Vladimir Belousov

Born Oct. 17 (30), 1907, in Moscow. Soviet geologist. Corresponding member of the Academy of Sciences of the USSR (1953). Head of the department of geodynamics at the Institute of Geophysics of the Academy of Sciences of the USSR since 1944. Professor at the Moscow Prospecting Institute since 1943 and at Moscow State University since 1953.

Belousov’s main works are devoted to tectonics, tectonic physics, and general problems in geophysics. He devised new methods for studying the history of the oscillatory motions of the earth’s crust and applied them to the understanding of the geological history of the Caucasus and the Russian platform. He discovered characteristic features in the development of these regions and applied the laws he established to the earth as a whole. Belousov distinguished several types of plication and worked out a concept of the development of the earth’s crust based on the idea of the primary nature of the vertical motions of the earth’s crust. Belousov initiated the creation of the international organization Upper Mantle Project and has been chairman of its committee since 1960. He has been awarded three orders and various medals.