Revaz Dogonadze - Life and Works

Life and Works

He was born in 1931, in Tbilisi, Georgia. His father, Dr.Sc. Roman I. Dogonadze (1905–1970) was a Professor of Agrarian Sciences. In 1955 Revaz Dogonadze graduated from the Moscow Physics-Engineering Institute. He was Scientific Fellow (1958–1962) and Senior Scientific Fellow – Head of the Group of Quantum Electrochemistry (1962–1978) of the Department of Theoretical Investigations of the Moscow Institute of Electrochemistry (now Frumkin Institute of Electrochemistry of the Russian Academy of Science). He was Associate Professor (1963–1969) and Professor (1969–1973) of the Moscow State University. In 1961 he received a PhD degree, in 1966 a degree of Doctor of Sciences (Full Doctor).

Dogonadze was the first to view a chemical electron-transfer process as a quantum-mechanical transition between two separate electronic states, induced by weak electrostatic interactions between the molecular entities represented by the states. His group attracted students from Moscow State University and the Moscow Physics-Engineering Institute, and foreign scientists as well; he was advisor for 13 PhD and 5 Dr.Sci. theses. Work of this group through the 1970s dealt with the relation between electron transfer and other condensed phase electronic processes such as light absorption, emphasizing processes involving three rather than two electronic levels, with low-temperature processes and with particular features characteristic of biological processes.

He and his pupils suggested the first quantum-mechanical model of proton transfer in polar solvents taking into account the dynamic role of the polar solvent, and created a well-known quantum-mechanical theory of kinetics of chemical, electrochemical and biochemical processes in polar liquids, as well as a quantum-mechanical theory of kinetics of atomic-molecular transformation in condensed media,

Dogonadze founded and was the first head (1978–85) of the Department of Theoretical Investigations of the Institute of Inorganic Chemistry and Electrochemistry of the Georgian National Academy of Sciences (GNAS). In 1982-85 he was also Head of the Department of General and Theoretical Physics of the Georgian Technical University and in 1982 was elected Corresponding Member of the GAS. From 1978-85. he was Chairman of the Department of Electrochemical Physics of the International Society of Electrochemistry (ISE). He was a member of the Editorial Board of the international Journal of Electroanalytical Chemistry and Interfacial Electrochemistry and the Editorial Board of the Russian journal Elektrokhimia.

Dogonadze organized a number of international conferences in his subject, and was author about 190 scientific research works (among them 7 monographs). Under Dogonadze's guidance were prepared about 20 theses (13 PhD's and 5 Dr.Sc.). He was co-editor and co-author of a three-volume collective monograph The Chemical Physics of Solvation (Elsevier, Amsterdam, 1985–1986).

Dogonadze is listed in the "Electrochemical Dictionary" (Springer-Verlag, Berlin-Heidelberg, 2008).