Fatigue of structures and materials in the 20th century and the state of the art

The paper surveys the historical development of scientific and engineering knowledge about fatigue of materials and structures in the 20th century. This includes fatigue as a material phenomenon, prediction models for fatigue properties of structures, and load spectra. The review leads to an inventory of the present state of the art. Some final remarks follow in an epilogue. (C) 2003 Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved.