The research objective is to develop fundamental insight, including explicit control design procedures, for control of mechanical systems subject to nonholonomic constraints (i.e., systems characterized by rolling without slipping). It has been demonstrated that suitable control cannot be achieved using classical nonlinear control methodologies, and this project's intent is to develop methods which are consistent with this class of dynamics problems. These methods involve mathematical concepts from differential geometry. Strong motivation is provided for this research by several important classes of engineering control problems, including several classes of problems with aerospace applications.*** //
