This research addresses delay effects in nonlinear systems, which are ubiquitous in various fields of physics, chemistry, biology, engineering, and even in social and economic systems. They may arise as a result of processing times or due to the finite propagation speed of information between the constituents of a complex system. Time delay has two complementary, counterintuitive and almost contradictory facets. On the one hand, delay is able to induce instabilities, bifurcations of periodic and more complicated orbits, multi-stability and chaotic motion. On the other hand, it can suppress instabilities, stabilize unstable stationary or periodic states and may control complex chaotic dynamics. This thesis deals with both aspects, and presents novel fundamental results on the controllability of nonlinear dynamics by time-delayed feedback, as well as applications to lasers, hybrid-mechanical systems, and coupled neural systems.

The book summarizes the state-of-the-art of research on control of self-organizing nonlinear systems with contributions from leading international experts in the field. The first focus concerns recent methodological developments including control of networks and of noisy and time-delayed systems. As a second focus, the book features emerging concepts of application including control of quantum systems, soft condensed matter, and biological systems. Special topics reflecting the active research in the field are the analysis and control of chimera states in classical networks and in quantum systems, the mathematical treatment of multiscale systems, the control of colloidal and quantum transport, the control of epidemics and of neural network dynamics.

The book summarizes the state-of-the-art of research on control of self-organizing nonlinear systems with contributions from leading international experts in the field. The first focus concerns recent methodological developments including control of networks and of noisy and time-delayed systems. As a second focus, the book features emerging concepts of application including control of quantum systems, soft condensed matter, and biological systems. Special topics reflecting the active research in the field are the analysis and control of chimera states in classical networks and in quantum systems, the mathematical treatment of multiscale systems, the control of colloidal and quantum transport, the control of epidemics and of neural network dynamics.