http://www.hindawi.com/journals/ame/si/954890/cfp/  

Reconfigurable and Deployable Mechanisms 

With the development of science and technology and especially the progress of deep space and undersea exploration, the traditional mechanisms with limited adaptability and flexibility are facing challenges. Reconfigurable and deployable mechanical systems being capable of adapting themselves to variable tasks have been attracting great attentions in both academia and industry. Reconfigurable mechanisms are well suited for applications in domestic, hazardous, deep space, deep sea, and complex manufacturing environments. Deployable structures are also widely used in a variety of spacecrafts and planetary detectors. With increasing requirements upon transformation, dexterity, modularization, reconfigurability, and reliability, research and development of reconfigurable and deployable mechanisms face a series of challenges both in theoretical and technical aspects.  

We invite researchers to contribute their original research articles and review articles describing the new outcomes as well as review articles that will stimulate the continuing efforts in design, construction, and analysis of reconfigurable and deployable mechanisms. Potential topics include, but are not limited to:  

>Reconfigurable mechanisms 

>Deployable mechanisms 

>Reconfigurable robots 

>Inflatable structures 

>Metamorphic mechanisms 

>Variable topology modeling 

>Kinematics and dynamics 

>Self-assembly mechanisms 

>Modular robots 

>Biometamorphic robotics 

>Solar panel or solar sail 

>Foldable structures 

>Bioinspired deployable structures 

>Compliant mechanisms 

>Self-replicating systems 

>Soft or flexible mechanisms 

Before submission authors should carefully read over the journal’s Author Guidelines, which are located at http://www.hindawi.com/journals/ame/guidelines/. Prospective authors should submit an electronic copy of their complete manuscript through the journal Manuscript Tracking System at http://mts.hindawi.com/submit/journals/ame/recon/ according to the following timetable:  

Manuscript Due: Friday, 12 December 2014  

First Round of Reviews: Friday, 6 March 2015  

Publication Date: Friday, 1 May 2015  

Lead Guest Editor 

Jinguo Liu, State Key Laboratory of Robotics, Shenyang Institute of Automation, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Shenyang, China  

Guest Editors 

Xilun Ding, Robotics Institute, Beijing University of Aeronautics and Astronautics, Beijing, China  

Yan Jin, School of Mechanical & Aerospace Engineering, Queen's University Belfast, Belfast, UK  

Ketao Zhang, Centre for Robotics Research, School of Natural and Mathematical Sciences, King’s College London, Strand, UK  

Guangbo Hao, School of Engineering, University College Cork, Cork, Ireland