Born in 1961, Leonid S. Dubrovinsky was student of Crystallography and Crystal Chemistry at the Geological Department of Moscow State University. In 1983, he graduated there with the Master of Science in Geochemistry; he received his doctoral degree in Mineralogy and Crystallography under the supervision of Professor Urusov in 1986. Together with Professor Urusov he is author of the monograph "Computer modeling of crystal structure and properties of minerals" published in 1989. From 1986 to 1996, Leonid S. Dubrovinsky was researcher and senior researcher at the Institute of Geology, Petrology, Mineralogy and Geochemistry of the Academy of Sciences of Russia. Since 1996, he is senior researcher at the Institute of Earth Sciences at Uppsala University, Sweden, and in 1998 he became Dozent in mineralogy, petrology and tectonics.
His experimental and theoretical research covers a broad spectrum from X-ray investigations of crystal structures to calculations of multicomponent phase equilibria. He is author and co-author of two books and about 90 publications; many of them were published in leading international journals.
However, since a number of years his special interest is devoted to ultrahigh pressure research aiming at the determination of phase diagrams and Pressure-Volume-State of Earth materials along the geotherm form the crust to the core. For instance, an X -ray diffraction study of iron and corundum up to 300 GigaPascal was performed which lead to the discovery of new polymorph of iron.