Matvei Petrovich Bronstein - Biography

Matvei Petrovich Bronstein (Матвей Петрович Бронштейн, — February 18, 1938) was a Soviet theoretical physicist, a pioneer of quantum gravity, author of works in astrophysics, semiconductors, quantum electrodynamics and cosmology, as well as of a number of books in popular science for children.

He introduced the cGh scheme for classifying physical theories. "After the relativistic quantum theory is created, the task will be to develop the next part of our scheme, that is to unify quantum theory (with its constant h), special relativity (with constant c), and the theory of gravitation (with its G) into a single theory."

He was married to Lydia Chukovskaya, a writer, prominent human rights activist, and a friend of Andrei Sakharov.

During the Great Purge, in August 1937 Bronstein was arrested. He was convicted by a list trial ("по списку") and executed the same day. His wife was told that he was sentenced to 10 years of labor camps without the right of correspondence.

Bronstein's books for children "Solar matter" (Солнечное вещество), "X Rays" (Лучи X), "Inventors of Radio" (Изобретатели радио) were republished after he had been rehabilitated in 1957.

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• Gorelik Gennady, Frenkel, Victor, 'Матвей Петрович Бронштейн, Moscow, Nauka, 1990
• Gorelik Gennady, Frenkel, Victor, Matvei Petrovich Bronstein and Soviet Theoretical Physics in the Thirties, Birkhäuser Verlag, 1994
• Gorelik Gennady, 'Meine antisowjetische Taetigkeit...' Russische Physiker unter Stalin. Vieweg, 1995
• Gorelik Gennady, Матвей Бронштейн и квантовая гравитация. К 70-летию нерешенной проблемы // Успехи физических наук 2005, №10 [1]; Matvei Bronstein and quantum gravity: 70th anniversary of the unsolved problem // Physics-Uspekhi 2005, no 10 [2]