Gerasim Eliashberg

Gerasim Matveyevich Eliashberg (; 26 July 1930 – 8 January 2021) was a Soviet theoretical physicist best known for developing the Eliashberg theory, a microscopic extension of the Bardeen–Cooper–Schrieffer (BCS) theory of superconductivity. He also made contributions related to Landau's Fermi-liquid theory, nonequilibrium superconductivity and other areas of condensed matter physics.

Biography Eliashberg was born on 26 July 1930 in Leningrad (now St. Petersburg) to Matvey Gerasimovich Eliashberg and Amalya Yakovlevna. His family, of Jewish origin, had moved from Dvinsk (present-day Daugavpils, Latvia) to St. Petersburg in 1907. His father was a chemical engineer, and worked as a director in the pulp and paper industry. As a teenager during the Second World War, Gerasim endured the Siege of Leningrad.

In 1947 he enrolled in the Faculty of Physics at Leningrad State University and graduated with honors in 1952. The growing antisemitic persecution in the Soviet Union prevented him from working as a scientist, and instead he worked at the Krasny Khimik ("Red Chemist") chemical plant for the next five years.

Following Stalin's death in 1953 and the subsequent easing of restrictions, Eliashberg was admitted in 1959 to the Leningrad Physico-Technical Institute to begin doctoral studies in theoretical physics.

He died on 8 January 2021, in Chernogolovka, and was buried at the Makarovskoye Cemetery in the Moscow region.

He had two younger brothers, both of whom became scientists: electrical engineer Victor Eliashberg (born 1933) and mathematician Yakov Eliashberg (born 1946). that became classics in the field. Eliashberg theory and its extensions have since become a standard tool for quantitative analysis of superconductivity in real materials and remains central to modern superconductivity research. He taught at the Moscow Institute of Physics and Technology and supervised doctoral students there.

Awards and honors Eliashberg's contributions were recognized both nationally and internationally. In 2006, Eliashberg received the Order of Honour of the Russian Federation.