Nikolai Tikhomirov

Nikolai Ivanovich Tikhomirov (; born Nikolai Viktorovich Slyotov; November 1859 – 28 April 1930) was a Russian and Soviet chemical engineer, inventor, founder of the Gas Dynamics Laboratory, specialist in rocket technology and one of the inventors of the Katyusha, which he was awarded the Hero of Socialist Labor (1991, posthumously). A crater on the far side of the Moon is named after him.

Biography Born in November 1859 in Moscow, to a noble family of a real state councilor. Tikhomirov suggested using the reaction of gases during the combustion of flammable liquids or explosives in combination with an ejected air medium to propel a rocket. In 1912, he submitted his project to the Minister of the Navy, Admiral Aleksei Birilev for consideration. The project was reported to the emperor. Nicholas II personally came to the test, ordered the work to be continued and allocated the necessary funding. In November 1915, Tikhomirov applied for a patent to the Technical Affairs Committee of the Department of Industry of the Ministry of Trade and Industry, which issued him a protective certificate No. 309 (without disclosure) for a type of "self-propelled mines for water and air."

With the assistance of the Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces of the Soviet Republic Sergey Kamenev, who instructed to allocate funding for Tikhomirov's workshop, on 1 March 1921, the country's first research and development organization for the development of smokeless powder shells began its work at the military department - " Laboratory for the development of inventions by N. I. Tikhomirov. In 1924, under the leadership of N.I. Tikhomirov, a recipe for smokeless pyroxylin powder was created on a non-volatile solvent - TNT, which differs from black smoke powder in powerful and stable combustion. In 1925 Tikhomirov's laboratory moved to Leningrad. In July 1928, the laboratory of N. I. Tikhomirov was renamed the Gas Dynamics Laboratory (GDL) of the Military Scientific Committee under the Revolutionary Military Council of the USSR.

He was buried in Moscow, at the Vagankovo Cemetery. The burial place was lost; in 1971 a symbolic tomb monument to Tikhomirov was erected at the cemetery.

Awards and recognition

In 1970, the International Astronomical Union named a crater on the far side of the Moon after Tikhomirov. In 1987, in Leningrad, on Nevsky Prospekt, on the wall of house 92, a memorial plaque was installed (architect V. S. Vasilkovsky) on which it is written: “In this house from 1926 to 1930, Nikolai Ivanovich Tikhomirov, the founder of the Gas Dynamic Laboratory, lived and worked, the first in the USSR research and development organization for the development of rocket technology. Tikhomirov and other participants in the creation of the famous rocket weapon of the Second World War, the Katyusha rocket launcher, received official recognition only in 1991. By decree of the President of the USSR Mikhail Gorbachev dated 21 June 1991, I. T. Kleymenov, G. E. Langemak, , , and N. I. Tikhomirov were posthumously awarded title of Heroes of Socialist Labor.