Boris Galerkin

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Boris Galerkin
Бори́с Григо́рьевич Галёркин
Born	Boris Grigoryevich Galerkin (1871-03-04)4 March 1871 Polotsk, Vitebsk Governorate, Russian Empire
Died	12 July 1945(1945-07-12) (aged 74) Moscow, Soviet Union
Alma mater	Saint Petersburg State Institute of Technology
Known for	Galerkin method
Spouse	Revekka Treivas
Scientific career
Fields	Applied mathematics Structural mechanics
Institutions	Military Engineering-Technical University

Boris Grigoryevich Galerkin (

Galerkin's first scientific work was published by the institute "Transactions". The article was titled "A theory of longitudinal curving and an experience of longitudinal curving theory application to many-storied frames, frames with rigid junctions and frame systems". He wrote it while in the "Kresty" prison. In the summer of 1909, Boris Grigoryevich went abroad to see constructions and buildings which interested him. During the next four years, i.e., before World War I, he and many other institute staff visited Europe to stimulate their scientific interests. Galerkin visited Germany, Austria, Switzerland, Belgium, and Sweden.

Galerkin taught students in the mechanical department structural mechanics, i.e., conducted exercises and designing. The lecturer was professor

In the autumn of 1911, Galerkin also worked at the Women's Polytechnical Institute. In 1913, he worked on the design of the metallic frame for a boiler power plant in

In January 1919, Galerkin became a professor in the 2nd (formerly Women's) Polytechnical Institute, remaining a teacher of structural mechanics in the 1st Polytechnical Institute (at that time the Polytechnical Institute was named so) mechanical department. In March 1920, a professor chair in structural mechanics was established at the department, and Galerkin won it in a competition. In the summer of 1921, S.P. Belzetskiy, a famous scientist in the field of structural mechanics and theory of elasticity, who was holding a similar chair at the civil engineering faculty, emigrated to Poland. Galerkin took part in a competition for his chair and at the beginning of 1922, he left the mechanical faculty for the civil engineering faculty, which was nearer to him in his scientific and engineering activities.

From 1917 to 1919, Galerkin published a series of works on rectangular and triangular plates curving in scientific periodicals and in the "Russian Academy of Sciences Transactions". Later he took a break from publications, and only in 1922 he began publishing again, but only in foreign magazines (in the Soviet Union there was not enough paper for scientific literature).

In December 1923, Galerkin was elected dean of the Polytechnical Institutes' civil engineering faculty. It happened during a very important period of the institute's history, when a group of deans resigned from their posts, protesting from the unceremonious intervention of so-called "student' representatives", controlled by the trade unions and the Communist party committees, into the educational process. Galerkin proved to be a talented leader of the faculty. He managed to neutralize overly active "assistants", who were appointed against his will, and he did not hurry to fulfill the orders of incompetent leaders who were conducting infinite experiments at the higher school at that time. From 1924 to 1929, Galerkin was also a professor in the Railway Engineers Institute and at St. Petersburg University. In 1924 he made his last trip abroad to participate in the Congress on applied mechanics in the Netherlands.

In the spring of 1926, Galerkin learned that

Though having so many titles, Galerkin remained a professor of the structural mechanics and theory of elasticity department at the hydrotechnical faculty (the Hydrotechnical Institute was returned to the Polytechnical (at that time–Industrial) Institute as a faculty in 1934). Mostly he taught the course on the theory of elasticity, which was very difficult for the students of that time, who had very weak training in mathematics. Students were visiting his lectures to look at the "real academician", but he disappointed them. He was short, puny, and had a weak voice. His image did not correspond to the status of a serious scientist with big authority, received from the government. At one time the academician was even pulled out of a tram by other passengers, and after this "accident", the institute administration applied to the authorities for a car.

Galerkin drew in

In the summer of 1941, after the beginning of the war, the Commission on the defensive installations construction was created by the city government. Some academicians and prominent scientists became members (almost everyone was from the Polytechnical Institute), but only Boris Grigoryevich was involved with construction engineering. Practically, he became the supervisor of the work for the commission. Simultaneously, Boris Grigoryevich was the city engineering defense department experts group head.

Later, he was evacuated to Moscow, where he joined the military engineering commission of the Academy of Sciences of the USSR. Hard non-stop work was undermining the scientist's health. Not long after the Great Victory, Galerkin died in Moscow on 12 July 1945. He is buried in the Volkovo Cemetery in St. Petersburg.^[3]

Galerkin's name is attached to the

Galerkin methods include:

• The Galerkin method - A method for approximating the solution to a problem in weak form. Most well-known in the finite element method
• The Petrov–Galerkin method
• The streamline upwind Petrov–Galerkin method (SUPG)
• The Discontinuous Galerkin method