Dmitri Vladimirovich Skobeltsyn (born 24.02.1892) — a Soviet physicist and public figure, an academician (1946; corresponding member 1939). Born in St Petersburg. He graduated from Petrograd University (1915). In 1916-37 he worked at the Leningrad Polytechnic Institute (professor from 1934) and at the same time in 1925 — 39 at the Leningrad Physico-Technical Institute. From 1937 he has worked at the Physical Institute of the USSR Academy of Sciences (director in 1951-72) and at the same time in 1946 —60 was director of the Institute of Nuclear Physics of Moscow University, which he organised; from 1940 he has also been professor and head of a chair at the university.
His research concerned nuclear physics, cosmic-ray physics and high-energy physics. In 1924, using a Wilson chamber placed in a magnetic field, he was the first to begin quantitative studies of the interaction of relativistic particles with matter. This cycle of work played an essential part in testing the basic theoretical ideas about the interaction of gamma quanta with the electrons of matter. In particular, his experiments observing recoil electrons from gamma quanta gave direct confirmation of the hypothesis of the quantum nature of light and led to a new method of gamma-ray spectroscopy. His further experiments with the Wilson chamber in a magnetic field were the first to show (1927) the presence of high-energy charged particles in cosmic rays and stimulated the development of cosmic-ray physics, beginning the study of the nature of cosmic radiation. In 1929 he discovered and studied the appearance of groups of several (up to 4) genetically related high-energy cosmic-ray particles. Later (1933) P. Blackett and G. Occhialini, in the controlled Wilson chamber they had invented, observed clusters of up to 20 particles — cosmic-ray showers.
In the work of the team led by Skobeltsyn, studies of cosmic radiation at great altitudes were widely developed — in the stratosphere with the help of sounding balloons and in the Pamirs. A cycle of work on extensive air showers led to the conclusion that the showers are not pure electron—photon cascades but the product of a complex nuclear-cascade process, and made it possible to construct a new nuclear-cascade scheme of the formation and development of extensive air showers, called electron—nuclear showers (USSR State Prize, 1951).
In 1950 —74 he was chairman of the Committee for the International Lenin Prizes “For Strengthening Peace Among Peoples”. Lenin Prize (1982). Hero of Socialist Labour (1969). He founded a school of physicists. The D. I. Mendeleev Prize (1936) and the S. I. Vavilov gold medal (1952).