Happy Catastrophe: Recent Progress in Analysis and Exploitation of Elastic Instability

A synthesis of recent progress is presented on a topic that lies at the heart of both structural engineering and nonlinear science. The emphasis is on thin elastic structures that lose stability subcritically --- without a nearby stable post-buckled state --- a canonical example being a uniformly axially-loaded cylindrical shell. Such structures are hard to design and certify because imperfections or shocks trigger buckling at loads well below...