Pavel Alexeyevich Cherenkov (born 28.07.1904) — Soviet physicist, academician (1970; corresponding member 1964). Born in the village of Novaya Chigla (now in Voronezh Oblast). Graduated from Voronezh University (1928). From 1930 he worked at the Physical Institute of the USSR Academy of Sciences, and from 1948 was also a professor at the Moscow Power Engineering Institute and from 1951 at the Moscow Engineering Physics Institute.
His work was in the field of physical optics, nuclear physics, cosmic-ray physics and accelerator technology. He began his scientific work in 1932 under S. I. Vavilov, studying the luminescence of solutions of uranium salts under the action of gamma rays. As a result of these studies he detected (1934) that, besides the ordinary luminescence caused by gamma rays, a further glow arises that differs from luminescent light (the Vavilov — Cherenkov radiation). He established (1936) the fundamental property of this radiation, its directionality, which proved decisive for clarifying the nature of the radiation and for creating its theory, which I. E. Tamm and I. M. Frank developed (1937). The effect he discovered, which shows itself in the glow of substances under the action of charged particles moving faster than light in the medium, came to be called the Vavilov — Cherenkov effect (State Prize, 1946; Nobel Prize, 1958). He put forward the idea of using this radiation to detect charged particles (Cherenkov counters).
He contributed to the creation of the first electron accelerators, the synchrotrons.
In particular, he took part in the design and construction of a 250 MeV synchrotron (State Prize of the USSR, 1952). He studied the interaction of bremsstrahlung with nucleons and nuclei, and photonuclear and photomeson reactions. In 1977 he was awarded the State Prize of the USSR for a series of studies of the disintegration of light nuclei by high-energy gamma quanta, made by the cloud chamber method in the powerful beams of electron accelerators.