History of Laboratory of Theoretical Physics
The Department of Theoretical Physics was organized in 1963 and led, until 2003, by Prof. Val’ter A. Ignatchenko. The laboratory’s research was initiated by experimental works carried out at the Institute. Since 2003, the laboratory has been headed by Prof. Valerii V. Val’kov. The research team develops the theories of quantum magnets, strongly correlated electron systems, high-temperature superconductivity, and propagation of waves in media with regular and random inhomogeneities.
The first research works were evoked by the experimental studies of the Laboratory of Physics of Magnetic Phenomena led by Leonid Vasil’evich Kirensky, the Institute’s founder. They were the theory of the domain structure and magnetization reversal, the theory of spin and magnetoelastic waves, the theory of nuclear magnetic resonance in ferromagnets. The Lab’s researchers predicted the phenomenon of electron nuclear magnetic resonance in ferromagnets; predicted and experimentally implemented a new, inverse mechanism of the spin echo excitation; contributed to the theory of dipole system ordering.
The Laboratory scientists succeeded in the development on the theory of nonlinear waves and stochasticity in dynamic systems. This led to the separation of a new group, the Laboratory of the Theory of Nonlinear Processes (Head G. M. Zaslavsky) from the research team in 1973.
The development of the theory of the resonance interaction of laser radiation and a substance were continued in the Laboratory of Coherent Optics (Head A.K. Popov) organized in 1975.
The works on the quantum theory of magnetic ordering in metals and alloys started at the Laboratory of Theoretical Physics gave rise to the Laboratory of the Theory of Condensed Matter (Head by E. V. Kuz’min; from 1995 till 2003, by V. V. Val’kov).