This volume consists of the state-of-the-art reports on new developments
in micromechanics and the modeling of nanoscale effects, and is a
companion book to the recent Kluwer volume on nanomechanics and mul-
scale modeling (it is entitled Trends in Nanoscale Mechanics). The two
volumes grew out of a series of discussions held at NASA Langley
Research Center (LaRC), lectures and other events shared by many
researchers from the national research laboratories and academia. The
key events include the 2001 Summer Series of Round-Table Discussions on
Nanotechnology at ICASE Institute (NASA LaRC) organized by Drs. V. M.
Harik and M. D. Salas and the 2002 NASA LaRC Workshop on Multi-scale
Modeling. The goal of these interactions was to foster collaborations
between academic researchers and the ICASE Institute (NASA LaRC), a
universi- based institute, which has pioneered world-class
computational, theoretical and experimental research in the disciplines
that are important to NASA. Editors gratefully acknowledge help of Ms.
E. Todd (ICASE, NASA LaRC), the ICASE Director M. D. Salas and all
reviewers, in particular, Dr. B. Diskin (ICASE/NIA, NASA LaRC), Prof. R.
Haftka (University of Florida), Dr. V. M. Harik (ICASE/Swales Aerospace,
NASA LaRC), Prof.