Alexander Gorlov


Alexander M. Gorlov was a Russian mechanical engineer who was Professor Emeritus and Director of Hydro-Pneumatic Power Laboratory at Northeastern University in Boston, Massachusetts.

Early life

Alexander M. Gorlov was born into the family of a prosperous lawyer. His father was arrested and died in prison during Joseph Stalin's purges. His mother also spent a number of years in concentration camps in Russia, which forced young Alexander Gorlov to spend some of his childhood years in the orphanage in a remote Russian Urals area.
Gorlov received his Doctorate in engineering and had a successful scientific career in Moscow for a number of years during the relatively liberal period of the so-called Khrushchev Thaw. He was granted the Gold and two Bronze Medals for Achievements of the USSR National Economy. In 1975 because of his friendship with Alexander Solzhenitsyn, the Nobel Prize winner and outspoken critic of the communist system, Gorlov was forced to break with his Soviet life and emigrate, eventually establishing a new home in the United States.

Career

Since 1976 Gorlov has been teaching Mechanical Engineering in the Northeastern University combining it with extensive research work in the area of harnessing renewable energy from water flows and wind. In the pursuit of his lifelong dream of creating inexpensive, environmentally friendly hydro-power, Gorlov has developed helical turbines for use in the river, tidal, and open ocean currents. His innovation has led to a series of patents for the Gorlov Helical Turbine which shows great promise for alleviating the worldwide crisis in energy use. This invention was named one of Popular Science's top 100 innovations of 2001. One of the other Gorlov's inventions - "Terrorist Truck-Bomb Protection System" - is certified by four US patents and is placed on the US Department of State list of certified equipment. That allows the system to be used for protection of vital Government installations such as nuclear power plants, military bases around the world, embassies, bridges and tunnels as well as other potential strategic targets from terrorist attacks.
Gorlov has over 100 technical publications, including books, and 25 US and international patents in such fields as renewable energy, structural analysis & design, theoretical mechanics and the design of bridges and tunnels.

International engineering activity

Professor Alexander M. Gorlov was a resident of Brookline and Falmouth, where he lived with his wife Ella who is a local historian.

Patents

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