Leonid Vasilyevich Kirensky (10.04.1909—3.11.1969) was a Soviet physicist and an academician (1968; corresponding member 1964). He was born in the village of Amga (now in the Yakut ASSR). He graduated from Moscow University (1936). From 1939 he worked at the Krasnoyarsk Pedagogical Institute (at the same time heading the department of physics at the medical institute). From 1957 he was director of the Institute of Physics of the Siberian Branch of the USSR Academy of Sciences (Krasnoyarsk) and professor at Krasnoyarsk University.
His research was in the field of the physics of magnetic phenomena and of biophysics. He established the temperature dependence of the constants of magnetic anisotropy for ferro- and ferrimagnetism, was the first to develop methods of studying the dynamics of domain structure over a wide range of temperatures and methods of obtaining single-crystal magnetic films of ferromagnetic metals and their alloys, discovered the process by which domain structure rearranges itself, found a number of new phenomena, built unique scientific apparatus and so on. In particular, Kirensky and his school were the first to develop a method of cine-filming domain structure, which made it possible to study the dynamics of domain structure in the finest detail under an applied field and under mechanical stresses. He was the first to create a technique for the visual study of domains by means of the magneto-optical Kerr effect. A large series of studies was carried out on the physics of thin magnetic films; multilayer film systems were studied for the first time, and magnetic single-crystal films both of pure ferromagnetic metals and of their binary and ternary alloys were obtained and studied.
Under Kirensky's direction, research was developed in Krasnoyarsk on the biophysics of complex systems and on the control of biosynthesis by means of physico-technical systems; in particular, an experiment on the regeneration of gas, water and, in part, food was carried out for the first time, and a number of substantial results were obtained on the creation of biotechnical systems.
Hero of Socialist Labour (1969). He founded a school in the field of magnetism. The Institute of Physics in Krasnoyarsk is named after Kirensky.