From the history of physics (Scientific session of the General Meeting of the Physical Sciences Division of the Russian Academy of Sciences, 17 December 2012)

A scientific session of the General Meeting of the Physical Sciences Division of the Russian Academy of Sciences (RAS) was held in the conference hall of the Lebedev Physical Institute, RAS on 17 December 2012.
The following reports were put on the session’s agenda posted on the website www.gpad.ac.ru of the RAS Physical Sciences Division:
(1) Dianov E M (Fiber Optics Research Center, RAS, Moscow) “On the threshold of a peta era”;
(2) Zabrodskii A G (Ioffe Physical Technical Institute, RAS, St. Petersburg) “Scientists’ contribution to the great victory in WWII using the example of the Leningrad (now A F Ioffe) Physical Technical Institute”;
(3) Ilkaev R I (Russian Federal Nuclear Center —All-Russian Research Institute of Experimental Physics, Sarov) “Major stages of the Soviet Atomic Project”;
(4) Cherepashchuk A M (Sternberg State Astronomical Institute of Lomonosov Moscow State University, Moscow) “History of the Astronomy history ”.

Papers written on the basis of the reports are published below.