Vladimir Yevgenyevich Sakharov

W. Sakharov (2003)

Wladimir Evgenjewitsch Sacharow ( Russian Владимир Евгеньевич Захаров ; English transliteration Vladimir E. Zakharov ; born August 1, 1939 in Kazan ) is a Russian theoretical physicist and mathematician who deals with nonlinear dynamics.

Sakharov studied from 1956 at the Moscow Institute for Energy Technology and from 1960 at the University of Novosibirsk , where he graduated in 1963 with a degree in physics. From 1964 he was at the Institute for Nuclear Physics in Novosibirsk, where he received his doctorate in 1966 (candidate title) and completed his habilitation in 1971 (Russian doctoral degree). There he initially researched plasma physics and in 1974 became head of the department for theoretical plasma physics at the Landau Institute for Theoretical Physics in Moscow, which he remained until 1992. In 1993 he became director of the Landau Institute (which he remained until 2003) and was also professor of mathematics at the University of Arizona in Tucson since 1992 , since 2004 as "Regent Professor of Mathematics". Since 2004 he has also been head of the mathematical physics department at the Lebedev Institute in Moscow. From 1990 to 1997 he was director of the International Center on Nonlinear Studies in Russia.

Sakharov is known for his mathematical work on nonlinear dynamics, including a. Inverse scattering transformation and solitons in various nonlinear differential equation systems (with applications in general relativity and Yang-Mills theory ) and nonlinear wave phenomena in (nonlinear) optics, hydrodynamics (including surface waves such as ocean waves and capillary waves), solid state physics and plasma physics. In the 1960s he developed a theory of wave turbulence . With Wladimir Belinski he introduced the inverse scattering transformation in the general relativity theory in 1978 to obtain new exact solutions of the field equations (gravitational instantons).

In the early 1970s, Sakharov and Alexei Schabat (AB Shabat) published important contributions to the method of inverse scattering transformation (solution of the non-linear Schrödinger equation with this method, transfer of the method to several spatial dimensions).

Since 1984 he has been a corresponding and since 1991 full member of the Russian Academy of Sciences , which awarded him its Bogolyubov gold medal in 2019 . In 1987 he received the Soviet State Prize for his work in plasma physics and in 1993 the State Prize of the Russian Federation for his work on soliton theory. In 1999 he received the Order of Merit of the Russian Federation. In 2003 he received the Dirac Medal (ICTP) with Robert Kraichnan .

In 1983 he was invited speaker at the International Congress of Mathematicians in Warsaw ( Multidimensional integrable systems ). He is a fellow of the American Mathematical Society . In 2011 he was elected a member of the Academia Europaea .

Fonts (selection)

• with S. Manakov, Sergei Novikow , L. Pitaevskii : Theory of Solitons - The Inverse Scattering Method, Plenum Press 1984 (Russian 1980)
• as editor: What is Integrability?, Springer 1991
• with AB Shabat: Exact Theory of Two-Dimensional Self-Focusing and One-Dimensional Self-Modulation of Waves in Nonlinear Media , Soviet Phys. JETP, Vol. 34, 1972, pp. 62-69.
• with AB Shabat: A scheme for integrating the nonlinear equations of mathematical physics by the method of the inverse scattering problem , Funct. Anal. Appl., Vol. 8, 1974, pp. 226-235

Web links

• Vladimir Yevgenyevich Sakharov in the Mathematics Genealogy Project (English)
• Homepage at the University of Arizona

Individual evidence

1. ^ Membership directory: Vladimir Zakharov. Academia Europaea, accessed October 11, 2017 .