The Conference had 165 participants from 28 countries. The program of the first morning was devoted to 3 plenary lectures by P. B. Gilkey, C. M. Marle and J. Eells. In conclusion of this morning, J. P. Bourguignon and P. Michor presented an interesting information about activities of the European Mathematical Society. Then the program was organized into 3 sections oriented towards Riemannian geometry (chairman O. Kowalski), other geometric structures (chairman I. Kolar) and geometric methods of mathematical physics (chairman J. Novotny). There were about 50 lectures in sections and more than 70 short communications. In the poster sessions, about 30 posters were presented. The meeting created an inspiring atmosphere for fruitful discussions among the participants. The historical sites of the town Brno and its surroundings offered excellent occasions to get to know Czech cultural traditions and for evening programs.
The papers collected in the present volume are based on the lectures presented at the Conference. The content of the papers covers a wide range of topics in differential geometry and its applications. The subjects receiving major emphasis are Riemannian geometry, higher order differential geometry, geometric theory of differential equations, geometry of the variational calculus, analytic mechanics and mathematical physics. The list of the participants of the Conference is also included. The electronic version of these Proceedings is located on the informational server of the European Mathematical Society on the address http://www.emis.de/proceedings/.
The editors express their deep gratitude to all participants who contributed to the success of the Conference and especially to those who submitted the manuscript for publication.