This volume is a collection of the main lectures over a broad spectrum of rheological models with singularities as the Leitmotiv, with 30 papers on the most recent developments in the analysis and understanding of non-linear singularities. Singularity-dominated local fields are frequently encountered in various branches of continuum mechanics, such as elasticity, plasticity, Newtonian fluids and more complex rheological models.

The optimal control of flexible structures is an active area of research. The main body of work in this area is concerned with the control of time-dependent displacements and stresses, and assumes linear elastic conditions, namely linear elastic material behavior and small defor- tion. See, e. g., 1]- 3], the collections of papers 4, 5], and references therein. On the other hand, in the present paper we consider the static optimal control of a structure made of a nonlinear elastic material and und- going large deformation. An important application is the suppression of static or...

The IUTAM Symposium on "Non-Linear Singularities in Defonnation and Flow" took place from March 17 to 21, 1997, at the Technion in Haifa, Israel, with 70 participants from 12 countries. The leitmotif of this Symposium brought together scientists working on singularity-dominated local fields in various branches of continuum mechanics, covering traditional solid and liquid behaviour as well as that of more complex non-linear materials; non-linearities arise either from the constitutive equations for the material or from the presence of interfaces or both. The scientific committee invited...