This week, the Joint Institute for Nuclear Research celebrated the birthdays of its two founding fathers, the outstanding physicists Georgy Nikolaevich Flerov and Vladimir Iosifovich Veksler.

Georgy Nikolaevich Flerov was born on 2 March 1913. He was an outstanding physicist, Academician of the USSR Academy of Sciences, he is the author of several scientific discoveries listed in the State Register of Discoveries of the USSR, the founder and the first Director of the Laboratory of Nuclear Reactions of JINR. He is a Laureate of the Lenin Prize, twice Laureate of the Stalin Prize, and a Laureate of the USSR State Prize.

Vladimir Iosifovich Veksler was born on 4 March 1907. He was a brilliant experimental physicist, Academician of the USSR Academy of Sciences, a creator of the legendary JINR’s Synchrophasotron, a founder of accelerator technology in the USSR, and the first Director of the Laboratory of High Energies of JINR. He is a Laureate of the Lenin Prize and the Stalin Prize of the first degree.