275 OPARIN 



Nauk 63, la, 33-50 (1957). Ref. Zh. Mekh. #8, 1958. Rev. 

 8371. Applied Mechanics Reviews 13^, 6634 (1960). 

 Office: Theoretical Mechanics Department 



Moscow State University 



Moscow, USSR 



OPARIN, ALEKSANDR IVANOVICH (Organic Chemist) 



A. I. Oparin was born March 3, 1894. In 1917 he graduated 

 from Moscow University, and in 1929 he became a professor 

 there. He helped organize the Institute of Biochemistry of the 

 U.S.S.R. Academy of Sciences, began working there in 1935, 

 and became the Director in 1946. He was elected Correspond- 

 ing Member of the U.S.S.R. Academy of Sciences in 1939 and in 

 1946 an Academician. From 1949 to 1956 he was Academician- 

 Secretary of the Department of Biological Sciences of the 

 U.S.S.R. Academy of Sciences. Oparin has been a prominent 

 national figure in the Soviet Union. In 1950 he was appointed a 

 member of the Soviet Committee in Defense of Peace and a 

 member of the International Council for Peace. He became, in 

 1952, Vice-President of the International Federation of Scien- 

 tists and was elected again in September 1962. In 1950 he was 

 awarded the A. N. Bakh and I. I. Mechnikov Prizes. 



Oparin' s work is devoted to the biochemical basis of pro- 

 cessing of vegetative raw materials, to the action of enzymes 

 in a living vegetative organism, and to the origin of life on the 

 earth. His work laid the basis for technical biochemistry in 

 the U.S.S.R. The study by Oparin and his students gave a 

 rational biochemical basis for the production of sugar, bread, 

 tea, wine, and tobacco. Oparin advanced a hypothesis on the 

 origin of life on earth based on investigations in the field of 

 astronomy, chemistry, geology and biology. 

 Bibliography: 



Origin of Life on Earth, 3rd ed. Moscow: 1957. 

 Changes of the Action of Enzymes in the Living Cell under 

 Influence of External Action. Moscow: 1952. 

 Life: Its Nature, Origin, and Development. Edinburgh: 

 Oliver and Boyd Co., 1961. 224 p. (English trans.) 

 Biography: 



Aleksandr Ivanovich Oparin. On 60th Anniversary since date 

 of birth. Biokhimya, 1954, 19, #2. 

 Office: A. N. Bakh Institute of Biochemistry of USSR 



Academy of Sciences 

 Leninskii Prospekt, 33 

 Moscow, USSR 



