EFIM MIKHAILOVICH STUDENKOV

(1912–1944)

On December 30, 1944, in the region of the city of Ergy (Hungary), a talented physicist, a contributor to our journal, Engineer-Captain Efim Mikhailovich Studenkov, was killed at his combat post.

After graduating from Crimean University, he entered graduate study in the Department of Physics of the Lenin Moscow State Pedagogical Institute in the section “Electromagnetic Oscillations.” E. M. became interested in electron-beam generators, designed an original mechanical model to illustrate phase focusing, and published in Uspekhi Fizicheskikh Nauk the first exhaustive review of the literature in Russian,^1 which has retained its significance up to the present time.

Owing to an insufficient material base, E. M. was unable to develop experimental work with electron-beam generators and took up experiments with waveguides; in the course of the work he quite independently arrived at the idea of using branched waveguides to transform waves of type $H$ into waves of type $E$ (and conversely), and proved the possibility of such a transformation by a series of elegant experiments that formed the basis of his candidate’s dissertation, which received high appraisal from the official opponents—Academician B. A. Vvedenskii and Professor K. F. Teodorchik.

The war prevented publication of the dissertation and forced him to limit himself to only a brief exposition of its most important results.^2 In addition, the material of the dissertation was used in the monograph by Academician Vvedenskii and Professor Arenberg, now coming off the press, devoted to waveguides.

At the same time as defending his dissertation (June 1941), E. M. wrote a very substantial review of the applications of waveguides in radio engineering.^3

Two weeks after defending his dissertation, E. M. was called up into the Red Army and sent to one of the military academies. From 1942 E. M. joined the ranks of the active army and with battles traversed the glorious path from the northern spurs of the Caucasus Range to Central Hungary.

Even under the difficult conditions of war, E. M. did not forget his beloved science, followed new works, and sincerely rejoiced when he received the few journals and reprints that could be sent to him.

During a temporary lull in military operations, while on the border of Romania, E. M. equipped a laboratory in a barn and constructed in it a hydraulic model of a klystron, the description of which is included in this same issue. In this small, elegant work there were once again manifested (alas, for the last time) E. M.’s remarkable experimental abilities, his skill in clearly posing experimental problems and solving them by simple means, and his clear understanding of the physical essence of a process—qualities inherent in talented researchers.

As a person, E. M. was distinguished by exceptional modesty, was a responsive comrade, and possessed a great store of optimism, which did not leave him either in the face of inevitable experimental failures or in the days of temporary setbacks of the Red Army, of which his letters testified, full of firm confidence in the victory to which E. M. was not fated to live.

The loss of Efim Mikhailovich Studenkov, a talented physicist and a fine person, is deeply felt by all his comrades.

N. N. Malov

LIST OF WORKS BY E. M. STUDENKOV

1. E. M. Studenkov, UFN, 23, 417, 1940.
2. E. M. Studenkov, Journ. of Phys., 7, 308, 1943.
3. E. M. Studenkov, UFN, 25, 474, 1941.