Petr Sobko

Sobko, Petr Ivanovich

 

Born May 18 (30), 1819, in Kiev; died Nov. 14 (26), 1870, in St. Petersburg. Russian engineer and scientist in the fields of structural mechanics and railroad construction.

Sobko graduated in 1840 from the Institute of the Corps of Railroad Engineers, where he became a teacher and, in 1848, a professor. He was the first in Russia to give a course in structural mechanics, and in 1853 he set up a laboratory for testing the mechanical properties of building materials. In 1839 and 1840, while working under S. V. Kerbedz, Sobko designed a suspension bridge over the Neva River; he incorporated steel elements in wooden bridge trusses. In 1869 he became the head of the traction and rolling stock department of the St. Petersburg-Warsaw railroad.

WORKS

“Teoriia soprotivleniia stroitel’nykh materialov.” Zhurnal glavnogo upravleniia putei soobshcheniia ipublichnykh zdanii, 1850, vol. 11, books 1-2.
Issledovanie voprosa ob upotreblenii zheleza v sooruzheniiakh na zheleznykh dorogakh.” Zhurnal glavnogo upravleniia putei soobshcheniia i publichnykh zdanii, 1851, vols. 13-14, book 1.
Pamiatnaia knizhka dlia inzhenerov i arkhitektorov, part 1. St. Petersburg, 1854. (With V. Glukhov.)