Mikhail Tikhonravov
Mikhail Klawdijewitsch Tichonrawow (Russian: Михаил Клавдиевич Тихонравов; born July 29, 1900 in Vladimir, Russia, † March 4, 1974 in Moscow) was a Soviet engineer. Who became known as the chief developer of Sputnik and Vostok awareness.
Tichonrawow comes from a lawyer and teacher family. In 1918 he moved to Pereslawl. Tichonrawow graduated in 1925 his training at the Air Force Academy in Zhukovsky from and then was active in various aviation- related companies before he joined in 1932, the GIRD (Group for the Study of reactive drives) as head of a research group there. In the course of this work, he developed the first Soviet two -stage rocket motor.
In 1932 he became Head of the RNII ( Scientific Research Institute of missiles). In this position, he developed and built sounding rockets and improved the accuracy of unguided military missiles ( ICBMs ).
Since the mid-1940s he was responsible for the development of missiles with high altitudes. There he played a leading role in the design of Sputnik 3, manned Wostokkapseln and early planetary probes.
From 1962 on he was a professor at the Moscow Aviation Institute.