Semenov, Nikolai Nikolaevich (1896-1986)

Russian physical chemist who was the first Russian to be awarded the Nobel Prize for Chemistry in 1956 for his study of chemical chain reactions, particularly branched-chain reactions, which can accelerate with explosive velocity.

Semenov was born in Saratov and studied at Petrograd (now St Petersburg). He became professor at the Physical-Technical Institute there in 1928. He was director of the Institute for Chemical Physics at the Soviet Academy of Sciences 1931-44, and then moved to Moscow State University.

Semenov did his Nobel prize-winning work in the 1920s and summarized his results in his book Chemical Kinetics and Chain Reactions (1934).

Semenov also played an important part in resisting narrow interpretations of Marxism-Leninism in its application to chemistry.