To the 125th anniversary of the outstanding geneticist and biophysicist Nikolay Vladimirovich Timofeev-Resovsky
Year: 2025
Type: article
Abstract: . In 2025, Nikolai Vladimirovich Timofeev-Resovsky (1900-1981), an outstanding geneticist and biophysicist, would have turned 125 years old. He was a student of geneticist S.S. Chetverikov. In 1922- 1925 he was an employee of the N.K. Koltsov Institute of Experimental Biology. In 1925-1945 he worked in Germany at the Kaiser Wilhelm Institute of Biology in Berlin (since 1936, he was the director of the department of genetics and biophysics). His main works are on genetics, radiobiology, biogeocenology, and evolutionary theory. One of the founders of quantitative radiation genetics and radiation biogeocenology. He was the author of many studies on the genetic effects of radiation, which allowed us to formulate the basic concepts of modern radiobiology – the "hit principle" and the "target" theory; he created (together with physicists M. Delbrück and K. Zimmer) the first biophysical model of the gene structure and proposed possible ways of changing it. He was the author of the term "genetic engineering". He had a number of works on population genetics; Nikolai Vladimirovich formulated and developed the doctrine of microevolution studying the initial stages of intraspecific differentiation. Upon returning to the USSR, he headed the departments of the Institute of Biology of the Ural Branch of the USSR Academy of Sciences (1955-1963) and the Institute of Medical Radiology of the USSR Academy of Medical Sciences (Obninsk, 1964-1969). Nikolai Vladimirovich was the founder and honorary member of the Presidium of the All-Union Society of Geneticists and Breeders named after N. I. Vavilov (1966), member of the Academy of Arts and Sciences of the USA (1973), the Leopaldina Academy (GDR, 1969); he had the Darwin Medal (GDR, 1959), the Mendel Medal (Czechoslovakia, 1965), the Kimber Prize in Genetics and the Gold Medal "For Outstanding Scientific Contribution to Genetics" (USA, 1966), the Mendel Medal (GDR, 1970), the Lazzaro Spallanzani Medal of the University of Pavia (1939, Italy). He was an honorary member of the Mendel Society in Lund, the Italian Society of Experimental Biology, the American Academy of Arts and Sciences (Boston), the British Genetics Society (Leeds), and one of the founders of the Biophysical Society of Germany. A small planet discovered by Russian astronomer Nikolai Chernykh in 1975 was named after Timofeev-Resovsky (3238 Timresovia). Keywords: Nikolay Vladimirovich Timofeev-Resovsky, genetics, biophysics, biophysical structure of the gene, evolution, biocenoses.
Authors: V.K. Plotnikov, A.I. Nasonov
Language: English
Subfield: History and Philosophy of Science
Field: Arts and Humanities
Domain: Social Sciences
Open Access status: diamond
OpenAlex ID: W4407225956