An overarching and unifying theme for this document is that viewing mechanical systems through a geometric lens opens up an extensive set of tools that can be brought to bear upon energy, mass, and system---conscious control design for constrained mechanical systems. To demonstrate this thesis we consider the dynamics and control for several mechanical systems.

Nonholonomic systems are a widespread topic in several scientific and commercial domains, including robotics, locomotion and space exploration. This work sheds new light on this interdisciplinary character through the investigation of a variety of aspects coming from several disciplines. The main aim is to illustrate the idea that a better understanding of the geometric structures of mechanical systems unveils new and unknown aspects to them, and helps both analysis and design to solve standing problems and identify new challenges. In this way, separate areas of research such as Classical Mechanics, Differential Geometry, Numerical Analysis or Control Theory are brought together in this study of nonholonomic systems.

This book explores connections between control theory and geometric mechanics. The author links control theory with a geometric view of classical mechanics in both its Lagrangian and Hamiltonian formulations, and in particular with the theory of mechanical systems subject to motion constraints. The synthesis is appropriate as there is a rich connection between mechanics and nonlinear control theory. The book provides a unified treatment of nonlinear control theory and constrained mechanical systems that incorporates material not available in other recent texts. The book benefits graduate students and researchers in the area who want to enhance their understanding and enhance their techniques.

The area of analysis and control of mechanical systems using differential geometry is flourishing. This book collects many results over the last decade and provides a comprehensive introduction to the area.

This book explores some of the connections between control theory and geometric mechanics; that is, control theory is linked with a geometric view of classical mechanics in both its Lagrangian and Hamiltonian formulations and in particular with the theory of mechanical systems subject to motion constraints. The synthesis of the topic is appropriate as there is a particularly rich connection between mechanics and nonlinear control theory. The book provides a unified treatment of nonlinear control theory and constrained mechanical systems and illustrates the elegant mathematics behind many simple, interesting, and useful mechanical examples. It is intended for graduate students who wish to learn this subject and researchers in the area who want to enhance their techniques. The book contains sections focusing on physical examples and elementary terms, as well as theoretical sections that use sophisticated analysis and geometry. The first four chapters offer preliminaries and background information, while the remaining five are broken down into chapters on nonholonomic mechanics, control and stabilization, optimal control, energy-based, and recent energy-based techniques for mechanical and nonholonomic systems. The second edition of the book extends many of the topics discussed in the first edition to incorporate both new research and more historical background. The additional material includes work on the Hamel equations and quasivelocities, discrete dynamics, bo th holonomic and nonholonomic, Hamiltonization, and the Hamilton-Jacobi equation. In addition new examples and exercises have been added. Review of earlier Edition (A.J. van der Schaft, IEEE Control System Magazine, 2005 ) This book can be read on many different levels and has been described as a "delightful book that will be valuable for both the control community and researchers" .

Some of the modem developments described in Motion, Control, and Geometry include the geometric control of robot motion and craft orientation, how high-power precision micromotors are engineered for less invasive surgery and self-focusing lens applications, what a mobile robot on a surface has in common with one moving in three dimensions, and how the motion-control problem is simplified by a coupled oscillator's geometric grouping of degrees of freedom and motion time scales. The four papers in these proceedings provide a view through the scientific portal of today's motion-control geometric research into tomorrow's technology. The mathematics needed to carry out this research is that of modem differential geometry, and the questions raised in the field of motion-control geometry go directly to the research frontier. Geometry is a mathematical area too often neglected nowadays in a student's education. This publication will help adjust the control initially imposed about 2,300 years ago on one kind of "motion"- that of students entering Plato's Academy, where the following caveat was inscribed above the doorway: "Let no one ignorant of geometry enter here." Readers of these chapters will gain an appreciation of modem geometry and how it continues to play a crucial role in the context of motion control in cutting-edge science and technology.

Three main disciplines in the area of multibody systems are covered: kinematics, dynamics, and control, as pertaining to systems that can be modelled as coupling or rigid bodies. The treatment is intended to give a state of the art of the topics discussed.

Model-Based Control of Nonlinear Systems presents model-based control techniques for nonlinear, constrained systems. It covers constructive control design methods with an emphasis on modeling constrained systems, generating dynamic control models, and designing tracking control algorithms for the models.The book's interdisciplinary approach illustr