Alexei Vasilievich Shubnikov (russian: Алексей Васильевич Шубников; 29March 1887 – 27April 1970) was a Soviet crystallographer and mathematician. Shubnikov was the founding director of the Institute of Crystallography (named after him following his death) of the

Academy of Sciences of the Soviet Union The Academy of Sciences of the Soviet Union was the highest scientific institution of the Soviet Union from 1925 to 1991, uniting the country's leading scientists, subordinated directly to the Council of Ministers of the Soviet Union (until 1946 ...

in Moscow. Shubnikov pioneered Russian crystallography and its application.

Life

Career

In 1912 Shubnikov graduated from the Department of Natural Sciences of the Faculty of Physics and Mathematics of

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 ...

. From 1920 to 1925 he was a professor at the Ural Mining Institute,

Yekaterinburg Yekaterinburg ( ; rus, Екатеринбург, p=jɪkətʲɪrʲɪnˈburk), alternatively romanized as Ekaterinburg and formerly known as Sverdlovsk ( rus, Свердло́вск, , svʲɪrˈdlofsk, 1924–1991), is a city and the administra ...

. In 1925, at the invitation of the well-known mineralogist and geologist

Alexander Fersman Alexander Evgenyevich Fersman (; 8 November 1883 – 20 May 1945) was a prominent Soviet Russian geochemist and mineralogist, and a member of the Soviet Academy of Sciences (1919–1945). Early life and education Fersman was born in St. Peter ...

, he went to

Leningrad Saint Petersburg ( rus, links=no, Санкт-Петербург, a=Ru-Sankt Peterburg Leningrad Petrograd Piter.ogg, r=Sankt-Peterburg, p=ˈsankt pʲɪtʲɪrˈburk), formerly known as Petrograd (1914–1924) and later Leningrad (1924–1991), i ...

, where he founded a laboratory of crystallography and laid the foundations of the Soviet school of theoretical and applied crystallography and related fields. From 1927 to 1929 he visited research institutions in Norway and Germany and worked temporarily with

Friedrich Rinne Friedrich Wilhelm Berthold Rinne (16 March 1863 in Osterode am Harz – 12 March 1933 in Freiburg im Breisgau) was a German mineralogist, crystallography, crystallographer and petrographer. Biography From 1880 he studied natural sciences at the ...

. In 1934 he received a doctorate in the field of geological sciences. As part of a restructuring in the Academy of Sciences, he moved to Moscow with his laboratory in 1934. With the beginning of the German-Soviet war in 1941 it was transferred to the

Sverdlovsk region Sverdlovsk Oblast ( rus, Свердловская область, Sverdlovskaya oblast) is a federal subject (an oblast) of Russia located in the Ural Federal District. Its administrative center is the city of Yekaterinburg, formerly known as S ...

, where research work on

piezoelectricity Piezoelectricity (, ) is the electric charge that accumulates in certain solid materials—such as crystals, certain ceramics, and biological matter such as bone, DNA, and various proteins—in response to applied mechanical stress. The word ''p ...

continued. In 1943 he returned to Moscow with his laboratory, and in 1944 it was transformed into the Institute of Crystallography by a decision of the Presidium of the Academy of Sciences. In 1953 he founded the Department of Crystal Physics at the Physics Faculty of

Lomonosov 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 ...

and was a professor there until 1968. He served as director of the academy's Institute for Crystallography until 1962. Shubnikov was a corresponding member of the

Academy of Sciences of the USSR The Academy of Sciences of the Soviet Union was the highest scientific institution of the Soviet Union from 1925 to 1991, uniting the country's leading scientists, subordinated directly to the Council of Ministers of the Soviet Union (until 1946 ...

from 1933, and a full member and academician from 1953. Shubnikov was a co-founder of the

International Union of Crystallography The International Union of Crystallography (IUCr) is an organisation devoted to the international promotion and coordination of the science of crystallography. The IUCr is a member of the International Council for Science (ICSU). Objectives ...

. Shubnikov was a foreign member of the mineralogical societies of Great Britain and of France. He is known for his research in the 1950s on the Shubnikov groups named after him, with many applications in

crystallography Crystallography is the experimental science of determining the arrangement of atoms in crystalline solids. Crystallography is a fundamental subject in the fields of materials science and solid-state physics (condensed matter physics). The wor ...

and

solid-state physics Solid-state physics is the study of rigid matter, or solids, through methods such as quantum mechanics, crystallography, electromagnetism, and metallurgy. It is the largest branch of condensed matter physics. Solid-state physics studies how the l ...

, especially in the fields of

magnetism Magnetism is the class of physical attributes that are mediated by a magnetic field, which refers to the capacity to induce attractive and repulsive phenomena in other entities. Electric currents and the magnetic moments of elementary particles ...

and

ferroelectricity Ferroelectricity is a characteristic of certain materials that have a spontaneous electric polarization that can be reversed by the application of an external electric field. All ferroelectrics are also piezoelectric and pyroelectric, with the add ...

. These groups were introduced by

Heinrich Heesch Heinrich Heesch (June 25, 1906 – July 26, 1995) was a German mathematician. He was born in Kiel and died in Hanover. In Göttingen he worked on Group theory. In 1933 Heesch witnessed the National Socialist purges of university staff. Not wi ...

in 1929 and are therefore also called Heesch-Shubnikov groups today.

Works

Shubnikov was the author of more than 250 scientific publications. His main works are devoted to the theory of

symmetry Symmetry (from grc, συμμετρία "agreement in dimensions, due proportion, arrangement") in everyday language refers to a sense of harmonious and beautiful proportion and balance. In mathematics, "symmetry" has a more precise definit ...

, the theory of

crystal growth A crystal is a solid material whose constituent atoms, molecules, or ions are arranged in an orderly repeating pattern extending in all three spatial dimensions. Crystal growth is a major stage of a crystallization process, and consists of the a ...

, and the physical properties of crystals. He was the first to draw attention to piezoelectric textures, which predicted the possibility of visual observation of atoms and molecules when monochromatic rays pass through two superimposed crystal rasters, which has found application in the technique of modern

electron microscopy An electron microscope is a microscope that uses a beam of accelerated electrons as a source of illumination. As the wavelength of an electron can be up to 100,000 times shorter than that of visible light photons, electron microscopes have a hi ...

. Having developed the doctrine of antisymmetry, he deduced the 58 crystallographic

point groups In geometry, a point group is a mathematical group of symmetry operations (isometries in a Euclidean space) that have a fixed point in common. The coordinate origin of the Euclidean space is conventionally taken to be a fixed point, and every p ...

of antisymmetry (Shubnikov groups). Selected works available in English: * On the works of Pierre Curie on Symmetry. In: Oops. fiz. Nauk. Volume 59, 1956, pp. 591–602. (Original Russian, English version in Comput. Math. Applic. 1988, do
10.1016/0898-1221(88)90225-8
* Antisymmetry of textures. In: Soviet Physics Crystall. Vol. 3, No. 3, 1958, pp. 269–273. (Original Russian, English version in Comput. Math. Applic. 1988, do
10.1016/0898-1221(88)90227-1
* Symmetry of similarity. In: Soviet Physics Crystall. Vol. 5, No. 4, 1961, pp. 469–476. (Original Russian, English version in Comput. Math. Applic. 1988, do
10.1016/0898-1221(88)90226-X
* Autobiographical Data and Personal Reminiscences, In: P.P. Ewald (Ed.): Fifty Years of X-Ray Diffraction, Conference Proc., 25–31 July 1962, Munich, Germany * Colored symmetry (1964) with N.V. Belov * Symmetry in science and art (1974) with V.A. Koptsik (Original in Russian published by Nauka, Moscow 1972.)

Honours and awards

Order of the Red Banner of Labour The Order of the Red Banner of Labour (russian: Орден Трудового Красного Знамени, translit=Orden Trudovogo Krasnogo Znameni) was an order of the Soviet Union established to honour great deeds and services to th ...

(1945, 1962) *

Stalin Prize Stalin Prize may refer to: * The State Stalin Prize in science and engineering and in arts, awarded 1941 to 1954, later known as the USSR State Prize The USSR State Prize (russian: links=no, Государственная премия СССР, ...

for his monograph on piezoelectric textures (1947), and for the creation of equipment and technology for the production of rubies (1950) *

Order of Lenin The Order of Lenin (russian: Орден Ленина, Orden Lenina, ), named after the leader of the Russian October Revolution, was established by the Central Executive Committee on April 6, 1930. The order was the highest civilian decoration b ...

(1953, 1967) *

Hero of Socialist Labour The Hero of Socialist Labour (russian: links=no, Герой Социалистического Труда, Geroy Sotsialisticheskogo Truda) was an honorific title in the Soviet Union and other Warsaw Pact countries from 1938 to 1991. It repre ...

(1967)

Life

Career

Works

Honours and awards

References

Further reading