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Ilya Mikhailovich Frank (russian: Илья́ Миха́йлович Франк; 23 October 1908 – 22 June 1990) was a
Soviet The Soviet Union,. officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR),. was a List of former transcontinental countries#Since 1700, transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 to 1991. A flagship communist state, ...
winner of the Nobel Prize for Physics in 1958 jointly with
Pavel Alekseyevich Cherenkov Pavel Alekseyevich Cherenkov (russian: Па́вел Алексе́евич Черенко́в ; July 28, 1904 – January 6, 1990) was a Soviet physicist who shared the Nobel Prize in physics in 1958 with Ilya Frank and Igor Tamm for the discove ...
and Igor Y. Tamm, also of the Soviet Union. He received the award for his work in explaining the phenomenon of Cherenkov radiation. He received the Stalin prize in 1946 and 1953 and the USSR state prize in 1971.


Life and career

Ilya Frank was born on 23 October 1908 in St. Petersburg. His father, Mikhail Lyudvigovich Frank, was a talented mathematician descended from a
Jewish Jews ( he, יְהוּדִים, , ) or Jewish people are an ethnoreligious group and nation originating from the Israelites Israelite origins and kingdom: "The first act in the long drama of Jewish history is the age of the Israelites""The ...
family, while his mother, Yelizaveta Mikhailovna Gratsianova, was a Russian Orthodox
physician A physician (American English), medical practitioner (Commonwealth English), medical doctor, or simply doctor, is a health professional who practices medicine, which is concerned with promoting, maintaining or restoring health through th ...
. His father participated in the student revolutionary movement, and as a result was expelled from
Moscow University M. V. Lomonosov Moscow State University (MSU; russian: Московский государственный университет имени М. В. Ломоносова) is a public research university in Moscow, Russia and the most prestigious ...
. After the
October Revolution The October Revolution,. officially known as the Great October Socialist Revolution. in the Soviet Union, also known as the Bolshevik Revolution, was a revolution in Russia led by the Bolshevik Party of Vladimir Lenin that was a key moment ...
, he was reinstated and appointed professor. Ilya's uncle,
Semyon Frank Semyon Lyudvigovich Frank (russian: Семён Лю́двигович Франк; 28 January 1877 – 10 December 1950) was a Russian philosopher. Born into a Jewish family, he became a Christian in 1912. Early life and studies Semyon Lyudvigov ...
, a noted Russian philosopher, wasn't as fortunate and was expelled from the USSR in 1922 together with 160 other intellectuals. Ilya had one elder brother, Gleb Mikhailovich Frank, who became an eminent
biophysicist Biophysics is an interdisciplinary science that applies approaches and methods traditionally used in physics to study Biology, biological phenomena. Biophysics covers all scales of biological organization, from Molecule, molecular to organismic ...
and member of the Academy of Sciences of the U.S.S.R. Ilya Frank studied mathematics and
theoretical physics Theoretical physics is a branch of physics that employs mathematical models and abstractions of physical objects and systems to rationalize, explain and predict natural phenomena. This is in contrast to experimental physics, which uses experim ...
at Moscow State University. From his second year he worked in the laboratory of Sergey Ivanovich Vavilov, whom he regarded as his mentor. After graduating in 1930, on recommendation of Vavilov, he started working at the State Optical Institute in Leningrad. There he wrote his first publication—about
luminescence Luminescence is spontaneous emission of light by a substance not resulting from heat; or "cold light". It is thus a form of cold-body radiation. It can be caused by chemical reactions, electrical energy, subatomic motions or stress on a cryst ...
— with Vavilov. The work he did there would form the basis of his doctoral dissertation in 1935. In 1934, Frank moved to the Institute of Physics and Mathematics of the USSR Academy of Sciences (which shortly would be moved to Moscow, where it was transformed into the Institute of Physics). Here he started working on
nuclear physics Nuclear physics is the field of physics that studies atomic nuclei and their constituents and interactions, in addition to the study of other forms of nuclear matter. Nuclear physics should not be confused with atomic physics, which studies the ...
, a new field for him. He became interested in the
effect Effect may refer to: * A result or change of something ** List of effects ** Cause and effect, an idiom describing causality Pharmacy and pharmacology * Drug effect, a change resulting from the administration of a drug ** Therapeutic effect, a ...
discovered by Pavel Cherenkov, that charged particles moving through water at high speeds emit light. Together with Igor Tamm, he developed a theoretical explanation: the effect occurs when charged particles travel through an optically transparent medium at speeds greater than the speed of light in that medium, causing a
shock wave In physics, a shock wave (also spelled shockwave), or shock, is a type of propagating disturbance that moves faster than the local speed of sound in the medium. Like an ordinary wave, a shock wave carries energy and can propagate through a med ...
in the
electromagnetic field An electromagnetic field (also EM field or EMF) is a classical (i.e. non-quantum) field produced by (stationary or moving) electric charges. It is the field described by classical electrodynamics (a classical field theory) and is the classical c ...
. The amount of energy radiated in this process is given by the
Frank–Tamm formula The Frank–Tamm formula yields the amount of Cherenkov radiation emitted on a given frequency as a charged particle moves through a medium at superluminal velocity. It is named for Russian physicists Ilya Frank and Igor Tamm who developed the theo ...
. The discovery and explanation of the effect resulted in the development of new methods for detecting and measuring the velocity of high-speed
nuclear particle In physics and chemistry, a nucleon is either a proton or a neutron, considered in its role as a component of an atomic nucleus. The number of nucleons in a nucleus defines the atom's mass number (nucleon number). Until the 1960s, nucleons were ...
s and became of great importance for research in
nuclear physics Nuclear physics is the field of physics that studies atomic nuclei and their constituents and interactions, in addition to the study of other forms of nuclear matter. Nuclear physics should not be confused with atomic physics, which studies the ...
. Cherenkov radiation is also widely used in biomedical research for detection of radioactive isotopes. In 1946, Cherenkov, Vavilov, Tamm, and Frank were awarded a Stalin Prize for their discovery, and 1958 Cherenkov, Tamm, and Frank received the
Nobel Prize in physics ) , image = Nobel Prize.png , alt = A golden medallion with an embossed image of a bearded man facing left in profile. To the left of the man is the text "ALFR•" then "NOBEL", and on the right, the text (smaller) "NAT•" then " ...
. In 1944, Frank was appointed professor and became head of a department at the Institute of Physics and of the Nuclear Physics Laboratory (which was later transferred to the Institute of Nuclear Research). Frank's laboratory was involved in the (then secret) study of
nuclear reactor A nuclear reactor is a device used to initiate and control a fission nuclear chain reaction or nuclear fusion reactions. Nuclear reactors are used at nuclear power plants for electricity generation and in nuclear marine propulsion. Heat from nu ...
s. In particular, they studied the diffusion and thermalization of
neutron The neutron is a subatomic particle, symbol or , which has a neutral (not positive or negative) charge, and a mass slightly greater than that of a proton. Protons and neutrons constitute the nuclei of atoms. Since protons and neutrons beh ...
s. In 1957, Frank also become director of the Laboratory of Neutron Physics at the
Joint Institute for Nuclear Research The Joint Institute for Nuclear Research (JINR, russian: Объединённый институт ядерных исследований, ОИЯИ), in Dubna, Moscow Oblast (110 km north of Moscow), Russia, is an international research cen ...
. The laboratory was based on the neutron fast-pulse reactor (IBR) then under construction at the site. Under Frank's supervision the reactor was used in the development of
neutron spectroscopy Neutron scattering is a spectroscopic method of measuring the atomic and magnetic motions of atoms. Inelastic neutron scattering observes the change in the energy of the neutron as it scatters from a sample and can be used to probe a wide variety of ...
techniques.


Personal life and death

Frank married the noted
historian A historian is a person who studies and writes about the past and is regarded as an authority on it. Historians are concerned with the continuous, methodical narrative and research of past events as relating to the human race; as well as the stu ...
, Ella Abramovna Beilikhis, in 1937. Their son, Alexander, was born in the same year, and would continue much of the studies of his father as a physicist. Frank died on 22 June, 1990 in
Moscow Moscow ( , US chiefly ; rus, links=no, Москва, r=Moskva, p=mɐskˈva, a=Москва.ogg) is the capital and largest city of Russia. The city stands on the Moskva River in Central Russia, with a population estimated at 13.0 million ...
at the age 81.


References


External links

* including the Nobel Lecture, December 11, 1958 ''Optics of Light Sources Moving in Refractive Media''
Ilya Mikhaylovich Frank – Source and photo
on nobel-winners.com
Ilja M. Frank


{{DEFAULTSORT:Frank, Ilya 1908 births 1990 deaths Nobel laureates in Physics Soviet Nobel laureates Scientists from Saint Petersburg People from Sankt-Peterburgsky Uyezd Experimental physicists Full Members of the USSR Academy of Sciences Jewish physicists Moscow State University alumni Soviet physicists Stalin Prize winners Recipients of the USSR State Prize Members of the German Academy of Sciences at Berlin