Oleg Lavrentiev
Oleg Alexandrovich Lavrentiev (Russian: Оле́г Алекса́ндрович Лавре́нтьев; July 7, 1926 Pskov, Russia – February 10, 2011 in Kharkiv, Ukraine) – Soviet physicist.
Born in Pskov, into a family of descendants of peasants.
His father, Alexander, completed 2 years at a parochial school, worked as a clerk at a Pskov factory, his mother, Alexandra, completed 4 years, a nurse.
During the war, at age 18 he volunteered for the front. Participated in the battles for the Baltic States (1944–1945), transferred to the Sakhalin Military District, and continued military service in Poronaisk.
While in grade 7 (in 1941) upon reading "Introduction to Nuclear Physics", he showed interest in this topic. While in the military on Sakhalin Lavrentiev was educating himself, using the library of technical literature and college textbooks. With his measly military allowance he subscribed for the journal Uspekhi Fizicheskikh Nauk. (Advances in physics science) In 1948, Lavrentiev was instructed to prepare a lecture on nuclear physics. With a few days to prepare, he had time to rethink the problem and wrote a letter to the Central Committee of the CPSU (b). From Moscow came an order to create for him an atmosphere where he could work. In a guarded room dedicated to him, he wrote his first article, which he sent in July 1950 via secret mail to the department of heavy equipment engineering of the Central Committee.
His proposal consisted of two parts. Firstly, he proposed an implementation of a hydrogen bomb, based on lithium deuteride. In the second part of his work, he describes how to obtain electricity from a controlled thermonuclear reaction. Sakharov reviewed his work and wrote in a review the following:
... I think we need a detailed discussion of the comrade Lavrentiev's draft proposal. Regardless of the outcome of the discussion now is the time to note the creative initiative of the author. "
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