158

This issue is dedicated to  Professor 
Alexander Petrov, whose 75th birthday we 
have celebrated this year. During all his 
life Alexander Petrov was deeply involved 
into teaching and research in the Chemical 
Faculty of  the Ural State University. His 
research interests included wide range 
of  topics concerning thermodynamics 
and stability of oxide systems, crystal and 
defect structure, charge and mass trans-
fer, technical applications of oxide materi-
als, and many others. Professor Petrov is 
a co-author of many publications, patents, 
and text-books. Together with his teacher, 
Professor Vladimir Zhukovsky, Alexander 
Petrov became a founder of outstanding 
research group for Solid State Chemistry 
in the Ural State University, which raised 
many talented young scientists.

He was one of the first scientists of the 
Ural State University who managed 
to go on an internship abroad, to Profes-
sor P. Kofstad. As a result, since mid-70th, 
Oslo University remains our good partner 
for collaboration in different forms. Later, 
Professor Petrov took part in  research 
in  well-known research centers in  Italy, 
Denmark, USA, and many others, and de-
livered lectures at international conferences 
as an invited speaker.

For 22 years (1986–2008) Professor 
Petrov headed the Department of Physi-
cal Chemistry in the Ural State University. 
During that time, he made a lot of effort 

to maintain close collaboration with Insti-
tutes of Ural Branch of the Russian Acad-
emy of Science and its predecessor — the 
Academy of Science of the USSR. In 1987, 
he organized a  joint laboratory with the 
Institute of Electrophysics. A branch of the 
Department of Physical Chemistry was es-
tablished in 1995 in the Institute of High-
Temperature Electrochemistry. A scientific 
laboratory “Neutron-diffraction studies 
of complex oxides” was organized jointly 
with the Institute for Metal Physics in 1997. 
It can be said that Professor Petrov antici-
pated the trends that the Ministry of Sci-
ence and Higher Education of  Russia is 
currently implementing.

Alexander Petrov repeatedly won high 
awards. For example, in 1989 together with 
others he was awarded by the Prize of the 
Council of Ministers of the USSR for the 
development of  novel ceramic cathodes 
for CO2-lasers, in 2000 he was awarded the 
State Scholarship for Outstanding Scholars 
of the Russian Federation, in 2001 he was 
awarded the Honored Scientist of the Rus-
sian Federation title.

In addition to his merits and titles, the 
most important traits of Alexander Petrov 
were his outstanding humanity and decen-
cy. He was always ready to fight for justice 
and come to the rescue. More than 10 years 
have passed since he is not with us, but we 
still keep bright memories and warm feel-
ings towards him in our hearts.