ABSTRACT
Preliminary research laying the foundation of the atomic industry was conducted well before World War II. At that time studies of physical and chemical effects of radioactivity were in progress at university laboratories and newly created institutes of the USSR Academy of Sciences in Leningrad, Moscow, Kharkov, Odessa, Tomsk, and other cities. In 1922 V.Í. Vernadskiy emphasized that "radioactive phenomena present to us the source of atomic energy which is a million times more powerful than any other sources one could imagine." Representatives of the USSR research centers worked as probationers at the laboratories headed by M . Curie, E. Rutherford, N . Bohr, and other great scientists of Western Europe. A l l great scientific discoveries and advances made at that time at home and abroad were covered in detail in monographs and popular scientific publications [2-4].
