Boris Nikolsky


Boris Petrovich Nikolsky was a Russian physical chemist and radiochemist, academician of the Soviet Academy of Sciences, and professor of Saint Petersburg State University. Boris Nikolsky was a 1925 graduate of Leningrad State University. In the 1930s he studied the ion exchange processes between aqueous solutions and solids. During that time Nikolsky developed the theory of ion exchange in glass electrodes. He derived equations that describe properties of glass electrodes as well as other types of ion-selective electrodes depending on chemical structure and multi-component composition of glass, concurrent interference of ions and so on. Boris Nikolsky also actively participated in the Soviet nuclear program. In 1952-1974 he was the senior scientist and the chairman of scientific committee at the Soviet nuclear fuel reprocessing plant Mayak, where he worked on the technology of processing and refining of plutonium. In 1961-1963 he was the chairman of the chemistry department at Leningrad State University.

General publications on the glass electrode theory

Boris Nikolsky was a co-author of the monumental textbook on physical chemistry and an editor-in-chief of the most comprehensive multivolume handbook of chemistry in Soviet Union.