Special Issue on "Rate-independent evolutions and hysteresis modelling"

The interest in hysteresis and rate-independent phenomena is shared by scientists with a great variety of different backgrounds. We can encounter these processes in several situations of common life: for instance in elasto-plasticity, ferromagnetism, shape memory alloys, phase transitions. Beyond physics, hysteresis and rate-independent phenomena appear also in engineering, biology, economics as well as in many other settings, playing an important role in many applications. The complexity arising in these fields necessarily requires a joint contribution of experts with different backgrounds and skills. Therefore, only synergy and cooperation among these several people can lead to concrete advances in the technological capabilities of our society. This special issue of Rendiconti del Seminario Matematico is devoted to the latest advances and trends in the modelling and in the analysis of this family of complex phenomena, motivated by the Spring School on Rate-independent Evolutions and Hysteresis Modelling, held at the Politecnico di Milano and University of Milano on May 27-31, 2013. In particular, we gathered contributions from different area of mathematics, with the intent of presenting an updated picture of current research directions, offering a new perspective in the study of these processes.