Some historical remarks on Bertil Lindblad's work on galactic dynamics -- Formation and evolution mechanisms of barred spiral galaxies -- Orbits in barred galaxies -- Secular evolution in barred galaxies -- The fate of barred galaxies in interacting and merging systems -- H i in barred spirals -- Hi Observations of a sample of barred spirals -- Hydrodynamical simulations of the barred spiral galaxy NGC 1365 -- Evolution of galaxies along the Hubble sequence -- Rings, lenses, nuclear bars: the fundamental role of gas -- The barred galaxy NGC 1530 -- A circumnuclear molecular torus in NGC 1365 -- Dynamics of inner galactic disks: The striking case of M 100 -- Dynamical substructures in two nearby galaxy nuclei -- The spheroidal component of Seyfert galaxies -- The pattern speed of the Galactic bulge -- The central Parsec of the Milky Way: Star formation and central dark mass -- Radio continuum and molecular gas in the Galactic Center -- The galactic center dynamics -- Observational evidence for the AGN paradigm -- Bar triggered nuclear activity and the anisotropic radiation fields of Active Galactic Nuclei -- Circumnuclear starbursts in barred galaxies -- Circumnuclear activity -- Outflows from the nearest barred galaxies -- The nuclear high excitation outflow cone in NGC 1365 -- Hubble Space Telescope observations of the centers of elliptical galaxies.

This collection of articles emerged from the Nobel Symposium 98 that celebrated the centenary of the Nobel Prize as well as the one of the famous Swedish astronomer Bertil Lindblad. Many outstanding scientists contributed to this unique review of the state of the art in barred galaxy research. Theoretical papers describe their evolution, the dynamics as well as fundamental physical effects near their nuclei. Other contributions cover numerical and observational aspects and thus represent a very active area in astrophysics. The centre of our galaxy was also amply dealt with. The collection addresses researchers as well as graduate students.