Various holonomy phenomena are shown to be instances of the reconstruction procedure for mechanical systems with symmetry. We systematically exploit this point of view for fixed systems and for slowly moving systems in adiabatic context. For the latter, we obtain the phases as the holonomy for a connection which synthesizes the Cartan connection for moving mechanical systems with the Hannay-Berry connection for integrable systems.

A development of the basic theory and applications of mechanics with an emphasis on the role of symmetry. The book includes numerous specific applications, making it beneficial to physicists and engineers. Specific examples and applications show how the theory works, backed by up-to-date techniques, all of which make the text accessible to a wide variety of readers, especially senior undergraduates and graduates in mathematics, physics and engineering. This second edition has been rewritten and updated for clarity throughout, with a major revamping and expansion of the exercises. Internet supplements containing additional material are also available.

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.

This booklet studies the geometry of the reduction of Lagrangian systems with symmetry in a way that allows the reduction process to be repeated; that is, it develops a context for Lagrangian reduction by stages. The Lagrangian reduction procedure focuses on the geometry of variational structures and how to reduce them to quotient spaces under group actions. This philosophy is well known for the classical cases, such as Routh reduction for systems with cyclic variables (where the symmetry group is Abelian) and Euler-Poincare reduction (for the case in which the configuration space is a Lie group) as well as Euler-Poincare reduction for semidirect products.

This volume provides a detailed account of the theory of symplectic reduction by stages, along with numerous illustrations of the theory. It gives special emphasis to group extensions, including a detailed discussion of the Euclidean group, the oscillator group, the Bott-Virasoro group and other groups of matrices. The volume also provides ample background theory on symplectic reduction and cotangent bundle reduction.

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 falling cat is an interesting theme to pursue, in which geometry, mechanics, and control are in action together. As is well known, cats can almost always land on their feet when tossed into the air in an upside-down attitude. If cats are not given a non-vanishing angular momentum at an initial instant, they cannot rotate during their motion, and the motion they can make in the air is vibration only. However, cats accomplish a half turn without rotation when landing on their feet. In order to solve this apparent mystery, one needs to thoroughly understand rotations and vibrations. The connection theory in differential geometry can provide rigorous definitions of rotation and vibration for many-body systems. Deformable bodies of cats are not easy to treat mechanically. A feasible way to approach the question of the falling cat is to start with many-body systems and then proceed to rigid bodies and, further, to jointed rigid bodies, which can approximate the body of a cat. In this book, the connection theory is applied first to a many-body system to show that vibrational motions of the many-body system can result in rotations without performing rotational motions and then to the cat model consisting of jointed rigid bodies. On the basis of this geometric setting, mechanics of many-body systems and of jointed rigid bodies must be set up. In order to take into account the fact that cats can deform their bodies, three torque inputs which may give a twist to the cat model are applied as control inputs under the condition of the vanishing angular momentum. Then, a control is designed according to the port-controlled Hamiltonian method for the model cat to perform a half turn and to halt the motion upon landing. The book also gives a brief review of control systems through simple examples to explain the role of control inputs.

* Winner of the Ferran Sunyer i Balaguer Prize in 2000. * Reviews the necessary prerequisites, beginning with an introduction to Lie symmetries on Poisson and symplectic manifolds. * Currently in classroom use in Europe. * Can serve as a resource for graduate courses and seminars in Hamiltonian mechanics and symmetry, symplectic and Poisson geometry, Lie theory, mathematical physics, and as a comprehensive reference resource for researchers.

Bridges studies the origin of Korteweg-de Vries equation using phase modulation and its implications in dynamical systems and nonlinear waves.