Sergey Alexeyevich Lebedev (russian: Серге́й Алексе́евич Ле́бедев; 2 November 1902, n.s. – 3 July 1974) 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, ...

scientist in the fields of

electrical engineering Electrical engineering is an engineering discipline concerned with the study, design, and application of equipment, devices, and systems which use electricity, electronics, and electromagnetism. It emerged as an identifiable occupation in the l ...

and

computer science Computer science is the study of computation, automation, and information. Computer science spans theoretical disciplines (such as algorithms, theory of computation, information theory, and automation) to Applied science, practical discipli ...

, and designer of the first Soviet computers.

Biography

Lebedev was born in

Nizhny Novgorod Nizhny Novgorod ( ; rus, links=no, Нижний Новгород, a=Ru-Nizhny Novgorod.ogg, p=ˈnʲiʐnʲɪj ˈnovɡərət ), colloquially shortened to Nizhny, from the 13th to the 17th century Novgorod of the Lower Land, formerly known as Gork ...

Russian Empire The Russian Empire was an empire and the final period of the Russian monarchy from 1721 to 1917, ruling across large parts of Eurasia. It succeeded the Tsardom of Russia following the Treaty of Nystad, which ended the Great Northern War. ...

. He graduated from Moscow Highest Technical School in 1928. From then until 1946 he worked at

All-Union Electrotechnical Institute The Soviet Union,. officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR),. was a transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 to 1991. A flagship communist state, it was nominally a federal union of fifteen nationa ...

(formerly a division of MSTU) 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 ...

and

Kyiv Kyiv, also spelled Kiev, is the capital and most populous city of Ukraine. It is in north-central Ukraine along the Dnieper, Dnieper River. As of 1 January 2021, its population was 2,962,180, making Kyiv the List of European cities by populat ...

. In 1939 he was awarded the degree of Doctor of Sciences for the development of the theory of "artificial stability" of electrical systems. During

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...

, Lebedev worked in the field of control automation of complex systems. His group designed a weapon-aiming stabilization system for tanks and an automatic guidance system for airborne missiles. To perform these tasks Lebedev developed an

analog computer An analog computer or analogue computer is a type of computer that uses the continuous variation aspect of physical phenomena such as electrical, mechanical, or hydraulic quantities (''analog signals'') to model the problem being solved. In c ...

system to solve ordinary differential equations. From 1946 to 1951 he headed the

Kiev Electrotechnical Institute NASU Institute of Electrodynamics (IED) ( uk, Інститут електродинаміки НАН України, (ІЕД НАНУ)) is a Ukraine leading science institution in field of electrical engineering, thermal power (heat energy), and re ...

of the Ukrainian Academy of Sciences, working on improving the stability of electrical systems. For this work he received the Stalin (State) prize in 1950. In 1948 Lebedev learned from foreign magazines that scientists in western countries were working on the design of electronic computers, although the details were secret. In the autumn of the same year he decided to focus the work of his laboratory on computer design. Lebedev's first computer,

MESM MESM (Ukrainian: MEOM, Мала Електронна Обчислювальна Машина; Russian: МЭСМ, Малая Электронно-Счетная Машина; 'Small Electronic Calculating Machine') was the first universally program ...

, was fully completed by the end of 1951. In April 1953 the State commission accepted the BESM-1 as operational, but it did not go into series production because of opposition from the Ministry of Machine and Instrument Building, which had developed its own weaker and less reliable machine. Lebedev then began development of a new, more powerful computer, the M-20, the number denoting its expected processing speed of twenty thousand operations per second. In 1958 the machine was accepted as operational and put into series production. Simultaneously the BESM-2, a development of the BESM-1, went into series production. Though the BESM-2 was slower than the M-20, it was more reliable. It was used to calculate satellite orbits and the trajectory of the first rocket to reach the surface of the Moon. Lebedev and his team developed several more computers, notably the

BESM-6 BESM-6 (russian: БЭСМ-6, short for ''Большая электронно-счётная машина'', i.e. 'Large Electronic Calculating Machine') was a Soviet electronic computer of the BESM series. It was the first Soviet second-generation ...

, which was in production for 17 years. In 1952, Lebedev became a professor at the

Moscow Institute of Physics and Technology Moscow Institute of Physics and Technology (MIPT; russian: Московский Физико-Технический институт, also known as PhysTech), is a public research university located in Moscow Oblast, Russia. It prepares speciali ...

. From 1953 until his death he was the director of what is now called the

Institute of Precision Mechanics and Computer Engineering Lebedev Institute of Precision Mechanics and Computer Engineering (IPMCE) is a Russian research institution. It used to be a Soviet Academy of Sciences organization in Soviet times. The institute specializes itself in the development of: * Computer ...

. Lebedev died in

and is interred at

Novodevichy Cemetery Novodevichy Cemetery ( rus, Новоде́вичье кла́дбище, Novodevichye kladbishche) is a cemetery in Moscow. It lies next to the southern wall of the 16th-century Novodevichy Convent, which is the city's third most popular tourist ...

. In 1996 the IEEE Computer Society recognized Sergey Lebedev with a

Computer Pioneer Award The Computer Pioneer Award was established in 1981 by the Board of Governors of the IEEE Computer Society to recognize and honor the vision of those people whose efforts resulted in the creation and continued vitality of the computer industry. T ...

for his work in the field of computer design and his founding of the Soviet computer industry.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Lebedev, Sergey Alexeyevich Burials at Novodevichy Cemetery Computer designers Bauman Moscow State Technical University alumni Moscow Institute of Physics and Technology faculty Heroes of Socialist Labour Soviet computer scientists Full Members of the USSR Academy of Sciences Russian expatriates in Ukraine 1902 births 1974 deaths Soviet inventors

Biography

See also

References