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E. A. Il'yushina, "A. A. Il'yushin: Biographical essay," Mech. Solids. 36 (1), 1-2 (2001)
Year 2001 Volume 36 Number 1 Pages 1-2
Title A. A. Il'yushin: Biographical essay
Author(s) E. A. Il'yushina
Abstract Aleksei Antonovich Il'yushin was born on the 20th of January, 1911 in Kazan. His father, Anton Nikanorovich, at the age of 12 was sent for service to Moscow from the village of Konoplenka of the Yelnya district of Smolensk province. He served for a well-known merchant Shevtsov who traded in tea. In 1911, he took an office of the manager of the Kazan Department of Trade House. The mother of Aleksei Antonovich, born Savost'yanova, came from the village of Seleshnya of the same district. The Il'yushins had eight children.

In 1928, A. A. Il'yushin finished school No. 2 in Kazan, which was one of the best schools in the city. During several years of famine in Povolzhie (an area along the Volga river), he lived in the village of Konoplenka in the house of his uncle Semen Nikanorovich and studied at the village school. To get the right to study at a university he had to work for one year at a ship-repairing yard as a wood lathe operator. In 1929, he entered Kazan University and in 1930 was transferred to the Department of Mechanics and Mathematics of the Moscow State University. At that time he took deep interest in engineering. He passed an exam for a steam locomotive assistant operator, attempted to enter a pilot school, and in 1932 started working as a senior technician in the sector of flight tests at the Central Institute of Aerohydrodynamics (TsAGI).

In 1933, Aleksei Antonovich defended with distinction his diploma project "Some cases of vibration of rods and rod systems" and became a graduate student of the Institute of Mechanics of the Moscow University. Simultaneously, he became an assistant lecturer at the Chair of Elasticity of the Department of Mechanics and Mathematics. In 1935, he started lecturing with the course of applied elasticity. At that time, Aleksei Antonovich began his intensive studies in the field of elastoplastic deformations. In his autobiography he wrote that this happened "under the influence of famous H. Hencky who was a consultant of Materials Testing Laboratory at the Moscow University during 1934-1935." In 1936, A. A. Il'yushin invented a high-speed pneumatic drop hammer that surpassed the then existed drop hammers in versatility and power, with the speed of materials deformation reaching 10−4-10−5 s. This drop hammer was constructed in the Laboratory in 1937. There had been a large number of tests performed on this machine that had a great value for both the development of the theory of plasticity and the solution of design tasks. In 1935, Aleksei Antonovich became a consultant at a number of research institutions of Peoples Commissariat (Ministry) of Ammunition, and in 1936 a senior researcher at the Institute of Mechanics of the Moscow University.

In 1937, he defended his Candidate of Science dissertation "On the viscoplastic flow of materials" and became an associate professor of the Chair of Elasticity of the Moscow University. In 1938, he received a Doctor of Sciences degree for his dissertation "Deformation of a viscoplastic body" and the title of professor at the Chair of Elasticity. Professor L. S. Leibenzon wrote about that young scientist that "He happily combines in himself a theorist of genius, a brilliant designer, and a sophisticated experimenter able to penetrate deeply into the essence of engineering problems to be solved. He masters the art of representing phenomena of nature in terms of mathematical symbols."

During World War II, Aleksei Antonovich created a theory of small elastoplastic deformations. Among the first applications of this theory was the strength analysis of artillery barrels and shells. In his autobiographical article "Dynamics" [Vestnik MGU (Bulletin of Moscow State University), Ser. 1. Matematika i Mekhanika, No. 3, pp. 79-87, 1994], A. A. Il'yushin described in detail the role played by these studies in the change of the technology of manufacturing shells. In 1943, he was elected a Corresponding Member of the USSR Academy of Sciences and in 1948 a Full Member of the Artillery Academy. The cycle of works on the theory of plastic deformations, completed by the monograph "Plasticity," was awarded in 1948 the State Prize of First Degree (that time this prize was called the Stalin Prize). The same year, NASA issued a full translation of works by Il'yushin. In 1947, he was invited to the missile center NII-88 that had been just organized, and soon he was appointed a deputy chief of this institute in science. At that time A. A. Il'yushin returned to research in aerodynamics and formulated and proved the "law of plane sections." This law was utilized already in 1948 in NII-88 and then in TsAGI to calculate the parameters of supersonic aerodynamic flows around bodies.

In spring of 1950, A. A. Il'yushin was appointed the Head of the Leningrad State University. The previous head of the university, Aleksandr Alekseevich Voznesenskii, had become a victim of the repressive regime of that time. A. A. Il'yushin went down in the history of the Leningrad University not only as a scientist who initiated the creation of the Leningrad scientific school in mechanics at the Chairs of Elasticity and Computational Solid Mechanics but also as an administrator who succeeded in dismissing the infamous "gangster from science" I. I. Present. "It is difficult to overestimate his heroic effort to minimize the losses suffered by the Leningrad scientific schools of genetics and philosophy," wrote later L. A. Verbitskaya, the Head of the St. Petersburg University.

In 1952, A. A. Il'yushin was unexpectedly "appointed" an assistant of Yu. B. Khariton in Arzamas-16 and appeared "behind the barbed wire." Perhaps, that was a result of conflict of interests of, on the one hand, T. D. Lysenko who wanted to remove the non-compliant Head of the University, and, on the other hand, B. L. Vannikov who tried to avert a threat from the valuable expert of the defense industry.

After successful tests of a nuclear bomb in 1953, Aleksei Antonovich found the circumstance to be favorable for quitting the "atomic project." He met N. S. Khrushchev and convinced him that this step was reasonable. In the same year, A. A. Il'yushin became the Director of the Institute of Mechanics of the USSR Academy of Sciences, which he headed until 1960. Since 1942 till 1998 he had permanently headed the Chair of Elasticity at the Moscow State University.

The works by Il'yushin in solid mechanics, his numerous pupils, and personal support stimulated the appearance and development of scientific schools in mechanics in various regions of the country. He had been the Chairman of the Scientific Council on Strength and Plasticity from its foundation. His contribution to the development of science and technology was marked by government awards. He was awarded ten orders and numerous medals. Among these are the medal of P. L. Kapitsa, which is awarded to outstanding inventors, and the Memorial Badge for the participation in the creation of the MI-4 helicopter.

In 1989, A. A. Il'yushin was involved in the team of experts for establishing the cause of destruction of steam generator headers at a number of nuclear power plants. He established that the radioactive water does not substantially influence the thermomechanical conditions and formulated a concept of basic characteristics causing the failure of the cold header. He suggested a plan of theoretical and experimental investigations that was implemented in the Central Research Institute of Machine Building (TsNIIMASh) under his supervision. These investigations made it possible to establish the true cause of the destruction of the collectors and give recommendations on the removal of defects in the technological process of their manufacture. The appropriate changes were introduced into the technological process, and failures of the collectors ceased.

Until the last days of his life, Aleksei Antonovich meditated upon the possibility of refining the basic relations of solid mechanics (asymmetry of the strain tensor). He was convinced that modern science and technology require new fundamental concepts and approaches.

Aleksei Antonovich died on May 31, 1998.
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