VAVILOV Nikolay Ivanovich (1887-1943), geneticist, plant-breeder, science official, public figure, Member of the Academy of Sciences of the USSR (1929), Member of the Academy of Sciences of the Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic (1929), the first President (1929-35) and Vice-President (1935-40) of the Lenin All-Union Academy of Agricultural Sciences. Brother of S.I. Vavilov. Graduated from the Moscow Agricultural Institute in 1911. Since 1921, lived in Petrograd (Leningrad). In 1921-40, headed the Applied and Selective Botany Department of the Agricultural Scientific Committee, reorganized into the All-Union Plant Research Institute in 1930, named after Vavilov in 1967, and located at 44 Bolshaya Morskaya Street (memorial plaque installed), where the Vavilov Museum was opened in 1980. Concurrently, in 1930-40, he was Director of the Genetics Laboratory (today the General Genetics Institute of the Russian Academy of Science, named after Vavilov in 1966). Organised botanical and agricultural expeditions to the Mediterranean countries, Asia, Northern Africa, North America and South America, by which the world's largest collection of cultivated plant-seeds was assembled. Provided a theoretical basis for plant immunity theory (1919), and formulated the law of homology-series in genetic mutation (1920). Advocated genetics in the struggle against the "doctrine" of T.D. Lysenko. President of the Geographical Society of the USSR (1931-40). Awarded the Lenin Prize in 1926. In 1940, Vavilov was repressed without grounds, and died in a prison hospital in Saratov. In 1928-40, lived at 2 Gogol Street (today Malaya Morskaya Street, memorial plaque installed). In 1967, the new passage between Nauki Avenue and Doroga na Ozerki Street was named after Vavilov and his brother.
References: Бальдыш Г. М., Понизовская Г. И. Николай Вавилов в Петербурге - Петрограде - Ленинграде. Л., 1987; Бахтеев Ф. Х. Николай Иванович Вавилов, 1887-1943. Новосибирск, 1988; Н. И. Вавилов: Документы. Фотографии. СПб., 1995.
O. N. Ansberg.
