... the greatest triumph of the power of the human genius
is that man is capable of apprehending things beyond
the pale of his imagination.
L.D.Landau
In the spring of 1937 Landau moved to Moscow where he became head of the Theoretical Division of the Institute of Physical Problems which had not long before been established under the direction of P.L.Kapitza. There he remained to the end of his life; in this Institute, which became a home to him, his varied activity reached its full flowering. It was there, in a remarkable interaction with experimental research, that Landau created what may be the outstanding accomplishment of his scientific life-the theory of quantum fluids.
It was there also that he received the numerous outward manifestations of the recognition of his contributions. In 1946 he was elected a full Member of the USSR Academy of Sciences. He was awarded a number of orders (including two Orders of Lenin) and the honorific title of Hero of Socialist Labour - a reward for both his scientific accomplishments and his contribution to the implementation of important practical State tasks. He was awarded the State Prize three times and in 1962, the Lenin Prize. There also was no lack of honorific awards from other countries. As far back as 1951 he was elected member of the Danish Royal Academy of Sciences and in 1956, member of the Netherlands Royal Academy of Sciences. In 1959 he became honorary fellow of the British Institute of Physics and Physical Society and in 1960, Foreign Member of the Royal Society of Great Britain. In the same year he was elected to membership in the National Academy of Sciences of the United States and the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. In 1960 he became recipient of the F. London Prize (United States) and of the Max Planck Medal (West Germany). Lastly, in 1962 he was awarded the Nobel Prize in Physics "for his pioneering theories for condensed matter, especially liquid helium".
Scientific papers were published in D. ter Haar (ed.),
Collected Papers of L.D.Landau (1965).
LANDAU The physicist and the men.
Recollections of L.D.Landau.
Edited by I.M.Khalatnikov. Translated from the Russian by J.B.Sykes.
Pergamon Press, (1989).