Kovalenkov, Valentin

Born Mar. 13 (25), 1884, in the village of Mezhnik, present-day Chudov Raion, Novgorod Oblast; died July 14, 1960, in Moscow. Soviet scientist in wire communications, automation, and remote control; corresponding member of the Academy of Sciences of the USSR (1939), Honored Scientist and Engineer of the RSFSR (1935), and major general of the technical engineering service (1943). Became a member of the CPSU in 1945.

Kovalenkov graduated from the St. Petersburg Institute of Electrical Engineering (1909) and the University of St. Petersburg (1911). From 1940 to 1948 he worked at the Institute of Automation and Remote Control of the Academy of Sciences of the USSR. From 1948 to 1956 he was director of the laboratory for problems of wire communications of the Academy of Sciences of the USSR. His main works concern research on electromagnetic processes in wire communications channels and quadrupole theory. In 1909 he invented a wire telephone repeater; in 1915 he proposed a vacuum-tube two-way line amplifier for the repeater. He received the State Prize of the USSR in 1941 and was awarded the Order of Lenin and three other orders, as well as medals.