[agents] CFP Agent-Directed Simulation 2009

[Yu Zhang]

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CALL FOR PAPERS
Agent-Directed Simulation Symposium (ADS'09)
Part of the 2009 Spring Simulation Multiconference
San Diego, California, USA
March 22-27, 2009

http://www.eng.auburn.edu/SCS-TM/ADS-2009.htm
Manuscript Submission: October 30, 2008.
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INTRODUCTION

Currently, there exist many agent conferences, as well as agent-based 
(social) simulation conferences. However, there are not many simulation 
conferences where agent and simulation technology are together a central 
theme. It is therefore that the ADS symposium fills a gap in the agent 
community as well as the simulation community.

The purpose of the ADS symposium is to facilitate dissemination of the 
most recent advancements in the theory, methodology, application, and 
toolkits of agent-directed simulation. Agent-directed simulation is 
comprehensive in the integration of agent and simulation technology, by 
including models that use agents to develop domain-specific simulations 
(this is often referred to as agent-based simulation), and by also 
including the use of agent technology to develop simulation techniques and 
toolkits that are subsequently applied, either with or without agents. 
Hence, agent-directed simulation consists of three distinct, yet related 
areas that can be grouped under two categories as follows:

Simulation for Agents (agent simulation): simulation of agent systems in 
engineering, human and social dynamics, military applications etc.

Agents for Simulation: agent-supported simulation deals with the use of 
agents as a support facility to enable computer assistance in problem 
solving or enhancing cognitive capabilities; agent-based simulation 
focuses on the use of agents for the generation of model behavior in a 
simulation study.

Through the theme of agent-directed simulation, the symposium will bring 
together agent technologies, tools, toolkits, platforms, languages, 
methodologies, and applications in a pragmatic manner. In this symposium, 
established researchers, educators, and students are encouraged to come 
together and discuss the benefits of agent technology in their use and 
application for simulation. It is a way for people to discuss why and how 
they have used agent technology in their simulations, and describe the 
benefit of having done so.

The theme of ADS'09 is based on the observation of the following premises.

The growth of new advanced distributed computing standards along with the 
rapid rise of e-commerce are providing a new context that acts as a 
critical driver for the development of next generation systems. These 
standards revolve around service-oriented technologies, pervasive 
computing, web-services, Grid, autonomic computing, ambient intelligence 
etc. The supporting role that intelligent agents play in the development 
of such systems is becoming pervasive, and simulation plays a critical 
role in the analysis and design of such systems.

The use of emergent agent technologies at the organization, interaction 
(e.g., coordination, negotiation, communication) and agent levels (i.e. 
reasoning, autonomy) are expected to advance the state of the art in 
various application domains. However, modeling and testing complex agent 
systems that are based on such technologies is difficult. Using 
agent-supported simulation techniques for testing complex agent systems is 
up and coming field.

To facilitate bridging the gap between research and application, there is 
a need for tools, agent programming languages, and methodologies to 
analyze, design, and implement complex, non-trivial agent-based 
simulations. Existing agent-based simulation tools are still not mature 
enough to enable developing agents with varying degrees cognitive and 
reasoning capabilities.

ADS 2009 will provide a leading forum to bring together researchers and 
practitioners from diverse simulation societies within computer science, 
social sciences, engineering, business, education, human factors, and 
systems engineering. The involvement of various agent-directed simulation 
groups will enable the cross-fertilization of ideas and development of new 
perspectives by fostering novel advanced solutions, as well as enabling 
technologies for agent-directed simulation.

PROGRAM TOPICS

Technical and position papers are solicited on the theory, methodology, 
technology, tools, toolkits, and environments as well as applications. 
Topics include, but are not limited to the following areas:

Theory/methodology:

- High-level agent specification languages for modeling and simulation.
- Agent programming and simulation modeling languages.
- Distributed simulation for multi-agent systems.
- Formal models of agents and agent societies.
- Advanced agent features for agent simulation: e.g.,
- Cooperation and coopetition modeling with holonic agents.
- Agents with personality, agents with dynamic personality, agents with
   emotions, agents having different types of intelligence such as
   emotional intelligence, agents with several types of understanding
   abilities such as multivision understanding ability, trustworthy
   agents, moral agents.
- Verification, validation, and testing of agent-directed simulations.

Technology, tools, toolkits, and environments:

- Agent infrastructures and supporting technologies (e.g.,
   interoperability, agent-oriented software engineering environments).
- Modeling, design, and simulation of agent systems based on
   service-oriented technologies, pervasive computing, web-services,
   grid computing, autonomic computing, ambient intelligence.
- Agent architectures, platforms, and frameworks.
- Standard APIs for agent simulation programming.

Applications:

- Simulation modeling of agent technologies at the organization,
   interaction (e.g., communication, negotiation, coordination,
   collaboration) and agent level (e.g., deliberation, social agents,
   computational autonomy).
- Application of agent simulations in various areas such as biology,
   business, commerce, economy, engineering, environment, individual,
   group, and organization behavior, management, simulation
   gaming/training, social systems.
- Conflict management simulation with holonic agents.

AUTHOR GUIDE

Short position papers are targeted at raising a question or framing an 
issue for discussion during the symposium. Position papers are limited to 
3 pages (min 10 pt, not including figures or references).

Technical papers provide a longer format for presenting experience 
reports, research results, or descriptions of  "work in progress". 
Technical papers are limited to 8 pages (min 10 pt).

If you wish to submit a position or technical paper please provide your 
manuscript by October 30, 2009 with the authors' complete addresses, 
phone, fax, and e-mail for consideration. Papers should be submitted 
electronically to http://www.softconf.com/scs/ADS09/. All technical 
papers will be subject to a peer-reviewing process by three program 
committee members. A notification of acceptance will be sent by December 
30, 2008. Full paper deadline is January 20, 2009

FINAL PAPER SUBMISSION GUIDELINES

All prospective authors, whose papers are accepted for inclusion in the 
program, will be invited to submit their position or technical  papers to 
ADS'08. Accepted papers will be published in the conference proceedings by 
the SCS. In addition, the committee will select a set of best papers. 
Authors of these papers will be encouraged to submit appropriately 
expanded versions of these papers for journal publication.

KEY DATES

Manuscript submission: October 30, 2008
Notification of acceptance: December 30, 2008
Full Camera-ready papers: January 20, 2009
ADS'09 Symposium: March 22-29, 2009

General Chair: Tuncer Ören, University of Ottawa
Program Co-Chair:
   Levent Yilmaz, Auburn University
   Maarten Sierhuis, NASA Ames Research Center
   Gregory Madey, University of Notre Dame
Publicity Chair: Yu Zhang, Trinity University

Sponsored by: The Society for Modeling and Simulation International (SCS) 
in collaboration with ACM/SIGSIM.