The origin of the mechanical sciences can be traced to the studies of Aristotle and Archimedes, who set forth the principles that are the basis of mechanics. However, development in successive centuries advanced but slowly, with notable progress made during the Middle Ages, and would find its complete formal development and linguistic expression only in the Renaissance.The use of elementary static systems followed different courses, tied more to empiricism and constructive technologies than to theoretical science, resolving the problems that were mentioned from time to time by the architects and builders of antiquity. Such problems, formulated from the constructive practices of architecture and by the machines for building, were resolved using those very mechanical devices that are at the basis of the discipline, without a precise knowledge of their general semantic value, but rather with a awareness of statics and constructive empiricism that validated the choices made on the building site.

This book, based on the Fourth International Conference on Advanced Manufacturing Systems and Technology - AMST '96 aims at presenting trend and up-to-date information on the latest developments - research results and industrial experience in the field of machining processes, optimization and process planning, forming, flexible machining systems, non conventional machining, robotics and control, measuring and quality, thus providing an international forum for a beneficial exchange of ideas, and furthering a favourable cooperation between research and industry.

This book consists of review articles by experts on recent developments in mechanical engineering sciences. The book has been composed to commemorate the Silver Jubilee of the Mechanical Engineering Department, Indian Institute of Technology Guwahati. It includes articles on modern mechanical sciences subjects of advanced simulation techniques and molecular dynamics, microfluidics and microfluidic devices, energy systems, intelligent fabrication, microscale manufacturing, smart materials, computational techniques, robotics and their allied fields. It presents the upcoming and emerging areas in mechanical sciences which will help in formulation of new courses and updating existing curricula. This book will help the academicians and policy makers in the field of engineering education to chart out the desired path for the development of technical education.

This book presents the most recent progress of fundamental nature made in the new developed field of micromechanics: transformation field analysis, variational bounds for nonlinear composites, higher-order gradients in micromechanical damage models, dynamics of composites, pattern based variational bounds.

Topics of this book span the range from spatial and temporal discretization techniques for contact and impact problems with small and finite deformations over investigations on the reliability of micromechanical contact models over emerging techniques for rolling contact mechanics to homogenization methods and multi-scale approaches in contact problems.

The articles in this book describe new developments in the area of structural testing, particularly those based upon the principle of fusing numerical and experimental methods such as real-time dynamic substructuring and hardware-in-the loop testing. In addition to the hybrid methods, chapters on the latest develoments in more established techniques, such as shaking table testing, provide a completely up-to-date survey of structural testing methods. The book is characterized by a multidisciplinary nature of the work that integrates cutting-edge research from the fields of non-linear dynamics, automatic control, numerical analysis, system modelling and mechatronics.