his graduation in Petrograd Šubnikov spent almost four years from 1926 to 1930 in Leiden, where he worked with the then director of the physics laboratory Wander de Haas and was the co-discoverer of the Shubnikov-de Haas effect. After his return to the Soviet Union he became the head of the first cryogenic laboratory in the Soviet Union at the Ukrainian Physico-Technical Institute in Char’kov, where he embarked on an extensive (very much Leiden inspired) research program that among other things resulted in the discovery of type II superconductivity (Shubnikov phase). The theoretical explanation of this phenomenon earned Abrikosov and Ginzburg the 2003 Nobel Prize. In 1937 at the...Show moreIn this thesis I discuss the development of Soviet fundamental physics from the 1917 October revolution until the end of the thirties of the twentieth century, using the life and career of the experimental low-temperature physicist Lev Vasil’evič Šubnikov (1901-1937) as a guide through this period. After his graduation in Petrograd Šubnikov spent almost four years from 1926 to 1930 in Leiden, where he worked with the then director of the physics laboratory Wander de Haas and was the co-discoverer of the Shubnikov-de Haas effect. After his return to the Soviet Union he became the head of the first cryogenic laboratory in the Soviet Union at the Ukrainian Physico-Technical Institute in Char’kov, where he embarked on an extensive (very much Leiden inspired) research program that among other things resulted in the discovery of type II superconductivity (Shubnikov phase). The theoretical explanation of this phenomenon earned Abrikosov and Ginzburg the 2003 Nobel Prize. In 1937 at the height of the Stalinist terror the NKVD launched a clamp-down on the Ukrainian Physico-Technical Institute, of which Šubnikov became one of the most important victims. He was shot in November 1937. I discuss the extent of the repression in physics in general and at the Ukrainian Physico-Technical Institute in particular, and put forward arguments for the thesis that this repression was not random, but at least in part a deliberate and carefully planned attack on individuals who were alleged or perceived to be disloyal to the Soviet cause. Apart from Šubnikov’s work I also discuss the work of other Soviet physicists in that period, among whom Pëtr Kapica, Lev Landau, Igor’ Tamm and others, and their experiences in the Soviet climate. I also pay attention to the (re)organization of science, and physics in particular, by the Bolsheviks after the October revolution, the reestablishment of contacts with the West, the influence of Marxism on physics research (the campaign against physical idealism), and the quality of Soviet contributions to physics and the appreciation of these contributions in the West.Show less

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The world of Lev Vasil’evič Šubnikov (1901-1937) and fundamental physics in the Soviet Union in the twenties and thirties