Boris Petrovich Zakharchenya (born 1.05.1928) was a Soviet physicist and a corresponding member of the USSR Academy of Sciences (1976). He was born in Orsha. He graduated from Leningrad University (1952). From 1952 he was head of a laboratory at the Leningrad Physico-Technical Institute, and from 1972 also professor at the Leningrad Electrotechnical Institute.
His work concerned the optics of semiconductors. Together with E. F. Gross he discovered a number of phenomena connected with the action of magnetic and electric fields on the spectra of semiconductors. He detected the effect of magnetoabsorption oscillations in semiconductors (1956) and diamagnetic excitons (1968). He laid the foundations of a new line of research in the physics of semiconductors — the optical orientation of electron and nuclear spins. He also worked on the use of metal–semiconductor phase transitions in optoelectronics and quantum electronics.
Lenin Prize (1966). USSR State Prize (1976).