Part I Historical Perspective.-� Meinhard Kuna: Physics and Engineering at the Crack Tip - A Retrospective -- Experimental and Numerical Fracture Mechanics � An Individually Dyed History -- Part II Applications -- Fracture Mechanics Assessment of Welded Components at Static Loading -- Application of Fracture Mechanics for the Life Prediction of Critical Rotating Parts for Aero Engines -- Consideration of Fatigue Crack Growth Aspects in the Design and Assessment of Railway Axles -- Part III Fracture Testing -- Assessment of Material Properties by Means of the Small Punch Test -- Determination of Fracture Mechanics Parameters for Cast Iron Materials under Static, Dynamic and Cyclic Loading -- On the Development of Experimental Methods for the Determination of Fracture Mechanical Parameters of Ceramics -- Transition from Flat to Slant Fracture in Ductile Materials.-�Part IV Smart Materials -- Interaction of Cracks and Domain Structures in Thin Ferroelectric Films -- Modeling Approaches to Predict Damage Evolution and Life Time of Brittle Ferroelectrics -- Numerical Analysis of Interface Cracks in Layered Piezoelectric Solids -- Part V Analytical Mechanics -- Crack-Tip Fields of a Crack Impinging upon the Yielding/Debonding Slippage in Anisotropic Body -- On Conservation Laws and Reciprocity in Configurational Mechanics -- Part VI Local Approach to Fracture -- A Model for Predicting Fracture Toughness and Scatter in Thermally Embrittled Steels -- Micromechanical-Based Models for Des cribing Damage of Ferritic Steels -- Recent Trends in the Development of the Gurson's Model.

This book covers a wide range of topics in fracture and damage mechanics. It presents historical perspectives as well as recent innovative developments, presented by peer reviewed contributions from internationally acknowledged authors.� The volume deals with the modeling of fracture and damage in smart materials, current industrial applications of fracture mechanics, and it explores advances in fracture testing methods. In addition, readers will discover trends in the field of local approach to fracture and approaches using analytical mechanics. Scholars in the fields of materials science, engineering and computational science will value this volume which is dedicated to Meinhard Kuna on the occasion of his 65th birthday in 2015. This book incorporates the proceedings of an international symposium that was organized to honor Meinhard Kuna�s contributions to the field of theoretical and applied fracture and damage mechanics.