The Italian Association of
Mechanics and its International Journal <Meccanica>
G. Rega
University of Rome "La Sapienza", Rome, Italy
The Italian Association of Theoretical and Applied Mechanics (AIMETA)
was established in 1965 as a joint cooperative initiative of various
distinguished scholars working in different areas of mechanics, namely general
mechanics, mechanics of fluids, mechanics of solids, and mechanics of machines.
The founders of the Association include Giovanni Bianchi, Carlo Ferrari, Bruno
Finzi, Leo Finzi, Elio Giangreco, Emilio Massa, Giorgio Sestini, and Giulio
Supino. A four-year term was established for the association chairmanship.
The
first elected President of AIMETA was Professor Bruno Finzi (1966-69), followed
by Professors Giulio Supino (1970-73), Carlo Ferrari (1974-77), Giorgio Sestini
(1978-81), Giovanni Bianchi (1982-85), Giulio Maier (1986-89), Carlo Cercignani
(1990-93), Enrico Marchi (1994-97), and Gianfranco Capriz (1998-2001). Professor
Angelo Morro is the President now in charge for a four-year term ending in
2005.
In 1966, Meccanica
was set as the official journal of AIMETA, published in English with the aim of
promoting the work done by Italian researchers in mechanical sciences on the
international scene. Since then, Meccanica
has published high quality research contributions in various fields of
mechanics, and in 1991 it has become a really International Journal - printed by Kluwer Academic Publishers -
in which the Italian scientific production finds its spot alongside that of
other nationals, whose articles are by now about 70% of all published papers.
Professor
Giovanni Bianchi was the first Editor of Meccanica (1966-81), followed by Giulio Maier
(1982-85), Carlo Cercignani (1986-89), and Giuliano Augusti (1990-97),
according to a variable term duration. Since 1998, the writer is in charge as
the Editor of the journal, with a term near to its conclusion.
One
main aim in setting down the AIMETA was to create a forum where discussing and
comparing advancements in research activities in all branches of mechanics,
from theoretical mechanics to its applications in the classical areas of
fluids, solids, structures and machines. As a natural consequence, the journal
of the Association, Meccanica, is transversal to all branches of mechanics, and this
represents a distinguishing feature entailing
aspects of both weakness and force. It is indeed well known how, besides
classical journals in mechanics, the recent editorial scenario has shown the
setting up of either highly specialized new journals conceived to cover
specific fields, or of multidisciplinary journals designed to bring together
from different areas papers concerned with new and/or emerging topics in
theoretical and applied science and engineering. While having completely
different - and broader - objectives with respect to the former kind of
journals, nonetheless Meccanica has
few aspects in common also with the latter kind. Indeed, its horizontal
multidisciplinary character aims at establishing links among scientists working
in different branches within mechanics,
rather than at providing a single forum for common aspects in different areas
of science and engineering.
The focus of the journal is thus mostly on the common methodological framework
scientists working in mechanics are expected to share with each other when
dealing with a theoretical or applied problem in whatever field, without,
however, keeping the attention away from the phenomenological aspects peculiar
to each mechanical problem. In this context, original scientific contributions
submitted to Meccanica are expected
to give adequate and possibly balanced emphasis to the various aspects of
mechanical and mathematical modelisation, of the analytical, geometrical,
numerical and/or experimental solutions, and of the analysis of system
behaviour.
Within this framework, the scope of the journal
is both on topics of permanent interest to research workers in mechanics, and
on fundamental and applicative problems in emerging fields. Besides
contemporary research clearly pertaining to such areas as general mechanics,
solid and structural mechanics, fluid mechanics, and mechanics of machines,
studies in interdisciplinary fields at the border between different areas of
mechanics, or between mechanics and other
mathematical and engineering sciences, are also considered of special
interest to the Journal. Typical of the former class are papers involved with
problems of fluid-solid interaction, acoustic-structural coupling,
thermomechanics. More likely to trace back to the latter are, among others,
problems of interaction of mechanics with dynamical systems, problems involving
new/advanced structural and functional materials, problems of interaction between
mechanics and control, or mechanics and computation, electromechanics,
biomechanics. In all cases, with reference to both deterministic and stochastic
systems, and with special emphasis to the analysis of the actual nonlinear
problems of the real world.
Along this general line, the editorial policy
of the journal has also aimed at expanding the role and presence of updated
scientific topics of mechanics. This is being continuously accomplished by
pursuing the publication of Special Issues devoted to selected topics, mainly -
but not only - originated from International Conferences or Symposia. In this
respect, it is worth mentioning a fruitful link established in the past few
years by Meccanica with a number of
EUROMECH (European Association for Mechanics) scientific events. But the list
of recently published (or under preparation) special issues, reported in the
following, highlights a widespread coverage of European scientific events of
high quality:
Stochastic Dynamics of Nonlinear Mechanical
Systems (Ed. M. Di Paola), from Euromech Colloq. 413,
Palermo, Italy, 2000
Mechanics of Tissues and Tissue Implants (Eds, P.J. Prendergast and R. Contro), from Int. Symp. on Biomechanics
at XV AIMETA Congress, Taormina, Italy, 2001
Nonlinear
Dynamics of Mechanical Systems (Eds: M. Wiercigroch, E. Kreuzer, and T. Kapitaniak), from Euromech
Colloq. 425, Aberdeen, Scotland, U.K., 2001
Control and
Condition Monitoring of Engineering Systems (Eds: M. Wiercigroch and A.A. Rodger), from Euromech
Colloq. 425, Aberdeen, Scotland, U.K., 2001
Dynamical
Systems: Theory and Applications (Ed: I. Awrejcewicz), from 6th Conf. on Dynamical Systems,
Lodz, Poland, 2001
Advanced Topics
in Mechanics (Eds: M.
Wiercigroch, M. Boltezar, and D. Indeitsev), from Int. Conf. on Advanced Problems
in Mechanics, St. Petersburg, Russia, 2003.
It is also worth noticing how a tradition of
scientific homage to distinguished Italian mechanicians to celebrate special
academic occasions (such as their retirement and/or their 70th birthday)
has recently been recovered by publishing two special issues - hosting invited
contributions by renowned scientists from all over the world - in honour of
worldwide recognized Italian professors such as Giulio Maier (2001) and Piero
Villaggio (2003).
Apart from the regular
papers forming the core of the journal, a further meaningful dedicated
initiative consists in hosting a series of papers by well known scholars, which
highlight their position on a given scientific topic, with a possible character
of tutorial, and which are published under a special journal heading named
Overviews and Tutorials. Particular effort is also devoted to the quick
publication of Brief Notes, which are a useful medium for prompt publication of
preliminary, yet consistent, formulations or of new results. But the overall
editorial policy of the journal actually aims at possibly publishing accepted
papers within a maximum of one year from their receipt, apart from the cases of
substantial reviewing requests.
Minor, though not negligible, contents of the
journal are a section of Book Reviews, for which the goal is in getting by the
reviewers more and more critical contributions, and the Meccanica Information
Calendar, which reports on an actually widespread number of conferences all
over the world as per the multidisciplinary character of the Journal.
Besides the Editor-in-chief, the Board of Meccanica presently comprises four Italian Associate
Editors broadly representing the four main areas of interest of the journal
(general mechanics, fluids, solids and structures, machines) and an Editorial
Board of sixteen renowned scientists from various ranges of Mechanics, most of
which are non-Italian and cover different geo-scientific areas.
Meccanica is indexed/abstracted in the most important
international Information Services, including the Science Citation Index, and
within the general Kluwer website it has its own dedicated slot (http://www.kluweronline.com/issn/0025-6455)
from which the paper can be downloaded according to variable access rules.
Starting from the first year (1998) of its evaluation, the trend of the journal
impact factor has always been meaningfully increasing, apart from a reduction
occurred in the year 2002 likely in connection with a lower number of yearly
published issues due to the publication of two double issues.
On behalf of AIMETA, and as the Editor in charge of
its journal, it is my great pleasure to invite Russian scientists working on
advanced problems in mechanics to consider Meccanica as a suitable medium for publication and worldwide dissemination of
their best scientific papers, thus adding themselves to the already meaningful
number of Russian - and worldwide - colleagues who already know the journal and
keeps on publishing on it.
I conclude this presentation by deeply thanking
Professor Lyudmila K. Kuzmina of the Kazan Aviation Institute, Co-Editor of the
International Journal Problems of Nonlinear Analysis in Engineering Systems, for inviting me to give a short account of
the Italian research and editorial initiatives in Mechanics, and for hosting it
in this prestigious journal of the International Federation of Nonlinear
Analysts
© 1995-2008 Kazan State University