Text | "China Science News" reporter Gan Xiao
The two monographs, "Basic Problems of Mechanics" and "Introduction to Mechanics", outline the framework and blueprint of the discipline of mechanics. Photo courtesy of the interviewee
Not long ago, at the "Qiushi General Education Lecture" held by Qiushi College of Zhejiang University, Yang Wei, academician of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, made a special report on the theme of "One Day in the Sea of Books", using seven important reading experiences in his life to condense his "seven-day book list". One of them is the translation of Introduction to Continuum Mechanics published by Science Press.
This book deeply influenced Yang Wei's mechanics research career, and it was also the starting point for his relationship with Science Press. In recent years, he has cooperated with Science Press to publish many monographs such as Introduction to Mechanics, Dynamics of Graduate Education, and Basic Issues in Mechanics.
From readers to authors, Yang Wei has witnessed the growth of mainland science and technology publishing and the progress of mainland mechanics research together with Science Press for decades.
Comprehend the avenue of power
In 1979, when Yang Wei was studying for a master's degree at Tsinghua University, his teacher, Professor Du Qinghua, recommended Introduction to Continuum Mechanics to students. This book was written by Feng Yuanzhen, a well-known mechanist and Chinese-American, and translated and published by Science Press.
Professor Du also mentioned in class that this book was a textbook for senior undergraduate students at the University of California, Berkeley in United States at that time. Yang Wei recalled, "We felt very fortunate that our group of graduate students were able to come into contact with the world's advanced scientific knowledge and scientific ideas at that time. ”
"Daigo empowerment." Nearly half a century later, Yang Wei still remembers how he felt when he read this book. The quality of the translation and editing of this translation is very high, which allows the students to understand the content of the book smoothly.
Since then, Science Press has also left a deep impression on Yang Wei and has become synonymous with authoritative, professional and high-quality publications in his heart. "The book is only two or three hundred pages, and the core content of mechanics is summarized through a few simplified equations, and this simple and abstract expression highlights the beauty of mechanics." He introduced.
Since he did not major in mechanics as an undergraduate, Yang Wei strung together the scattered knowledge points through the study of this book, and was able to examine the grand problems of mechanics from a unified perspective.
Yang Wei said: "This book has had a profound impact on my career, it is not only a guide to knowledge, but also stimulates my passion for mechanics research and makes me willing to devote myself to mechanics research. ”
Many years later, Yang Wei became a well-known scholar in the field of mechanics and devoted himself to the management of graduate education, still inspired by this book, and tried to look at graduate education from the perspective of mechanics.
Based on these reflections, Yang Wei wrote the book "Dynamics of Graduate Education", which was published by Science Press in 2021. The book describes graduate education through quantitative analysis, and makes forward-looking predictions on the development of disciplines and the construction of "double first-class" in mainland China, which is refreshing.
A blueprint for the power of writing
Since 2020, Yang Wei has continued to cooperate with Science Press to complete the publication of two monographs, Introduction to Mechanics and Basic Problems of Mechanics. These two monographs are the condensation and summary of Yang Wei's academic achievements for decades, and also outline the framework and blueprint of the discipline of mechanics.
Around 2020, when the "Aeronautics and Astronautics Science and Technology Textbook Publishing Project" was in full swing, the textbook compilation team invited Yang Wei to write a textbook on mechanics. In the opinion of experts, the aerospace field is inseparable from the support of mechanics. For example, aircraft need to be aerodynamic in the design phase; Solid mechanics is applied in the fabrication stage of the structure; When it comes to engine design and manufacturing, thermodynamics and fluid mechanics are indispensable.
At that time, shortly after Yang Wei stepped down as director of the National Natural Science Foundation of China, he took the lead in establishing the "Center for Interdisciplinary Mechanics" at Zhejiang University. "I teach a general education course of 'Introduction to Mechanics' for first-year freshmen at Zhejiang University, and I am planning to write a textbook, hoping that students will be interested in mechanics at the beginning of their enrollment, and it is also a condensation of this course to better pass on the academics." He said.
Therefore, Yang Wei cooperated with Zhao Pei and Wang Hongtao, two young professors of Zhejiang University, to complete the "Introduction to Mechanics", which was published as one of the books of the "Aeronautics and Astronautics Science and Technology Textbook Publishing Project". This book covers the content of the first-level discipline of mechanics, not only the second-level or third-level disciplines, but also introduces the history of mechanics and the stories of many famous mechanics and thinkers in history such as Mozi, Aristotle, Newton, etc., which increases the attractiveness of the textbook. These contents can also benefit liberal arts students and become one of the general education courses in the school.
To Yang Wei's gratification, "Introduction to Mechanics" was selected as a double recommended textbook by the Steering Committee for the Teaching of Mechanics and Aerospace Majors in Colleges and Universities of the Ministry of Education during the review stage. In 2023, the teaching reform achievement of "Introduction to Mechanics" and supporting courses as one of the core innovation points won the first prize of the National Teaching Achievement Award for Higher Education (Undergraduate).
After the good response of "Introduction to Mechanics", in 2022, the editorial team of Science Press proposed that it hoped that experts would further condense major scientific issues in the field of mechanics, and invited Yang Wei to write the book "Basic Problems of Mechanics".
With a philosophical and open-ended description method, Yang Wei comprehensively introduces the discipline of mechanics and its interdisciplinary frontiers in this book, and sorts out 70 basic problems, including not only the unsolved problems raised by previous research, but also the new challenges faced by mechanics in the era of the new scientific and technological revolution. The book was published in June 2024. In the preface to the book, Yang Wei wrote: "I have also written several books in Chinese or English in my life, but they are all exhibitions of existing knowledge frameworks. It's the first time I've tried to write a book like this, which is based on 'asking questions' in terms of topic selection, content, and structure. ”
Today, Yang Wei's cooperation with Science Press is still "in progress". He co-edited the book "Technical Science in the New Era", which has entered the typesetting stage of Science Press. The book is a compilation of the views of more than 30 academicians, aiming to explore the role of the bridge between basic science and engineering technology.
Looking back on the publishing process of these four books, Yang Wei was deeply impressed by the professionalism and professionalism of the editorial team of Science Press. "Xu Yangfeng, one of the editors of "Introduction to Mechanics" and "Basic Problems of Mechanics", graduated from the School of Aeronautics and Astronautics of Zhejiang University, with a background in mechanics and a very high professional level. Yang Wei said. At the same time, he also remembers that there was an editor nicknamed "Sun Xiaojiao", who was extremely demanding of the manuscript, and did not let go of every punctuation mark.
Explore the future of power
In Yang Wei's view, the mainland's current mechanics research has reached the "quasi-first-class" level. "In terms of the number of researchers, the scope of disciplines covered, and the published research results, we are not much different from the international advanced level." "However, there is still a gap between the top scholars and the most influential original works in the mainland," he said. ”
High-quality scholarly publishing will help improve the dissemination of original scientific research. As the leader of the expert group of the China Science and Technology Journal Excellence Action Plan and a member of the China Association for Science and Technology's United Nations Consultative Committee on Open Science and Global Partnerships, Yang Wei has been responsible for and participated in a number of academic journal-related affairs in recent years. He observes that despite the increase in academic output and the number of high-impact papers on the mainland, the results of these high-impact work are rarely published in domestic journals. Relevant data show that at present, only 5% of China's SCI papers are published in domestic registered journals, and the rest are published in foreign journals. Further analysis found that there are currently about 5,000 scientific and technological journals in the mainland, but they belong to 4,000 different institutions, showing the characteristics of "small and scattered". Of these journals, only about 1,300 (less than 5%) make it to the Elsevier Scopus database. In addition, only four or five hundred journals are able to enter the SCI database, which is an even lower percentage.
"This means that the competitiveness of our domestic journals is still weak, and we still need to improve our academic communication power. Academic communication power includes not only the journal itself, but also the construction of academic platforms. Yang Wei said. To this end, he suggested that we should continue to focus on building a first-class journal platform, and integrate the strength of about 5,000 journals to seek common development.
As a leader in the domestic publishing industry, Science Press and Elsevier jointly established KeAi, which provides a good model for the industry. In order to adapt to the changes in the global publishing market, the transformed company is committed to building a development platform for China's scientific and technological journals to "go global", and currently has nearly 200 journals.