Nuclear Museum Logo
Nuclear Museum Logo

National Museum of Nuclear Science & History

Viktor Adamsky

PhysicistRussia

ScientistSoviet Atomic Bomb Program

Viktor Adamsky was a Soviet physicist.

After graduating from Moscow University in 1950, Adamsky was assigned to Sarov (also known as Arzamus – 16), a secret closed city, where he worked in the theoretical department.  Adamsky lived alongside other scientists such as Igor Tamm, Yuri Romanov, and Andrei Sakharov. As Adamsky described it, “There was enthusiasm. We worked well. We felt we were doing our duty. It was very interesting physics.”

Adamsky worked on the Soviet hydrogen bomb project. He helped design and was present for the Tsar Bomba test, the largest nuclear weapon ever detonated. His detailed account of the Tsar Bomba test can be read here.

Related Profiles

Matthew Sands

Los Alamos, NM

Matthew Sands (1919-2014) was an American physicist. In 1943, Matthew Sands began working for the Naval Ordnance Laboratory and developed two types of influence mines before being disillusioned by the bureaucracy of the navy.

Arthur Adamson

Oak Ridge, TN

Arthur Adamson (1919-2003) was an American chemist.  Adamson was born on August 15, 1919 in Shanghai, China to American parents.

Joseph Hirschfelder

Los Alamos, NM

Joseph Hirschfelder was an American physicist. He held doctorates in physics and chemistry from Princeton University.

Irene LaViolette

Hanford, WA

Irene LaViolette was born in Manhattan in 1920. After she finished kindergarten, her family moved to Greece, where her grandparents lived, due to diminishing economic prospects in the United States.