About Zhores Alferov
Zhores Ivanovich Alferov was a Russian applied physicist who contributed significantly to the creation of modern heterostructure physics and electronics. In 2000, Alferov shared the Nobel Prize in Physics for the development of the semiconductor heterojunction for optoelectronics. He also became a politician in his later life, serving in the State Duma as a member of the Communist Party from 1999. In 1966, Alferov's lab created the first lasers based on heterostructures, although they did not lase continuously. Then in 1968, Alferov and coworkers produced the first continuous-wave semiconductor heterojunction laser operating at room temperature. Alferov worked with a group led by Vladimir Tuchkevich, who became director of the Ioffe Institute in 1967, on planar semiconductor amplifiers for use in radio receivers. In 1997 Alferov founded the Research and Education Center at the Ioffe Institute and in 2002, this center officially became the Saint Petersburg Academic University after gaining a charter to award masters and PhD degrees.
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