Leonid Sedov

Leonid Ivanovich Sedov (Russian: Леонид Иванович Седов; 14 November 1907, Rostov-on-Don – 5 September 1999, Moscow) was a Russian physicist who worked as an engineer in the former Soviet space program.

In 1930 Sedov graduated from the Moscow State University, where he had been a student of Sergey Chaplygin, with the degree of Doctor of Physics and Mathematical Sciences.

During World War II, he devised the so-called Sedov Similarity Solution for a blast wave.

He was the first chairman of the USSR Space Exploration program and broke first news of its existence in 1955.

[1] Until recently, it had been thought that Sedov was the principal engineer behind the Soviet Sputnik project.