Activity and trends in MMS from IFToMM community

Abstract

Mechanism and Machine Science (MMS) has been the core of mechanical engineering, and indeed of industrial engineering, since the beginning of engineering practice and particularly in modern times. A short survey is presented to outline the main characteristics of mechanisms and their evolution with the aim to identify challenges and the role of MMS in future developments of Technology for the benefit of Society. The significance of IFToMM, the International Federation for the Promotion of MMS, is also stressed as the worldwide community that in the past 40 years has contributed the most to aggregate common views and developments with an important role for future improvements yet to come. Modern systems specifically with mechatronic design and operation still need careful attention from mechanism design viewpoints to properly achieve the goals of forwarding technological developments for supporting or replacing human operators in their activity.