Mikhail Mikhaylovich Rusinov

Mikhail Mikhailovich Rusinov (, 11 February 1909 – 29 September 2004) was a Russian scientist specialising in optics. He co-founded the USSR Science School of Computational Optics and discovered several optical phenomena, including aberration vignetting, projection centre distortion (1957), and existence of second-order aberration (1986). The phenomenon of projection centre distortion became the basis for engineering photometry.

Biography

Rusinov was born into the family of a high school mathematics teacher. His father Mikhail Nikolayevich Rusinov taught at the N. A. Rimsky-Korsakov Saint Petersburg State Conservatory. His mother Yevdokiya Vasilyevna Rusinova studied piano under Anton Rubinstein. Many well-known Russian composers were family friends, including Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov and Alexander Glazunov. Mikhail Rusinov inherited his mother's love of music and composed waltzes as an adult.

Rusinov's scientific work is closely associated with ITMO University. He worked at ITMO from its foundation, holding the position of Department Head for more than 40 years and was Scientific Supervisor of its laboratory, which later became the Technical Optics Laboratory. He became Professor of the Applied and Computational Optics Department in 1997.

Rusinov wrote more than 152 scientific papers (18 monographs), and held 320 Inventor's Certificates and 22 patents (7 in Russia). In 1995 he published a monograph on Off-Centre Optical Systems Composition. He received most of his state awards for development of wide-angle lenses for aerophotography.

Rusinov died on 29 September 2004. He was buried at Volkovo Cemetery in Saint Petersburg.

Personal life Rusnov was married to Nadezhda Agaltsova, a colleague who shared with him the 1982 Lenin Prize for the development of wide-angle aerophotography lenses. He was also an avid winter swimmer and continued this activity through his eighties. As a teenager Rusinov sustained an eye injury that affected him through most of his life. His vision deteriorated with age, urging him to change from long-distance winter swimming to dipping in an ice bath.

Awards and honors Three Stalin Prizes (1941, 1949, 1950) Order of Lenin (1961) USSR State Prize (1967) Order of the Red Banner of Labour (1981) Lenin Prize (1982)