Shatelen, Mikhail

Born Jan. 1 (13), 1866, in Anapa, in what is now Krasnodar Krai; died Jan. 31, 1957, in Leningrad. Soviet electrical engineer. Corresponding member of the Academy of Sciences of the USSR (1931); Hero of Socialist Labor (1956).

Shatelen graduated from the University of St. Petersburg in 1888. In 1891 he joined the teaching staff of the University of St. Petersburg; he also taught at the St. Petersburg Mining Institute. In 1893 he was appointed a professor at the St. Petersburg Electrical Engineering Institute. Shatelen was a founder of the St. Petersburg Polytechnic Institute (now the Leningrad Polytechnic Institute), where he taught from 1901 to 1957. He took part in the development and implementation of the GOELRO plan. In 1929, Shatelen became the president of the Central Board of Weights and Measures; from 1929 to 1949, he was a member of the International Committee on Weights and Measures.

Shatelen’s main works dealt with general problems of electrical engineering, illuminating engineering, metrology, and the history of technology. Shatelen received the State Prize of the USSR in 1949 and was awarded four Orders of Lenin, the Order of the Red Banner of Labor, and various medals.