Nonconvexity and nonsmoothness arise in a large class of engineering applica- tions. In many cases of practical importance the possibilities offered by opti- mization with its algorithms and heuristics can substantially improve the per- formance and the range of applicability of classical computational mechanics algorithms. For a class of problems this approach is the only one that really works. The present book presents in a comprehensive way the application of opti- mization algorithms and heuristics in smooth and nonsmooth mechanics. The necessity of this approach is presented to the...

Experience gained during a ten-year long involvement in modelling, program- ming and application in nonlinear optimization helped me to arrive at the conclusion that in the interest of having successful applications and efficient software production, knowing the structure of the problem to be solved is in- dispensable. This is the reason why I have chosen the field in question as the sphere of my research. Since in applications, mainly from among the nonconvex optimization models, the differentiable ones proved to be the most efficient in modelling, especially in solving them with computers,...