Pavel Podvig is a member of SGS based in Geneva. There, he also runs his research project Russian Nuclear Forces and works as a Senior Researcher at the UN Institute for Disarmament Research (UNIDIR). He started his work on arms control at the Center for Arms Control Studies at the Moscow Institute of Physics and Technology (MIPT), which was the first independent research organization in Russia dedicated to analysis of technical issues of disarmament and nonproliferation. In recognition of his work in Russia, the American Physical Society awarded Podvig the Leo Szilard Lectureship Award of 2008 (with Anatoli Diakov). Podvig worked with the Program on Science and Global Security at Princeton University, the Security Studies Program at MIT, and the Center for International Security and Cooperation at Stanford University. Pavel Podvig is a member of the International Panel on Fissile Materials. He has a physics degree from MIPT and PhD in political science from the Moscow Institute of World Economy and International Relations.
Research Interests
My current research focuses on nuclear disarmament verification and specifically on two areas. One is the development of approaches to verification of the dismantlement of nuclear warheads and the elimination of fissile materials that does not require access to sensitive information about warheads or materials. The other is the analysis of nuclear disarmament arrangements that focus on verifiable removal of nuclear weapons from operations. I also continue my research on the Russian nuclear forces, nuclear weapons complex, nuclear arms control and disarmament, and missile defense.
Publications
Pavel Podvig and Joseph Rodgers, Deferred Verification: Verifiable Declarations of Fissile Material Stocks, UNIDIR, 2017.
Pavel Podvig, Who Lost the INF Treaty?, Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, October 26, 2018.
Pavel Podvig, Ryan Snyder, and Wilfred Wan, Evidence of Absence: Verifying the Removal of Nuclear Weapons, UNIDIR, 2018.
Pavel Podvig, ed., The Use of Highly-Enriched Uranium as Fuel in Russia, International Panel on Fissile Materials, 2017.
Pavel Podvig, “Did Star Wars Help End the Cold War? Soviet Response to the SDI Program”, Science & Global Security, 25 (1), 2017, pp. 3–27.
Pavel Podvig, The Window of Vulnerability That Wasn’t: Soviet Military Buildup in the 1970s, International Security, 33 (1), 2008, pp. 118–138.
Talks
Verifying the removal of nuclear weapons, UN First Committee side event, United Nations Headquarters, New York, October 18, 2018.
Elements of a Fissile Material Cutoff Treaty, Session of the Subsidiary Body 2 of the Conference on Disarmament, Palais des Nations, Geneva, May 15, 2018.
Verifying nuclear disarmament without access to sensitive information, NPT PrepCom 2018 side event, UNODA, Palais des Nations, Geneva, May 4, 2018.