It is two decades since Mitchell Feigenbaum's landmark papers on period doubling and the modern beginnings of what is now called "Chaos Theory." From the very beginning, mechanics has been a central focus for modem nonlinear dynamical systems. Fluid, structural, machine and rigid body dynamics has been a fertile field for nonlinear phenomena and chaos in particular. Early experimental evidence for chaotic phenomena in mechanics gave the new chaos theory a mark of credibility, importance, and relevance that its earlier sister field, catastrophe theory, did not achieve. The fact that mechanics...

This proceedings volume contains 39 papers presented at the IUTAM Sym posium on Variations of Domains and Free Boundary Problems in Solid Mechanics, held in Paris from April 22nd to 25th 1997, at the Ecole des Mines and the Ecole Poly technique. This symposium offered an opportunity for researchers from all engineering disciplines and applied mathematics to review the state of the art and to identify new trends and new features in the field. Mechanical modelling, mathematical discussion and numerical resolution have been the primary goals of the meeting. Principal subjects of discussion...

The JUT AMlIACM Symposium on Discretization Methods in Structural Mechanics was nd th held in Vienna, Austria, from 2 to 6 June 1997. The site of the Symposium was the "Theatersaal" of the Austrian Academy of Sciences. The Symposium was attended by 71 persons from 23 countries. In addition, several Austrian graduate students and research associates participated in the meeting. In the 5-day Symposium a total of 48 papers were presented. All of them were invited and accorded equal weight in the programme. The following topics were covered: - Error-controlled adaptivity of finite element methods...

This textbook deals with optimization of dynamic systems. The motivation for undertaking this task is as follows: There is an ever increasing need to produce more efficient, accurate, and lightweight mechanical and electromechanical de- vices. Thus, the typical graduating B.S. and M.S. candidate is required to have some familiarity with techniques for improving the performance of dynamic systems. Unfortunately, existing texts dealing with system improvement via optimization remain inaccessible to many of these students and practicing en- gineers. It is our goal to alleviate this difficulty by...

Multibody dynamics started with the ideas of Jacob and Daniel Bernoul- li and later on with d'Alembert's principle. In establishing a solution for the problem of the center of oscillation for a two-mass-pendulum Jacob Ber- noulli spoke about balancing the profit-and-Ioss account with respect to the motion of the two masses. Daniel Bernoulli extended these ideas to a chain pendulum and called forces not contributing to the motion "lost forces," thus being already very close to d'Alembert's principle. D'Alembert considered a "system of bodies, which are interconnected in some arbitrary way. "...

Continuum Continuum mechanics mechanics provides provides a a theoretical theoretical structure structure for for analyzing analyzing the the response response of of materials materials to to mechanical mechanical and and thermal thermal loads. loads. One One of of the the beauties beauties of of continuum continuum mechanics mechanics is is that that the the fundamental fundamental balance balance laws laws (conservation (conservation of of mass mass and and balances balances of of linear linear momentum, momentum, angular angular momentum, momentum, energy energy and and entropy) entropy)...

The IUTAM-IASS Symposium on Deployable Structures: Theory and Applications was held on 6-9 September 1998 in the Department of Engineering, University of Cambridge. The Scientific Committee was appointed jointly by the two sponsoring organisations, the International Union for Theoretical and Applied Mechanics (IUTAM) and the International Association for Shell and Spatial Structures (lASS). Its membership was as follows: S. Pellegrino (UK, Chairman) C. R. Calladine (UK) L. B. Freund (USA) M. Geradin (Belgium) Y. Hangai (Japan) K. Kawata (Japan) B. Kroplin (Germany) S. ]. Medwadowski (USA) M....

Nonlinearity and stochastic structural dynamics is of common interest to engineers and applied scientists belonging to many disciplines. Recent research in this area has been concentrated on the response and stability of nonlinear mechanical and structural systems subjected to random escitation. Simultaneously the focus of research has also been directed towards understanding intrinsic nonlinear phenomena like bifurcation and chaos in deterministic systems. These problems demand a high degree of sophistication in the analytical and numerical approaches. At the same time they arise from...

The IUTAM Symposium on Mechanical and Electromagnetic Waves in Structured Media took place at the University of Sydney from January 18- 22, 1999. It brought together leading researchers from eleven countries for a week-long meeting, with the aim of providing cross-links between the com- nities studying related problems involving elastic and electromagnetic waves in structured materials. After the meeting, participants were invited to submit articles based on their presentations, which were refereed and assembled to constitute these Proceedings. The topics covered here represent areas at the...

This book was developed while I was teaching graduate courses on analysis, design and optimization of structures, in the United States, Europe and Israel. Structural analysis is a main part of any design problem, and the analysis often must be repeated many times during the design process. Much work has been done on design-oriented analysis of structures recently and many studies have been published. The purpose of the book is to collect together selected topics of this literature and to present them in a unified approach. It meets the need for a general text covering the basic concepts and...