Special issue on symposia organized by the American Society of Biomechanics at the 7th World Congress of Biomechanics.

First, a bit of historical background adapted from the founding documents of the American Society of Biomechanics (original author unknown)... The American Society of Biomechanics (ASB) was founded in 1977 by a group of 53 scientists and clinicians. There were at the time several regional and national organizations in the United States that regularly or occasionally assigned portions of their broader meetings to biomechanics content. However, people associated with the parent fields generally attended those meetings, with more sparse attendance by front-line biomechanists. As a result, there was little opportunity for the kind of exchange between people working in biomechanics across different fields of application that would clearly benefit all concerned. ASB was formed to meet that need. The ASB mission is: