Mikhail Oknov

Born Sept. 15 (27), 1878, in the village of Kaledino, in what is now Zubtsov Raion, Kalinin Oblast; died Feb. 22, 1942, at the Zhikharevka station of the Northern Railroad. Soviet scientist; physical metallurgist.

After graduating from the University of St. Petersburg (1904), Oknov worked as head of a metallography laboratory at the Obukhov Factory. In 1907 he began teaching at the St. Petersburg (Leningrad) Polytechnic Institute, becoming a professor and head of the subdepartment of metallography in 1930. His main works dealt with transformation processes in alloys that are associated with volume changes. Oknov demonstrated the importance of the volumetric method for the study of phase transformations that occur in alloys.