Boris Nikitin
Nikitin, Boris Aleksandrovich
Born May 1 (14), 1906, in St. Petersburg; died July 20, 1952, in Leningrad. Soviet radiochemist; corresponding member of the Academy of Sciences of the USSR (1943). Joined the CPSU in 1941. Student of V. G. Khlopin.
Nikitin graduated from Leningrad State University in 1927 and worked at the V. G. Khlopin Radium Institute of the Academy of Sciences of the USSR (became director in 1950). He used isomorphic cocrystallization to isolate and study a number of molecular compounds of inert gases with water, phenol, and other substances. He established the applicability of the solute distribution law to gas-solid phase systems (Nikitin’s law) and studied the distribution of radium in natural waters. He was awarded the State Prize of the USSR (1943), the Order of Lenin, and two other orders.