The last of such a workshop in the 20th Century, this workshop aims not only to summarize the state-of-the-art developments in VSS theory and applications, but also identify new promising directions perceived as being important for VSS in the 21st century. The 20th Century has witnessed the formation and consolidation of VSS theory and its applications. It has also witnessed an emerging trend of cross-fertilization and integration of VSS with other control and non-control areas such as feedback linearization, flatness, passivity based control, adaptive control, system identification, pulse width modulation, Hinf, geometric and algebraic methods, artificial intelligence, modelling and optimisation, neural networks, fuzzy logic, etc. This trend will continue and flourish in the new millennium.Special features of the book include a survey paper entitled “VSS Premise of XX Century: Evidences of a Witness” by the father of VSS theory Professor Vadim Utkin and other articles by many authoritative experts in VSS.

This book reflects the latest developments in variable structure systems (VSS) and sliding mode control (SMC), highlighting advances in various branches of the VSS/SMC field, e.g., from conventional SMC to high-order SMC, from the continuous-time domain to the discrete-time domain, from theories to applications, etc. The book consists of three parts and 16 chapters: in the first part, new VSS/SMC algorithms are proposed and their properties are analyzed, while the second focuses on the use of VSS/SMC techniques to solve a variety of control problems; the third part examines the applications of VSS/SMC to real-time systems. The book introduces postgraduates and researchers to the state-of-the-art in VSS/SMC field, including the theory, methodology, and applications. Relative academic disciplines include Automation, Mathematics, Electrical Engineering, Mechanical Engineering, Instrument Science and Engineering, Electronic Engineering, Computer Science and Technology, Transportation Engineering, Energy and Power Engineering, etc.