Alexey A. Bulgakov

Alexey A. Bulgakov

Born: 

Thursday, March 10, 1910

Passed away: 

Friday, November 12, 1993

Alexey Bulgakov, in full Alexey Alexeevich Bulgakov, was a well-known researcher and engineer in automatic control. From 1931, he worked as a laboratory assistant at the All-Union Electrotechnical Institute (VEI). In 1937, Bulgakov graduated with honors from the evening department of Moscow Power Engineering Institute (MPEI) and began to work as an electrical shop engineer at the Serp & Molot steel factory (Moscow). In 1939, he returned to VEI. From 1941 to 1945, Bulgakov was an officer in the Soviet Army.

After his demobilization in 1947, Bulgakov joined the Institute of Automation and Remote Control (IARC), the USSR Academy of Sciences. He worked there for 38 years, until his retirement in 1985. In 1966, Bulgakov defended his doctoral dissertation. His research was focused on electromechanics, particularly electric drives. Bulgakov published 20 monographs and over 100 papers as well as received many inventor’s certificates. His widely known books Chastotnoe upravlenie asinkhronnymi dvigatelyami (Frequency Control of Asynchronous Motors), Elektronnye ustroistva avtomaticheskogo upravleniya (Electronic Devices for Automatic Control), Issledovanie kvazinepreryvnykh sistem (A Study of Quasicontinuous Systems), and Programmnoe upravlenie sistemami mashin (Programmed Control of Machine Systems) were translated into foreign languages.

Bulgakov’s major theoretical results were implemented in industry. He developed the first electronic automatic devices in the world to control electric drives with a maximum capacity of 240 kW for rolling mills. Also, Bulgakov proposed a theory of controlled gates and a corresponding method to control the speed of induction motors. The static phase controller, designed by him, solved the problem of automatic control of mercury rectifiers. Those automated rectifiers were embedded in all units for electric drives and the excitation systems of synchronous generators in power systems.

Bulgakov’s main books are as follows:

  1. Rízení asynchronních motorú mënlcl frekvence, Prague: Nakladatelství technické literatury, 1989. — 240 p.;
  2. Chastotnoe upravlenie asinkhronnymi dvigatelyami (Frequency Control of Asynchronous Motors), Moscow: Energoizdat, 1982. — 216 p.;
  3. Programmnoe upravlenie sistemami mashin (Programmed Control of Machine Systems), Moscow: Nauka, 1980. — 264 p.;
  4. Issledovanie kvazinepreryvnykh sistem (A Study of Quasicontinuous Systems), Moscow: Nauka, 1973. — 102 p.;
  5. Novaya teoriya upravlyaemykh vypryamitelei (A New Theory of Controlled Rectifiers), Moscow: Nauka, 1970. — 320 p.;
  6. Energeticheskie protsessy sledyashchego elektroprivoda v garmonicheskom rezhime (Energy Processes of the Servo Drive in Harmonic Mode), Moscow: the USSR Academy of Sciences, 1960. — 120 p.;
  7. Programmnoe upravlenie metallorezhushchimi stankami (Programmed Control of Metal-Cutting Machines), Moscow: Energoizdat, 1959. — 125 p.;
  8. Elektronnye ustroistva avtomaticheskogo upravleniya (Electronic Devices for Automatic Control), Moscow: Energoizdat, 1958. — 255 p.

Many of them are presented in the Institute’s database:
https://www.ipu.ru/d7ipu/books_library_grid?combine=Булгаков

Also, see Bulgakov’s papers at Math-Net.Ru:

  1967
1. A. A. Bulgakov, Determination of the Continuous Effective Component of Quasi-continuous Sampled-Data Systems, Dokl. Akad. Nauk SSSR174:1 (1967),  45—46.    
  1947
2. G. N. Alyab’eva, A. A. Bulgakov, An Electric Drive with Electronic Thyratron Control, Avtomat. i Telemekh.8:4 (1947),  243—254.  

https://www.mathnet.ru/php/person.phtml?&personid=80889&option_lang=eng

The list of his papers in Avtomatika i Telemekhanika can be found at:
https://www.mathnet.ru/php/search.phtml?jrnid=at&tjrnid=at&wshow=search&option_lang=eng

For their English versions, see the microfilm collection of Automation and Remote Control:
https://archive.org/details/pub_automation-and-remote-control

Many inventions by Bulgakov are available at:
https://elibrary.ru/patents.asp

Articles about A.A. Bulgakov

1. Bulgakov A.A.Avtomat. i Telemekh., 1994, no. 3, 189.