Bolotin graduated in 1976 from the Faculty of Mechanics and Mathematics of
Moscow State University. There he received in 1981 his
Candidate of Sciences degree (PhD) with thesis Либрационные движения обратимых механических систем (
Librational motions of reversible mechanical systems). He received in 1998 (Double-asymptotic trajectories and
integrability conditions for
Hamiltonian systems). Since 1998 Bolotin is a professor in the Department of Theoretical Mechanics, Faculty of Mechanics and Mathematics, Moscow State University. His research deals with dynamical systems of classical mechanics, Hamiltonian systems, and
variational methods. In 2016 he was elected a corresponding member of the
Russian Academy of Sciences. His brother Yuri Vladimirovich Bolotin (born December 1, 1954) is a professor at Moscow State University. Both brothers in 2020 became champions of Russia in the class of yachts "Carter 30". ==Selected publications==