Optimization, as examined here, ranges from differential equations to problems arising in Mechanics and Statistics. The main topics covered are: calculations of variations and nonlinear elasticity, optimal control, analysis and optimization in problems dealing with nondifferentiable data, duality techniques, algorithms in mathematical programming and optimal control.

The 9th Belgian-French-German Conference on Optimization has been held in Namur (Belgium) on September 7-11, 1998. This volume is a collection of papers presented at this Conference. Originally, this Conference was a French-German Conference but this year, in accordance with the organizers' wishes, a third country, Belgium, has joined the founding members of the Conference. Hence the name: Belgian French-German Conference on Optimization. Since the very beginning, the purpose of these Conferences has been to bring together researchers working in the area of Optimization and partic ularly to encourage young researchers to present their work. Most of the participants come from the organizing countries. However the general ten dancy is to invite outside researchers to attend the meeting. So this year, among the 101 participants at this Conference, twenty researchers came from other countries. The general theme of the Conference is everything that concerns the area of Optimization without specification of particular topics. So theoretical as pects of Optimization, in addition to applications and algorithms of Opti mization, will be developed. However, and this point was very important for the organizers, the Conference must retain its convivial character. No more than two parallel sessions are organized. This would allow useful contacts between researchers to be promoted. The editors express their sincere thanks to all those who took part in this Conference. Their invaluable discussions have made this volume possible.

This volume contains a collection of 23 papers presented at the 4th French-German Conference on Optimization, hold at Irsee, April 21 - 26, 1986. The conference was aUended by ninety scientists: about one third from France, from Germany and from third countries each. They all contributed to a highly interesting and stimulating meeting. The scientifique program consisted of four survey lectures of a more tutorical character and of 61 contributed papers covering almost all areas of optimization. In addition two informal evening sessions and a plenary discussion on further developments of optimization theory were organized. One of the main aims of the organizers was to indicate and to stress the increasing importance of optimization methods for almost all areas of science and for a fast growing number of industry branches. We hope that the conference approached this goal in a certain degree and managed to continue fruitful discussions between -theory and -applications-. Equally important to the official contributions and lectures is the -nonmeasurable part of activities inherent in such a scientific meeting. Here the charming and inspiring atmosphere of a place like Irsee helped to establish numerous new contacts between the participants and to deepen already existing ones. The conference was sponsored by the Bayerische Kultusministerium, the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft and the Universities of Augsburg and Bayreuth. Their interest in the meeting and their assistance is gratefully acknowledged. We would like to thank the authors for their contributions and the referees for their helpful comments.

The book is intended for people (graduates, researchers, but also undergraduates with a good mathematical background) involved in the study of (static) optimization problems (in finite-dimensional spaces). It contains a lot of material, from basic tools of convex analysis to optimality conditions for smooth optimization problems, for non smooth optimization problems and for vector optimization problems.The development of the subjects are self-contained and the bibliographical references are usually treated in different books (only a few books on optimization theory deal also with vector problems), so the book can be a starting point for further readings in a more specialized literature.Assuming only a good (even if not advanced) knowledge of mathematical analysis and linear algebra, this book presents various aspects of the mathematical theory in optimization problems. The treatment is performed in finite-dimensional spaces and with no regard to algorithmic questions. After two chapters concerning, respectively, introductory subjects and basic tools and concepts of convex analysis, the book treats extensively mathematical programming problems in the smmoth case, in the nonsmooth case and finally vector optimization problems.· Self-contained· Clear style and results are either proved or stated precisely with adequate references· The authors have several years experience in this field· Several subjects (some of them non usual in books of this kind) in one single book, including nonsmooth optimization and vector optimization problems· Useful long references list at the end of each chapter

The 2-yearly French-German Conferences on Optimization review the state-of-the-art and the trends in the field. The proceedings of the Fifth Conference include papers on projective methods in linear programming (special session at the conference), nonsmooth optimization, two-level optimization, multiobjective optimization, partial inverse method, variational convergence, Newton type algorithms and flows and on practical applications of optimization. A. Ioffe and J.-Ph. Vial have contributed survey papers on, respectively second order optimality conditions and projective methods in linear programming.

In January 1992, the Sixth Workshop on Optimization and Numerical Analysis was held in the heart of the Mixteco-Zapoteca region, in the city of Oaxaca, Mexico, a beautiful and culturally rich site in ancient, colonial and modern Mexican civiliza tion. The Workshop was organized by the Numerical Analysis Department at the Institute of Research in Applied Mathematics of the National University of Mexico in collaboration with the Mathematical Sciences Department at Rice University, as were the previous ones in 1978, 1979, 1981, 1984 and 1989. As were the third, fourth, and fifth workshops, this one was supported by a grant from the Mexican National Council for Science and Technology, and the US National Science Foundation, as part of the joint Scientific and Technical Cooperation Program existing between these two countries. The participation of many of the leading figures in the field resulted in a good representation of the state of the art in Continuous Optimization, and in an over view of several topics including Numerical Methods for Diffusion-Advection PDE problems as well as some Numerical Linear Algebraic Methods to solve related pro blems. This book collects some of the papers given at this Workshop.

This book constitutes the thoroughly refereed post-proceedings of the First International Workshop on Global Constraints Optimization and Costraint Satisfaction, COCOS 2002, held in Valbonne-Sophia Antipolis, France in October 2002. The 15 revised full papers presented together with 2 invited papers were carefully selected during two rounds of reviewing and improvement. The papers address current issues in global optimization, mathematical programming, and constraint programming; they are grouped in topical sections on optimization, constraint satisfaction, and benchmarking.