The advent of steam turbines and the sudden rise of steam temperature at the beginning of the 20th century gave a great impetus to the start of scientific research on metal creep and high-temperature strength. Then aeronautical and aerospace exploitation in the 1940's and 1950's enlarged the scope of creep research. In this context, the first IUTAM Symposium on "Creep in Structures" was held at Stanford University in July 1960, and about 60 participants from seven countries around the world discussed their recent results on this problem. Subsequent innovation in science and technology, as in nuclear and new energy technology, new materials, large scale integration of semiconductors etc., has claimed solutions to new and challenging problems in this fundamental field of applied mechanics. In order to discuss the new topics in this discipline, the IUTAM Symposia "Creep in Structures" thereafter have been held every ten years; i.e. the second in 1970 at Gothenburg, Sweden, the third in 1980 at Leicester, U.K. and the fourth in 1990 at Cracow,Poland. The First (1960) and Second Symposium (1970) were concerned mainly with the phenomenological law of creep and creep analysis of structural elements, whereas the issues of the Third Symposium (1980) shifted toward the problems of creep damage, creep crack growth, practical and effective design methods, etc.

Inhalt
An opening address; D.R. Hayhurst. Micromechanism-quantification for creep constitutive equations; B.F. Dyson, M. MCLean. Creep of gamma-TiA1 based alloys: experiments, computational modelling; W.T. Marketz, et al. Anisotropic creep of single crystal superalloys; D.M. Knowles, D.W. MacLachlan. A rate dependent formulation for void growth in single crystal materials; E.P. Busso, et al. Microstructural modeling of creep fracture in polycrystalline materials; P. Onck, et al. Creep crack growth: from discrete to continuum damage modelling; B.-N. Nguyen, et al. Prediction of inner cracking behavior in heat-resistant steel under creep-fatigue condition by means of three-dimensional numerical simulation; N. Tada, R. Ohtani. Creep of welded structures; T.H. Hyde, W. Sun. Two parameter characterization of crack tip fields under creep conditions; A.D. Bettinson, N.P. O'Dowd, et al. Cavity growth induced by electric current and stress in LSI conductor; T. Kitamura, T. Shibutani. Dislocation density simulations for bulk single crystal growth process using dislocation kinetics model; N. Miyazaki. Multiaxial creep fatigue under anisothermal conditions; J.P. Sermage, et al. Constitutive modeling of viscoplastic damage in solder materials; Y. Wei, et al. Consideration of stress state influences in the material modeling of creep, damage; H. Altenbach. Strain, stress, damage fields in damaged, cracked solids; A. Benallal, L. Siad. Effects of damage on the asymptotic fields of a model I creep crack in steady-state growth; S. Murakami, et al. Computational continuum damage mechanics: its use in the prediction of creep in structures: past, present, future; D.R. Hayhurst. Cracking of creeping structures described by means of CDM; A. Bodnar, M.Chrzanowski. A coupled formulation for thermo-viscoplasticity at finite strains: application to hot metal forming; L. Adam, J.P. Ponthot. Thick axisymmetric plate subjected to thermo-mechanical damage; A. Ganczarski. Creep of shotcrete tunnel shells; Ch. Hellmich, et al. Rupture life time prediction, deformation mechanisms during creep of single-crystal nickel-base superalloys; A. Epishin, et al. Creep damage assessment, void formation in engineering materials; H.C. Furtado, I. Le May. Creep damage accumulation, and failure in narrow regions of steel welds; D.J. Smith, et al. Long-term creep life prediction based on understanding of creep deformation behavior of ferritic heat resistant steels; K. Yagi, et al. Near-threshold fatigue 1 crack growth in SUS304 steel at elevated temperatures; S. Kubo, et al. Approximate viscoplastic notch analysis; G.Härkegard, H.-J. Huth. The reference stress method in creep design: a thirty year retrospective; J.T. Boyle, R. Seshadri. Study on creep-fatigue life prediction methods based on long-term creep-fatigue tests for austenitic stainless steel; Y. Takahashi. Developments in creep fracture assessments within the R5 procedures; R.A. Ainsworth, et al. On global approaches to some problems involving plasticity, viscosity effects; K. Dang Van. On the simulation of large viscoplastic structures under anisothermal cyclic loadings; L. Verger, et al. Description of inelastic behavior of perforated plates based on effective stress concept; T. Igari, et al. The overstress model applied to normal, pathological behavior of some engineering alloys; E. Krempl, K. Ho. Creep strain uncertainties associated with testpiece extensometer ridges: their identification, reduction; D.R. Hayhurst, et al. Equivalence of back stress