An up-to-date description of progress and current problems with the
gravitational constant, both in terms of generalized gravitational
theories and experiments either in the laboratory, using Casimir force
measurements, or in space at solar system distances and in cosmological
observations.
Contributions cover different aspects of the state and prediction of
unified theories of the physical interactions including gravitation as a
cardinal link, the role of experimental gravitation and observational
cosmology in discriminating between them, the problem of the precise
measurement and stability of fundamental physical constants in space and
time, and the gravitational constant in particular.
Recent advances discussed include unified and scalar-tensor theories,
theories in diverse dimensions and their observational windows,
gravitational experiments in space, rotational and torsional effects in
gravity, basic problems in cosmology, early universe as an arena for
testing unified models, and big bang nucleosynthesis.