- SECOND CALL FOR PAPERS - SECOND CALL FOR PAPERS - FIFTH ANNUAL WORKSHOP ON Evolutionary Computation and Multi-Agent Systems and Simulation Workshop (ECoMASS-2011) to be held as part of the 2011 GENETIC AND EVOLUTIONARY COMPUTATION CONFERENCE (GECCO-2011) July 12-16, 2011 (Tuesday-Saturday) Dublin, Ireland Organized by ACM SIGEVO www.sigevo.org/GECCO-2011/ PAPER SUBMISSION DEADLINE FOR WORKSHOP: April 7, 2011 Workshop URL: http://www.cscs.umich.edu/ecomass/ --------------------------------------------------------------- Evolutionary computation (EC) and multi-agent systems and simulation (MASS) both involve populations of agents. EC is a learning technique by which a population of individual agents adapt according to the selection pressures exerted by an environment; MASS seeks to understand how to coordinate the actions of a population of (possibly selfish) autonomous agents that share an environment so that some outcome is achieved. Both EC and MASS have top-down and bottom-up features. For example, some aspects of multi-agent system engineering (e.g., mechanism design) are concerned with how top-down structure can constrain or influence individual decisions. Similarly, most work in EC is concerned with how to engineer selective pressures to drive the evolution of individual behavior towards some desired goal. Multi-agent simulation (also called agent-based modeling) addresses the bottom-up issue of how collective behavior emerges from individual action. Likewise, the study of evolutionary dynamics within EC (for example in coevolution) often considers how population-level phenomena emerge from individual-level interactions. Thus, at a high level, we may view EC and MASS as examining and utilizing analogous processes. It is therefore natural to consider how knowledge gained within EC may be relevant to MASS, and vice versa; indeed, applications and techniques from one field have often made use of technologies and algorithms from the other field. Studying EC and MASS in combination is warranted and has the potential to contribute to both fields. The goal of this workshop is to facilitate the examination and development of techniques at the intersection of evolutionary computation and multi-agent systems and simulation. The ECoMASS workshop welcomes original submissions in the theory and practice on all aspects of Evolutionary Computation and Multi-Agent Systems and Simulation, which include (but are not limited to) the following topics and themes: -Multi-agent systems and agent-based models utilizing evolutionary computation -Optimization of multi-agent systems and agent-based models using evolutionary computation -Evolutionary computation models which rely not on explicit fitness functions but rather implicit fitness functions defined by the relationship to other individuals / agents -Applications utilizing MASS and EC in combination -Biological agent-based models (usually called individual-based models) involving evolution -Evolution of cooperation and altruism -Genotypic representation of the complex phenotypic strategies of MASS -Evolutionary learning within MASS (including Baldwinian learning and phenotypic plasticity) -Emergence and feedbacks -Open-ended strategy spaces and evolution -Adaptive individuals within evolving populations *Paper Submission Each accepted paper will be presented orally at the workshop and distributed in the workshop proceedings to all GECCO attendees. Authors should follow the format of the GECCO manuscript style; refer to http://www.sigevo.org/gecco-2011/ for details. Manuscripts should not exceed 8 pages. Papers should be submitted by 7 April, 2011 in PostScript or PDF format to: [log in to unmask] or [log in to unmask] *Important Dates Paper submission deadline: 7 April, 2011 Notification of acceptance: 14 April, 2011 Final Papers Due: 26 April, 2011 Registration Deadline: 2 May, 2011 *Workshop Chairs Bill Rand, University of Maryland Forrest Stonedahl, Northwestern University *Program Committee of ECoMASS 2011 Rick Riolo, University of Michigan Matt Knudson, Carnegie Mellon University Jim Reggia, University of Maryland Michael North, Argonne National Laboratory Robert G. Reynolds, Wayne State University Tina Yu, Memorial University of Newfoundland GECCO is sponsored by the Association for Computing Machinery Special Interest Group on Genetic and Evolutionary Computation (SIGEVO). SIG Services: 2 Penn Plaza, Suite 701, New York, NY, 10121, USA, 1-800-342-6626 (USA and Canada) or +212-626-0500 (Global). -- Forrest Stonedahl, Ph.D. Candidate Electrical Engineering and Computer Science Department Center for Connected Learning and Computer-Based Modeling Northwestern University, Evanston, Illinois http://forrest.stonedahl.com/