Fesenkov Astrophysical Institute

The Fesenkov Astrophysical Institute is a research institute in Almaty, Kazakhstan, founded in 1941 as the Institute for Astronomy and Physics of the Kazakh branch of the USSR Academy of Sciences, when Soviet astronomers were evacuated from the European parts of the USSR during World War II. It became the Astrophysical Institute of the Kazakh SSR in 1950 and was renamed in 1989 after Vasily Fesenkov, one of its founders. It conducts observational and theoretical research on the Sun, outer planets, comets, Herbig Ae/Be stars and active galaxies, and on stellar dynamics, cosmology and the physics of comets and the interstellar medium. It runs three mountain observing bases near Almaty, the Kamenskoe Plateau, Assy-Turgen and Tien Shan observatories, and it is a member of the International Astronomical Union.