German Avgustovich Khelkvist

Born Sept. 23 (Oct. 5), 1894, in the village of Balakhany, near Baku; died Oct. 21, 1968, in Moscow. Soviet petroleum geologist. Corresponding member of the Academy of Sciences of the USSR (1958). Member of the CPSU from 1946.

Khel’kvist graduated from the Tomsk Technological Institute in 1923. From 1924 to 1950 he worked in the petroleum industry. In 1950 he turned to research, working at various scientific institutions. He also taught at the Azerbaijan Polytechnic Institute from 1927 to 1930, at the Academy of the Petroleum Industry from 1949 to 1956, and at the I. M. Gubkin Moscow Petroleum Institute, where he was a professor from 1956 to 1958. Beginning in 1957, Khel’kvist was director of the Sakhalin Integrated Scientific Research Institute of the Siberian Division of the Academy of Sciences of the USSR.

Khel’kvist’s main works dealt with the formation of petroleum and natural-gas deposits. Khel’kvist was involved in the study, prospecting, and exploration of petroleum deposits in Azerbaijan, the northern Caucasus, the Ukraine, the Volga Region, and Sakhalin. He introduced the concept of zonal petroleum deposits and proposed a method of prospecting for such deposits.

Khel’kvist received the State Prize of the USSR in 1948. He was awarded two Orders of Lenin, the Order of the Red Banner of Labor, and various medals.