Mathematics is playing an ever more important role in the physical and biological sciences, provoking a blurring of boundaries between scientific disciplines and a resurgence of interest in the modern as well as the classical techniques of applied mathematics. This renewal of interest, both in re- search and teaching, has led to the establishment of the series Texts in Applied Mathematics (TAM). The development of new courses is a natural consequence of a high level of excitement on the research frontier as newer techniques, such as numeri- cal and symbolic computer systems, dynamical...

Stellt man heute einen Studenten einer naturwissenschaftlich - tech nischen Richtung im ersten Semester vor die Aufgabe, Alltagsproble me mathematisch zu behandeln, so wird man - von ruhmlichen Ausnah men abgesehen - haufig auf Unverstandnis stossen. Ja, dass man prak tische Probleme uberhaupt mathematisch beschreiben kann, verursacht vielfach Erstaunen. Trotz aller modischen Stromungen, von denen auch naturwissenschaftliche Disziplinen und selbst die Mathematik heimge sucht werden, stehen die Hochschulen noch immer in der Pflicht, ih ren Studierenden in Vorlesungen, Ubungen und Praktika ein...

The volume contains new research papers (some of which are of a tutorial nature) on theory and computational methods, oscillatory control, deterministic control of uncertain systems, nonlinear perturbed optimal control, and on control of systems with distributed parameters.

Resources should be used sparingly both from a point of view of economy and eco- logy. Thus in controlling industrial, economical and social processes, optimization is the tool of choice. In this area of applied numerical analysis, the INTERNATIONAL FEDERATION OF AUTOMATIC CONTROL (IFAC) acts as a link between research groups in universities, national research laboratories and industry. For this pur- pose, the technical committee Mathematics of Control of IFAC organizes biennial conferences with the objective of bringing together experts to exchange ideas, ex- periences and future...

The 12th conference on "Variational Calculus, Optimal Control and Applications" took place September 23-27, 1996, in Trassenheide on the Baltic Sea island of Use dom. Seventy mathematicians from ten countries participated. The preceding eleven conferences, too, were held in places of natural beauty throughout West Pomerania; the first time, in 1972, in Zinnowitz, which is in the immediate area of Trassenheide. The conferences were founded, and led ten times, by Professor Bittner (Greifswald) and Professor KlCitzler (Leipzig), who both celebrated their 65th birthdays in 1996. The 12th...