Inelastic media constitute a rich source of interesting and important problems in theoretical, experimental and computationalmechanics. Signi?cantinsightshavebeengainedthroughstudiesofthemathematicalchar- teristics of new models. New constitutive theories have lead to variational and other formulations that are generally more complex, often highly nonlinear, and requ- ing new tools for their successful resolution. Likewise, there have been signi?cant advances of a computational nature, coupled to the development of new algorithms for solving such problems in discrete form. It is clear,...