Vadim Leonidovich Levshin (28.01.1896-12.12.1969) was a Soviet physicist and a Doctor of Physical and Mathematical Sciences (1935). He was born in the town of Korcheva (now in Kalinin Region). He graduated from Moscow University (1918), where he worked in 1919 — 23 and from 1944 was professor (in 1922 — 32 he was also at the Institute of Physics and Biophysics of the People's Commissariat of Health of the RSFSR and in 1932 — 35 at the Research Institute of Physics of Moscow University). From 1934 he was also at the Physical Institute of the USSR Academy of Sciences (in 1937 —51 deputy head and in 1951—63 head of the luminescence laboratory, and in 1947 —58 deputy director of the institute).
His research concerned mainly the study of luminescence. He developed (1925) the theory of polarised luminescence (the Levshin — Perrin formula). In 1923, together with S. I. Vavilov, he found the first nonlinear effect in optics. He established the rule of the mirror symmetry of the absorption and luminescence spectra of dye solutions (Levshin's rule). He studied the influence of molecular association and of other physico-chemical factors on the luminescence of solutions, the triplet levels and the phosphorescence of molecules, and the features of the emission of uranyl compounds.
He studied the laws of the decay of crystal phosphors, established (1934) the recombination character of the emission processes in crystal phosphors, and studied flash phosphors, systems of local levels of various depths and the redistribution of electrons over these levels under the action of various factors, and the interaction of activators in crystal phosphors. He contributed to the creation of Soviet fluorescent lamps, to the development of flash crystal phosphors and of phosphors for cathodoluminescent screens, and to the introduction of methods of luminescence analysis into various branches of the national economy.
USSR State Prizes (1951, 1952). The L. I. Mandelstam Prize (1947). Honoured Worker of Science and Technology of the RSFSR (1968).