Brekhovskikh was born to a peasant family in Strunkino, a small village in Vologda Governorate (now Arkhangelsk Oblast), Russia.

[1] He later developed a theory of the propagation of acoustical waves in layered media, for which he received his DSc in Physics and Mathematics from FIAN in 1947.

[1] During 1946, his research in the Sea of Japan led him to the discovery of the deep sound channel, a concept which would eventually lead to the foundation of modern acoustical oceanography.

[1] In 1953, Brekhovskikh left FIAN and founded the Andreyev Acoustics Institute in Moscow, which he directed until 1961 (he remained a department head there until his leaving, in 1980).

[1] These ships observed the mesocale eddies for the first time, confirming the predictions made by Henry Stommel in the mid 1960s.