Pyotr Kapitsa (1894-1984) was a Soviet physicist awarded the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1978 for his experimental discoveries in low temperature physics, chief among them the 1937 discovery of superfluidity in liquid helium. He spent over a decade working at Cambridge University under Ernest Rutherford, building a strong low temperature research program there, before the Soviet government refused to let him leave the country during a 1934 visit home and had his Cambridge laboratory equipment purchased and shipped to Moscow so he could continue the same research at a newly built institute. He later spent years effectively sidelined after refusing to work on Soviet nuclear weapons research on ethical grounds, before being reinstated to run his institute. His Nobel Prize came sixteen years after Lev Landau, whose release from Stalinist imprisonment Kapitsa had personally secured, won the same prize for the theoretical explanation of the phenomenon Kapitsa had discovered experimentally.
Facts
Birth YearSourced to the subject's own account Birth DateSourced to the subject's own account Death DateSourced to the subject's own account Death YearSourced to the subject's own account FieldSourced to the subject's own accountlow-temperature physics 1 Death PlaceSourced to the subject's own account NationalitySourced to the subject's own account Notable WorkSourced to the subject's own account1937 discovery of superfluidity in liquid helium-4; 1978 Nobel Prize in Physics 1 BirthplaceSourced to the subject's own account Sources
1. Pyotr Kapitsa (Wikipedia)
WikipediaWikipedia article 'Pyotr Kapitsa', Biography section, first sentence (birth year)
Kapitsa was born on 9 July [O.S. 26 June] 1894, in Kronstadt, Russia, to the Bessarabian Leonid Petrovich Kapitsa (Romanian: Leonid Petrovici Capița), a military engineer who constructed fortifications, and to the Volhynian Olga Ieronimovna Kapitsa, from the Polish noble (szlachta) Stebnicki family.
Wikipedia article 'Pyotr Kapitsa', Biography section, first sentence (birth date, New Style)
Kapitsa was born on 9 July [O.S. 26 June] 1894, in Kronstadt, Russia, to the Bessarabian Leonid Petrovich Kapitsa (Romanian: Leonid Petrovici Capița), a military engineer who constructed fortifications, and to the Volhynian Olga Ieronimovna Kapitsa, from the Polish noble (szlachta) Stebnicki family.
Wikipedia article 'Pyotr Kapitsa', Biography section, first sentence (birthplace)
Kapitsa was born on 9 July [O.S. 26 June] 1894, in Kronstadt, Russia, to the Bessarabian Leonid Petrovich Kapitsa (Romanian: Leonid Petrovici Capița), a military engineer who constructed fortifications, and to the Volhynian Olga Ieronimovna Kapitsa, from the Polish noble (szlachta) Stebnicki family.
Wikipedia article 'Pyotr Kapitsa', Biography section, death sentence (death year)
Kapitsa died on 8 April 1984 in Moscow, at the age 89.
Wikipedia article 'Pyotr Kapitsa', Biography section, death sentence (death date)
Kapitsa died on 8 April 1984 in Moscow, at the age 89.
Wikipedia article 'Pyotr Kapitsa', Biography section, death sentence (death place)
Kapitsa died on 8 April 1984 in Moscow, at the age 89.
Wikipedia article 'Pyotr Kapitsa', lead paragraph, first sentence (nationality)
Pyotr Leonidovich Kapitsa (Russian: Пётр Леонидович Капица; Romanian: Petre Capița; 9 July [O.S. 26 June] 1894-8 April 1984), also known as Peter Kapitza, was a Russian and Soviet physicist, whose research focused on low-temperature physics.
Wikipedia article 'Pyotr Kapitsa', lead paragraph, first sentence (field)
Pyotr Leonidovich Kapitsa (Russian: Пётр Леонидович Капица; Romanian: Petre Capița; 9 July [O.S. 26 June] 1894-8 April 1984), also known as Peter Kapitza, was a Russian and Soviet physicist, whose research focused on low-temperature physics.
Wikipedia article 'Pyotr Kapitsa', Biography section, superfluidity discovery paragraph
This research culminated with the 1937 discovery of superfluidity (another expression of the state of matter that gives rise to superconductivity).
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