The State enterprise, Institute for Physico-Technical Problems of the Ministry of Atomic Energy of Russian Federation, was founded in 1992.

The Institute works on the basis of the Statute (registration No. 0800599 of 13.01.93). It is an independent economic subject with the right of juridical person, has an independent balance, settlement and other accounts in banks, a seal with its name, letterheads, a firm name, and a trade mark.

Institute for Physico-Technical Problems was granted a State accreditation according to the Federal law "On science and state scientific-technical policy" (the certificate of State accreditation of a scientific organization No. 926 of 03.02.1999).

The Institute was created to extend and intensify scientific activities in the field of solid state physics, nuclear physics and related areas of research, to develop and implement in industry and national economy scientific instruments, radioisotope instruments for in-process measurements, and analytic instruments based on semiconductor detectors of ionizing radiation. Nuclear radiation detectors are very important monitoring instruments used at mining, production, and processing of nuclear fuel, monitoring of operating modes at NPP, internal and external monitoring of NPP radiation environment, monitoring of radiation environment at the sites of radiation waste confinement and burial. These instruments are necessary to solve fundamental and applied problems as well as some special problems for the sake of the Russian Federation defense.

In former Soviet Union the Riga Scientific Research Institute of Radioisotope Devices (RSRIRD) of the Ministry of Medium Engineering Industry was the monopolist in development and fabrication of semiconductor detectors. By the decree of the Supreme Council of the Latvian Republic of August 24, 1991, RSRIRD was transferred to the government of the Latvian Republic. The Latvian Republic does not consume semiconductor detectors of ionizing radiation, does not have its own raw material for their production, and at present this institute has redirected to other activities, which has completely stopped the supply of semiconductor detectors for our industry and national economy of Russia. Similar situation was with plastic scintillation detectors developed in Sukhumi Physical-Technical Institute of the Ministry of Medium Engineering Industry. At present these developments are completely lost for Russia as well. In view of the fact that detectors of ionizing radiation are a unique and irreplaceable spectrometry means, stopping of this scientific development could hurdle the development of the whole nuclear complex of Russia. By the decree No. 61 of the President of the Russian Federation of 29.01.92 and by the decree of the Ministry of Atomic Power of No. 188 of 19.03.93 the IPTP was committed to create in short term the scientific-production basis for development and production of semiconductor detectors of ionizing radiation in order to provide the independence of the nuclear complex of Russia.