Pyotr Nikolsky

Pyotr Vasilyevich Nikolsky was an Imperial Russian and later Soviet dermatologist. He was born in Usman, Tambov Governorate, Russian Empire and earned his medical degree from the Saint Vladimir Imperial University of Kyiv in 1884. After graduating, he studied under Mikhail Stukovenkov at the Department of Dermatology and Venerology in Kyiv. In 1896, he defended his doctoral thesis on pemphigus foliaceus, in which he described a dermatological condition involving a weakening relationship among the epidermal layers. The sloughing of skin associated with certain varieties of this condition is now referred to as Nikolsky's sign. In 1898, he became a professor at the Imperial University of Warsaw, and later established the Department of Dermatology and Venerology in Rostov at what is now Rostov State Medical University.