NCA 2008 -  Workshop on Natural Computing and Applications

to be held in the framework of

SYNASC 2008 

 10^th Symposium of Symbolic and Numeric Algorithms for Scientific Computing

Timisoara, Romania, September 26-29, 2008

Workshop description:

Natural Computing is a field of research that is concerned with the use of nature-inspired paradigms for solving computational problems. The world of natural computing is diverse and fascinating. It tries to combine the computing carried in computer science with the computing observed in nature. It can be used both to better understand complex natural phenomena and to design methods
to solve complex problems.

We invite authors to submit their original and unpublished work that communicates current research in all area of natural computing with a
particular focus on methods designed to solve complex problems. The contributions can address both theoretical and methodological aspects,
as well as various applications in science, engineering, business, commerce etc. 

Topics:

Suggested topics for papers include, but are not limited to, the following:

  -evolutionary computing,
   -neural computing, Bayesian networks, learning algorithms,
   -membrane computing,
   -DNA computing,
   - molecular computing,
   -information processing in cells and tissues,
   -quantum computing,
   -immunocomputing,
   -swarm intelligence, particle swarm optimization, ant colony optimization,
   -bacterial foraging
   -computation with words,
   -granular computation,
   -artificial life,
   -emergent computing and self-organizing systems
   -complex adaptive systems
   -hybridization of evolutionary, neural, molecular and quantum computing,
   -hybrid optimization algorithms involving natural computing techniques and other
    global and local optimization methods,
   -integration of natural computing techniques in intelligent systems,
   -implementation issues of natural computing techniques,
   -natural computing approaches for multi-objective, multimodal and dynamic optimization,
   -natural computing approaches in knowledge discovery, natural language processing, image processing, planning and scheduling,  information security, human-computer interaction, Web Intelligence, Web-based support systems,
   -natural computing applications in science, business, finance,  engineering,  medicine, bioinformatics and other fields.

Submission of papers:

 Papers of up to 8 pages edited using the IEEE conference style (http://synasc08.info.uvt.ro/storage/IEEE_CS_Latex.zip) be submitted electronically to nca08@info.uvt.ro.

Submitted papers have to be original and should contain new and interesting results. All papers will be peer reviewed by at least THREE independent referees of the program committee of NCA'08 and accepted on the basis of their scientific merit and relevance to the Workshop topics. Papers accepted and presented at the workshop will be published in the SYNASC'08 post-proceedings edited by IEEE Computer Society (ISI Proceedings).

 Additional publication opportunities:

Several Special issues focused on some topics will be formulated soon after the conference. These special issues will be published by International journals in the field.

Workshop deadlines:

Submission of papers (extended deadline): July 7, 2008

Notification of acceptance:  August 10, 2008

Final paper:   September 1, 2008

Registration:   September 1, 2008

Revised paper for post-proceeedings: October 25, 2008

Workshop chairs:

Ajith Abraham - Norwegian University of Science and Technology, Norway, ajith.abraham@ieee.org

Dan Dumitrescu - Department of Computer Science, Babes Bolyai University, Cluj-Napoca, Romania, ddumitr@cs.ubbcluj.ro

Program Committee:

 Abo Al-Ola Atifi - CBA Kuwait University, Kuwait

Mokhtar Beldjehem - Ecole Polytechnique de Montreal, Montreal, Canada

Yuehui Chen - Jinan University, China

Camelia Chira - University "Babes-Bolyai" Cluj-Napoca, Romania

Juan M. Corchado - University of Salamanca, Spain

Bernard De Baets -  University of Ghent, Belgium

Laura Diosan - University "Babes-Bolyai" Cluj-Napoca, Romania

Stefka Fidanova - Bulgarian Academy of Science, Bulgaria

Olivier Francois -  Institut National Polytechnique de Grenoble, France

Pierluigi Frisco - Heriot-Watt University, Edinburgh, UK

Ranadhir Ghosh -  University of Ballarat, Australia

Anca Gog - Babes Bolyai University, Cluj Napoca, Romania

Crina Grosan -  Babes Bolyai University, Cluj Napoca, Romania

Hisao Ishibuchi - Osaka Prefecture University, Japan

Er Meng Joo -  Nanyang Technological University, Singapore

Urszula Markowska Kaczmar - Wroclaw University of Technology, Poland

Janusz Kacprzyk - Polish Academy of Sciences, Poland

Arpad Kelemen - Niagara University, USA

Mario Koppen - Kyushu Institute of Technology, Japan

Jiri Kroc - University of West Bohemia, Czech Republic

Hongbo Liu -  Dalian University of Technology, China

Carlos Martin-Vide - Roveira I Virgili University, Spain & European Research Council, Brussels

Sanaz Mostaghim - University of Karlsruhe, Germany

Nadia Nedjah - State University of Rio, Brazil

Mihai Oltean - Babes Bolyai University, Cluj Napoca, Romania

Vasile Palade - Oxford University, UK

Gheorghe Paun - Institute of Mathematics of the Romanian Academy, Romania

Witold Pedrycz - University of Alberta, Canada

Ashraf Saad - School of Computing,Armstrong Atlantic State University USA

Khalid Saeed - Bialystok University of Technology, Poland

P. Saratchandran - Nanyang Technological University, Singapore

Josef Tvrdik - University of Ostrava, Czech Republic

Yanqing Zhang - Georgia State University, USA

Berend Jan van der Zwaag - University of Twente, Netherlands

Fabio Zambetta - Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology, Australia

Local organizer:

Daniela Zaharie - West University of Timisoara, Romania, dzaharie@info.uvt.ro