Nikolai Krasovskii

Born Sept. 7, 1924, in Sverdlovsk. Soviet scientist in the field of mechanics and control processes; academician of the Academy of Sciences of the USSR (1968; corresponding member, 1964). Member of the CPSU since 1954. Graduated from the Urals Polytechnic Institute in 1949; became a professor there in 1957 and a professor at Urals University in 1959. Since 1970 he has been the director of the Institute of Mathematics and Mechanics of the Academy of Sciences of the USSR.

Krasovskii’s main works have dealt with the theory of stability of motion and with the dynamics of controlled systems. He developed the method of Liapunov functions and fully solved the existence problem for those functions in all the fundamental cases of stability and instability. He proposed a new functional treatment for systems with aftereffect. He developed a theory of stabilization of controlled systems based on a synthesis of methods of stability theory and the new apparatus of the theory of optimum processes. He developed a control theory in the game problems of dynamics. He has been awarded the Order of Lenin and the Order of the Red Banner of Labor.