Preface to the topical issue on applied and nonlinear dynamics: Part I

The current special issue of the GAMM Mitteilungen, which is the first of a two-part series, contains several contributions on the topic of applied and nonlinear dynamics. Dynamical problems occur in a wide range of engineering systems, such as all kinds of vehicles, wind power plants, turbines, engines, machine tools or in robotics, ranging from industrial robotics to service and medical robots. Dynamical questions are also essential in the modeling of biomechanical systems, for example in the description of the (human) musculoskeletal system or in the development of human dummies for crash tests. Nowadays a wide range of analytical, numerical, data-based and experimental tools and methods exists to foster the investigation of all kinds of dynamical systems. Hereby also the issue of model reduction plays an increasingly important role. Modern dynamical systems are often active systems, thus methods from system dynamics and control theory have to be included. This important connection between these communities is also reflected in the GAMM activity group (Fachausschuss) “Dynamics and Control Theory.” Many researchers contributing to this topical issue on applied and nonlinear dynamics are members of this GAMM activity group. We are very happy that several teams of authors have accepted our invitation to report on recent developments, research highlights and emerging application areas in applied and nonlinear dynamics. The four papers in this first part of the topical issue on applied and nonlinear dynamics are devoted to the above mentioned topics. The first paper [1] presents a minimal model for investigation of the influence of equilibrium positions on brake squeal. Paper [2] deals with an interpolation-based parametric model order reduction of automotive brake systems for frequency-domain analyses. In the contribution [3] nonlinear vibration phenomena in hydrodynamically supported rotor systems are discussed. Finally the last paper [4] presents the application of stable inversion methods to flexible manipulators modeled by the absolute nodal coordinate formulation for feedforward control design.