One of the greatest scientists of the 20th century, Nikolai Vavilov, dreamed of ending world hunger, but in 1943 he himself died of starvation in a Saratov prison. The pioneer of Russian genetics, a tireless and resilient plant hunter, became a victim of the ideologization of Stalinist science. Never one to succumb to scientific difficulties or to the most difficult expeditions to the wildest corners of the Earth, Nikolai Vavilov was unable to oppose anything to the pressure of the cynical demagogue and opportunist Trofim Lysenko. The purge of geneticists threw Russian science back a whole generation and caused enormous harm to the country. Reconstructing the story of how Nikolai Vavilov’s greatest humanitarian mission led Nikolai Vavilov to starvation, Peter Pringle relied on recently discovered archival documents, personal and official correspondence, vivid reports on expeditions, earlier unpublished family letters and diaries, as well as eyewitness memories. A deeply humane and vivid story paints a very vivid image of a brilliant scientist, lover of life and ascetic, who did not part with his great dream until his very last days.