This is the fifth book of the Kluwer's series Advances in Robot Kine matics. The book presents the most recent research advances in the theory, design, control and application of robotic systems, which are intended for a variety of purposes such as manipulation, manufactur ing, automation, surgery, locomotion and biomechanics. The issues addressed are fundamentally kinematic in nature, including synthesis, calibration, redundancy, force control, dexterity, inverse and forward kinematics, kinematic singularities, as well as over-constrained systems. Methods used include line geometry, quaternion algebra, screw alge bra, and linear algebra. These methods are applied to both parallel and serial multi-degree-of-freedom systems. The results should interest researchers, teachers and students, in fields of engineering and mathe matics related to robot theory, design, control and application. Each contribution in this book had been rigorously reviewed by two or three independent reviewers and 53 articles had been recommended for publication. We are happy to observe that Advances in Robot Kine matics has always attracted the most outstanding authors and has de veloped a remarkable scientific community in the area. Many important and original scientific results were for the first time reported and dis cussed in these books. All articles in this book were also reported at the eight international symposium on Advances in Robot Kinematics that was organised in June 2002 in Caldes de Malavella in Spain.
