In the last forty years, nonlinear analysis has been broadly and rapidly developed. Lectures presented in the International Conference on Variational Methods at the Chern Institute of Mathematics in Tianjin of May 2009 reflect this development from different angles. This volume contains articles based on lectures in the following areas of nonlinear analysis: critical point theory, Hamiltonian dynamics, partial differential equations and systems, KAM theory, bifurcation theory, symplectic geometry, geometrical analysis, and celestial mechanics. Combinations of topological, analytical (especially variational), geometrical, and algebraic methods in these researches play important roles. In this proceedings, introductory materials on new theories and surveys on traditional topics are also given. Further perspectives and open problems on hopeful research topics in related areas are described and proposed. Researchers, graduate and postgraduate students from a wide range of areas in mathematics and physics will find contents in this proceedings are helpful.

Shape optimization problems are treated from the classical and modern perspectives Targets a broad audience of graduate students in pure and applied mathematics, as well as engineers requiring a solid mathematical basis for the solution of practical problems Requires only a standard knowledge in the calculus of variations, differential equations, and functional analysis Driven by several good examples and illustrations Poses some open questions.

In the last forty years, nonlinear analysis has been broadly and rapidly developed. Lectures presented in the International Conference on Variational Methods at the Chern Institute of Mathematics in Tianjin of May 2009 reflect this development from different angles. This volume contains articles based on lectures in the following areas of nonlinear analysis: critical point theory, Hamiltonian dynamics, partial differential equations and systems, KAM theory, bifurcation theory, symplectic geometry, geometrical analysis, and celestial mechanics. Combinations of topological, analytical (especially variational), geometrical, and algebraic methods in these researches play important roles. In this proceedings, introductory materials on new theories and surveys on traditional topics are also given. Further perspectives and open problems on hopeful research topics in related areas are described and proposed. Researchers, graduate and postgraduate students from a wide range of areas in mathematics and physics will find contents in this proceedings are helpful.

Hilbert's talk at the second International Congress of 1900 in Paris marked the beginning of a new era in the calculus of variations. A development began which, within a few decades, brought tremendous success, highlighted by the 1929 theorem of Ljusternik and Schnirelman on the existence of three distinct prime closed geodesics on any compact surface of genus zero, and the 1930/31 solution of Plateau's problem by Douglas and Radò. The book gives a concise introduction to variational methods and presents an overview of areas of current research in this field. This new edition has been substantially enlarged, a new chapter on the Yamabe problem has been added and the references have been updated. All topics are illustrated by carefully chosen examples, representing the current state of the art in their field.

Hilberts talk at the second International Congress of 1900 in Paris marked the beginning of a new era in the calculus of variations. A development began which, within a few decades, brought tremendous success, highlighted by the 1929 theorem of Ljusternik and Schnirelman on the existence of three distinct prime closed geodesics on any compact surface of genus zero, and the 1930/31 solution of Plateaus problem by Douglas and Rad. This third edition gives a concise introduction to variational methods and presents an overview of areas of current research in the field, plus a survey on new developments.

This book contains both a synthesis and mathematical analysis of a wide set of algorithms and theories whose aim is the automatic segmen tation of digital images as well as the understanding of visual perception. A common formalism for these theories and algorithms is obtained in a variational form. Thank to this formalization, mathematical questions about the soundness of algorithms can be raised and answered. Perception theory has to deal with the complex interaction between regions and "edges" (or boundaries) in an image: in the variational seg mentation energies, "edge" terms compete with "region" terms in a way which is supposed to impose regularity on both regions and boundaries. This fact was an experimental guess in perception phenomenology and computer vision until it was proposed as a mathematical conjecture by Mumford and Shah. The third part of the book presents a unified presentation of the evi dences in favour of the conjecture. It is proved that the competition of one-dimensional and two-dimensional energy terms in a variational for mulation cannot create fractal-like behaviour for the edges. The proof of regularity for the edges of a segmentation constantly involves con cepts from geometric measure theory, which proves to be central in im age processing theory. The second part of the book provides a fast and self-contained presentation of the classical theory of rectifiable sets (the "edges") and unrectifiable sets ("fractals").

Physics has long been regarded as a wellspring of mathematical problems. Mathematical Methods in Physics is a self-contained presentation, driven by historic motivations, excellent examples, detailed proofs, and a focus on those parts of mathematics that are needed in more ambitious courses on quantum mechanics and classical and quantum field theory. Aimed primarily at a broad community of graduate students in mathematics, mathematical physics, physics and engineering, as well as researchers in these disciplines.