[agents] CFP (extended deadline): Special Issue on Model-driven Engineering of Multi-agent Systems in Theory and Practice Elsevier COMLAN,

[jjgomez]

CALL FOR PAPERS (extended deadlines)

Elsevier Computer Languages, Systems and Structures journal (COMLAN)
Special issue on Model-driven Engineering of Multi-agent Systems in Theory
and Practice

http://www.journals.elsevier.com/computer-languages-systems-and-structures/call-for-papers/special-issue-on-model-driven-engineering-of-multi-agent-sys/

Guest Editors:
Geylani Kardas, Ege University, Turkey (geylani.kardas at ege.edu.tr <mailto:geylani.kardas at ege.edu.tr>)
Jorge J. Gomez-Sanz, Universidad Complutense de Madrid, Spain (
jjgomez at ucm.es <mailto:jjgomez at ucm.es>)

Multi-agent systems (MASs) are those systems having software agents within
an environment where agents interact in order to solve problems in a
competitive or collaborative manner. Agents are expected, too, to be
autonomous, perhaps through a set of reactive/proactive behaviors designed
for addressing situations likely to happen in particular domains. Under
those requirements, development and evolution of such MAS are challenging
tasks.  To cope with those challenges, researchers in MAS have recently
made extensive use of the Model Driven Development (MDD) paradigm.
Model-driven engineering (MDE) aims to change the focus of software
development from code to models while enabling the systematic use of models
as primary engineering artifacts throughout the engineering lifecycle.

MDE applied to autonomous agents and MASs has become one of the active
research topics in agent-oriented software engineering (AOSE) area. Agent
researchers investigate how the level of abstraction during software
development can be promoted and they propose various agent meta-models,
modeling languages, MAS development methodologies, and supporting
computer-aided software engineering (CASE) tools. Within this context, MAS
development may also benefit from both domain-specific modeling (DSM) and
the use of domain-specific (modeling) languages (DSLs/DSMLs). Researchers'
work improves the use of MDE for agent systems by developing new DSLs/DSMLs
in which language syntax offer concepts and relations specific to the MAS
domain. Graphical or textual syntax of such agent DSLs/DSMLs with
supporting developer tools enhance the MAS development and, in many
situations, they facilitate a more convenient design and implementation
when comparing with the use of general-purpose languages (GPLs) and their
available integrated development environments. Moreover, formal
specification of related agent DSL/DSML semantics paves the way of both
verification of the constructed MAS models and implementation of the
systems on various agent execution platforms. Besides, as new development
activities are incorporated into the MAS development process, it becomes
necessary to formally define the scope of those activities, what they do,
what they require, and what they produce. MDE can help in this endeavour too.

MDE has been applied to understand and reuse the development processes in
MASs. In particular, research has produce metamodels of fragments for
agent-oriented methodologies to, among others, propose new combinations of
such fragments adapted to specific development needs.

The main goal of this special issue is to present most recent studies on
MDE to MAS along the abovementioned research directions. This includes MAS
modeling, model-based MAS specification, model-driven MAS architectures,
DSL/DSML specification, CASE tool development, and empirical evaluation of
model-driven MAS development. We specially encourage novel contributions on
the practical application of MDE for agent development and assessment of
the use of model-driven methodologies during construction of real agent
systems for various industries. Papers addressing the quantitative and/or
qualitative evaluation of applying MDE techniques for agent development are welcome too.

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Scope:

Topics of interest include, but are not limited to:
* Agent meta-modeling
* MDE methodologies for MAS development
* Model-driven architecture for MAS
* Definition and application of model-to-model and/or model-to-text
transformations for MAS development
* Declarative specifications of agent systems used in MDE
* Model checking for MAS
* Validation and verification of MAS via MDE techniques
* MDE applied to the MAS development processes
* Specification of MAS DSLs/DSMLs
* CASE tools for model-driven MAS development
* Evolution of model-driven MAS development
* Roundtrip-engineering of agent systems constructed by using MDE techniques
* Empirical evaluation of model-driven MAS development
* Case studies and lessons learned in applying MDE for MAS development in industry
* Quality aspects of MDE for MAS development

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Important Dates (extended):
* Submission start date: June 1, 2016
* Submission deadline: August 15, 2016 (extended)
* Deadline for 1st round of reviews: November 30, 2016
* 1st notification for the authors: December 5, 2016
* Deadline for submitting the revised papers: February 6, 2017
* Deadline for 2nd round of reviews: April 18, 2017
* 2nd notification for the authors: May 2, 2017
* Camera ready final manuscript: May 16, 2017
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Submission Guidelines:

The work submitted should not be previously published or submitted
elsewhere for publication. In case the authors are extending a previous
conference version, the submitted article should contain at least 30% new
material. Also, the authors are requested to attach the previous published
conference version and explain the novelty of their extended version,
submitted for journal publication. The authors should refer to Guide for
Authors at
http://www.journals.elsevier.com/computer-languages-systems-and-structures/
to see the expected manuscript format. The manuscripts along with all the
required supplementary material should be submitted using Elsevier new
submission platform EVISE
(https://www.evise.com/evise/faces/pages/navigation/NavController.jspx?JRNL_ACR=COMLAN).
The authors should choose SI: MDEforMAS when they reach the Article Type
step of the submission process. The manuscripts would be reviewed according
to COMLAN reviewing policies using Evise system. For further questions and
queries contact the corresponding Guest Editor Dr. Geylani Kardas.

-- 
Dr. Jorge Gomez Sanz

Office 437
Facultad de Informática
Universidad Complutense de Madrid
28040 Madrid (Spain)

Phone: + 34 91 394 7644
Fax  : + 34 91 394 7547
email: jjgomez at ucm.es <mailto:jjgomez at sip.ucm.es>
web: http://grasia.fdi.ucm.es/jorge
twitter: @jjgomezs
Research:
-G.Scholar: http://tinyurl.com/boqr628
-Microsoft: http://tinyurl.com/cuzqdzj