In 1996 St. Petersburg Technical University organized the international conference “Differential Equations and Their Applications”. At the initiative of the chief of organizing committee Prof. G. S. Osipenko the decision was made to organize the electronic journal “Differential Equations and Control Processes”. The situation in Russia in those years was rather difficult: financial support of scientific research practically stopped, many journals closed because the stress of money.
At the same time the system of science financing by grants, which was the new one for Russia, was promoted. In particular, the conference mentioned was supported by Russian Fond of Basic Research (RFBR). The international information system INTERNET reached the level that assured reliable and effective existence both electronic issues and electronic libraries. It became clear that electronic publications offer few advantages over traditional “hardcopy” issues, namely efficiency, the absence of size constraints, short publication time and wide dissemination of the papers. Moreover, an electronic version may be easy implemented in the traditional publication form. Hence, the conditions for design of an electronic publication system were formed. But a major part of scientific community had cast doubt on electronic publications, considering them as not full-fledged ones. In that time Russian Highest Certifying Committee avoided making decision concerning the status of electronic publications. The posi-tion of the Committee could be formulated as “if a dissertation council sends a request, we make a decision”. In this situation dissertation councils began to take electronic publications into account. On the other hand in Russia there was not any system for registration of electronic resources and it was not clear how to register them. So, the journal “Differential equations and control processes” was registered as a traditional (hardcopy) journal having St. Petersburg and Leningrad area as geographic distribution of authors. The initiative of the foundation of this electronic journal won support of many Russian scientists. It was St. Petersburg Technical University that carried out the constitutor’s duty, the financial and technical support was received and in March 1997 the journal was registered. (reg.№ П23275 , 07.03.97).
The journal aimed at publication of results of theoretical investigations and their applications, reports about program products relating to the journal scope, teaching papers, information about scientific and educational events and new books. In the journal the following sections were formed: educational, distant learning and student (to publish course works and diploma papers). The journal published articles, reviews, monographs, thesis and other papers. All published papers were reviewed. Thus, the journal became known as a research and educational center in theoretical and applied mathematics. The organizers of the journal decided that the journal should be open access in INTERNET. These ideas and principles led to forming wide network of readers and authors.
The academic council of Technical University defined the line of devel-opment of the journal. Publishing council and editorial board that included leading scientific authorities of Russia (among which were 3 academicians and 4 corresponding members of Russian Academy of Science – RAS) defined publishing and editorial policy of the journal. Much work concerning organization of editorial board has been done by Prof. N. H. Rosov (Moscow state university), corresponding member of (RAS) V. A. Pliss (St. Petersburg State University) and corresponding member of RAS A.G. Chentsov (Institute of Mathematics and Mechanics, Ural Branch of RAS). Editor-in-Chief Prof. G. S. Osipenko and Deputy Editor Prof. O. Y. Kulchizkii worked with a will. As there was not an editorial office, the journal was published in so called “home environment”. The journal site was designed by L. Linchuk.
At a later date the journal design changed several times and came to the present style in 2004. This work was done by Dr. N. B. Ampilova and E. I. Petrenko. From the first version only logotype invented by G. S. Osipenko was inherited. Initially the journal was allocated on the site of the Robotics Central Institute by the address http://www.neva.ru/journal/.
At a time of journal infancy its material and technical basis were formed generally at the expense of grants. So, in 1997-1998 RFBR gave the grant 97-07-90088 for the information system “Differential equations and dynamical systems” (project coordinator G. S. Osipenko), and the journal was a part of the project. In 1996-1998 the journal received support in accordance with INTAS program, grant «Europe Mathematical Net» (EMNet/NIS), project coordinator Flemming Topsoe, Denmark. In 2000 the journal was supported by the project “Electronic Libraries”. From the same year Technical University gave some financial support, which allowed working more confidently. The journal published 4 numbers in a year, and each number contained at least 3 articles.
The journal was a center of organization of international conferences «Differential equations and applications» and «Mathematical modelling tools». Seven conferences were organized, and their papers were published in the journal and additionally as the periodic issue “Mathematical research” in 6 volumes. The journal was indexed in mathematical DBs, in particular eLibrary.ru. The articles were reviewed in Mathematical Reviews and Zentralblatt für Mathematik. Geographic distribution of authors included not only republics of former USSR, but German, Sweden, Italy, Romania, India, Turkey, Japan, South Africa, Oman, Trinidad and Tobago, Swaziland. The journal won international prestige and in 2005 it got the index of international periodic issue ISSN: 1817-2172.
In 2008 on G. S. Osipenko’s initiative Dean of the Faculty of Mathematics and Mechanics of St. Petersburg State University Prof. G. A. Leonov and corresponding member of RAS Prof. V.A. Pliss made a decision to allocate the mirror of the journal on the faculty site. This work was done by Dr. N. B. Ampilova and Dr. E. I. Petrenko. In 2009 G. S. Osipenko retired and in April 2010 St. Petersburg State University became the publisher. The journal was registered as electronic title with the number Эл. № ФС77-39410. Since that time Editor- in- Chief is corresponding member of RAS Prof. G. A. Leonov.
A new history of the journal started. From January 2010 the papers in English are indexed in EBSCO.
In 2011 Editor-in-Chief of the journal “Differencial’nye uravnenia”/”Differential equations” member of RAS V. A. Ilyin and publishing house MAIK suggested to G. A. Leonov selecting the best papers of the electronic journal “Differential equations and control processes” for the year to translate them into English and publish in the additional issue of the journal “Differential equations” (annual issue № 13, Guest editor G. A. Leonov).
These publications are distributed by Springer company (http://www.springer.com/mathematics/dynamical+systems/journal/10625) and indexed in Scopus and Web of Science.
2011 - http://link.springer.com/journal/10625/47/13/page/1
2012 - http://link.springer.com/journal/10625/48/13/page/1
2013 - http://link.springer.com/journal/10625/49/13/page/1
2014 - http://link.springer.com/journal/10625/50/13/page/1
2015 - http://link.springer.com/journal/10625/51/13/page/1
2016 - http://link.springer.com/journal/10625/52/13/page/1
2017 - http://link.springer.com/journal/10625/53/13/page/1
In 2017 the contract with MAIK was completed.
In 2018 on the passing away G.A. Leonov Nikolay Kuznetzov is Editor-in-Chief.
The journal is indexed in Russian Science Citation Index system, EBSCO, SCOPUS.