New Springer publications from the Department of Theoretical Electrical Engineering and Electromechanics

The IETS media group interviewed Nikolay Vladimirovich Korovkin, the head of TEE department,  about his books published this year in English by the world-famous Springer publishing company.

Nikolai Vladimirovich, please tell us about the books you are holding in your hands?

- Author's groups of our department is particularly proud of these books. "Inverse problems in the theory of electrical circuits and electromagnetism", written by N.V. Korovkin, V.L.Chechurin and M.Khayakawa and "Large electric machines of alternating current", by I.Z. Boguslavsky, N.V. Korovkin and M.Khayakava. Now, when the books are already writtenand read around the world, we see it as anachievement of our university scientific school. I will also say that writing is a hard work/ The first book took the year of our life, the second one was copleted in two years.

What are tge steps of the publication process?

- The process is long, complex and expensive. Springer is a publishing company with a worldwide reputation. Manuscripts undergo rigorous review at the application stage, when the relevance of the content is confirmed by several experts. ТNext step is to sign the contract  and only then the writing of texts, the translation, editing of "our" English by the native speaker and the specialist in the subject of the book. Then  the design of the manuscript in accordance with the template of the publisher and sending the first version to the publisher. The  manuscript is returned with comments (up to 10 on each page!), It is being edited (this is done in the mode of operation of the fire brigade, since you have just a couple of weeks), the second draft . And ... that is it!

Why would someone spend so much time and efforts on publishing in the world's leading publishing house? It's hard to say what's more. Challenge, pride,  fame, or simply a desire to share with the scientific community your achievements - all of these become the driving force.

Are you satisfied with the result?

- Of course. Our books are not printed in large numbers.This kind of literature is printed on demand and delivered to educational institutions, or downloaded from the official website of the publishing house. By the way you can not only download the whole book, but also only the necessary chapter. Of course, we still get the agreed percentage for any download. It is always interesting to know which chapter is read more, and which ones are not in demand.

Do you promote your books?

- We do not insist, but we recommend them for reading. Recently, a copy was presented to the rector of SPbPU - Andrei Ivanovich Rudskoy, we plan to place an order for 5-6 copies for the university's fundamental library. I am very pleased that our departnent has long had a warm and friendly relationship with many international universities and scientists who are willing to help in the promotion of our work. Believe me, it is a great pleasure to find your own book  on the shelf of the library of an internnationsal university. You take it, have a look which sections were read (this is not hard to see from the state of the pages). You can understand  whether it is in demand.

That must be a very pleasant feeling! Tell me, are you preparing any other surprises for your readers?

- we are, publishing is addictive. I am certainly not Alexandre Dumas, but I can write two or three pages a day. So now we are preparing for reissue our first work "Inverse problems in Electric Circuits & Electromagnetics". Here we must say that we get results much more slowly than write about them. About 10 years have passed since the release of the previous edition (and more than 1,000 copies have been sold, by the way) and only now we have prepared a sufficient amount of new material (at least 30% is required by the publisher).

Together with my former graduate student, we are preparing a new book on the effects of geomagnetic disturbances of the atmosphere on energy networks. In the northern countries whole regions remain without electricity, because of geomagnetic storms. This topic has  little been  studied and it can be of interest even to the general public.

Thank you, Nikolay Vladimirovich, for the conversation. We wish you and your creative team further success.