Following a suggestion by the Gesellschaft fur Angewandte Mathematik und
Mechanik (GAMM) the International Union of Theoretical and Applied
Mecha- nics (IUTAM) decided to sponsor a Symposium on "Laminar-Turbulent
Tran- sition". Originally planned to be held in Oberwolfach, where the
number of participants would have had to have been rather limited, the
overwhelming response to the first announcement made it clear that the
larger facili- ties at the University of Stuttgart would be more
appropriate. The Scientific Committee decided that the Symposium should
concentrate on fundamental mechanisms of the transition process. With
this limited scope it was hoped to facilitate an easy exchange of ideas
and to enable fruit- ful discussions. The Symposium consisted of eight
invited lectures in ad- dition to 34 contributed papers solicited by a
Call for Papers. With this Call for Papers it was intended to encourage
participation of yet unknown researchers in this field and to insure
that all innovative work would be included.