Special section on uncertainty quantification and management in nonlinear dynamical systems in aerospace and mechanical engineering

With the increasing integration of lightweight structures, multibody systems, and multidomain coupled systems into aerospace systems, the study of nonlinearities on their dynamical response is becoming an important area of research. These nonlinearities can arise from various sources, such as large structural deformation, multiple joints within complex mechanisms, as well as multiphysical couplings such as fluid–structural and electrical–mechanical interactions. The effects of these nonlinearities on dynamics and control can be very significant, such as changing flutter boundary in tiltrotor systems and shifting the aerodynamic center of certain wings affecting control. However, the influence of these nonlinearities is often neglected in the analysis of engineering structures due to added computational complexity, nonlinearities characterization, and high computational cost, leading to significant uncertainties in the durability and reliability of critical aerospace system designs. In addition, the dynamics of spacecraft motion also have strong nonlinearity due to the perturbations from the nonsphericity of the earth, the atmospheric drag, solar radiation pressure, and the gravitation of the sun and moon. These nonlinearities could make the motion of the spacecraft very sensitive to the initial state and unmodeled forces.