IEEE CONTROL SYSTEMS SOCIETY TECHNICAL COMMITTEE
ON DISCRETE EVENT SYSTEMS

    Ryan J. Leduc
    Chair, IEEE CSS Technical Committee on DES
    Dept. of Computing and Software
    McMaster University
    1280 Main Street West
    Hamilton, Ontario
    Canada L8S 4K1

    Phone: (905) 525-9140 Ext. 27962
    Fax: (905) 524-0340
    e-mail: leduc@mcmaster.ca
    WWW: http://www.cas.mcmaster.ca/~leduc/

DESTC Web Page: http://www.cas.mcmaster.ca/destc/

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Contents:

1. Editorial

2. Announcements
 2.1 Extension of deadline for WODES'08 and second call for papers

3. Conferences
 3.1 2008 IEEE Conference on Automation Science and Engineering,
     Washington DC, USA, August 23 - 26, 2008
 3.2 Eighth International Conference on Monte Carlo and Quasi-Monte Carlo
     Methods in Scientific Computing, Montreal, July 6 - 11, 2008
 3.3 IFAC Symposium on System Identification, SYSID'09, Saint-Malo,
     France, July 6 - 8, 2009

4. Journals
 4.1 Selections from IEEE Transactions on Robotics, Volume: 23, Issue:
     6, December 2007

Welcome to the newsletter of the IEEE Control Systems Technical Committee on Discrete Event Systems!

See http://www.cas.mcmaster.ca/destc/ for information on the DESTC.

Personal note from the editor:

Happy New year everyone!  I hope 2008 will be a prosperous year for all of us!

Ryan

Contributed by: Ryan Leduc <leduc aT mcmaster dOt ca>

EXTENSION OF DEADLINE FOR WODES'08 AND SECOND CALL FOR PAPERS

Dear Colleagues,

We are happy to announce that

1. The deadline for submission of papers and invited sessions for
WODES'08 at Chalmers University of Technology, Gteborg, Sweden, May
28-30, 2008 is extended to

       January 25, 2008 

2. The plenary speakers will be
* Prof Panos J. Antsaklis, University of Notre Dame, USA
* Prof Kim G. Larsen, Aalborg University, Denmark
* Dr Stephan Biller, General Motors R&D Center, Detroit, USA.

3. We expect a number of interesting invited sessions at the workshop.

Important Dates
January 25, 2008: Extended deadline for submission of full papers and
special sessions.
March 21, 2008: Notification of acceptance.
April 18, 2008: Submission of final camera ready papers and
registration.
May 28-30, 2008: Workshop!

For more detailed information we refer to WODES'08 webpage:
http://www.wodes2008.org/

Best wishes and welcome to Chalmers in the end of May

Bengt Lennartson, Chalmers, Sweden
Martin Fabian, Chalmers, Sweden
Knut kesson, Chalmers, Sweden
Alessandro Giua, University of Cagliari, Italy
Ratnesh Kumar, Iowa State University, USA
The Organizing Committee & Co-Chairs of Scientific Program Committee

Contributed by: Ryan Leduc <leduc _at_ mcmaster _dot_ ca>

2008 IEEE CONFERENCE ON AUTOMATION SCIENCE AND ENGINEERING
Washington DC, USA
August 23 - 26, 2008

CALL FOR PAPERS

Sponsored by IEEE Robotics and Automation Society

Proceedings indexed by: Elsevier databases Engineering Index (EI) and
Compendex.

The fourth annual IEEE Conference on Automation Science and Engineering
(IEEE CASE 2008), sponsored by the IEEE Robotics and Automation
Society, will be held from August 23 to 26, 2008 in Washington DC,
U.S.A.  CASE is the primary forum for cross-industry research in
automation. The conference goal is the broad coverage and dissemination
of foundational research on automation among researchers, academicians,
and industry practitioners.  The focus is on scientific methods for
automated machines and systems operating in structured environments
over long periods, and also on the explicit structuring of environments.  

CASE is an offspring of IEEE Transactions on Automation Science and
Engineering, IEEE T-ASE (www.ieee.org/t-ase). High quality CASE papers
will be recommended for publication in this flagship automation journal.

The technical program of IEEE CASE will consist of workshops, invited
talks, posters, and paper presentations. Submitted papers must describe
original work, in the form of modeling abstractions, algorithms,
theoretical analysis and case studies, and they can cover any of the
following areas:

- Automatic Identification and Security
- Automation in Life Sciences: Biotechnology, Pharmaceutical, and
Health Care
- Business and Software
- Construction Automation
- Data Analytics in Supply Chain
- Discrete Event Systems & Petri Nets
- Food Handling and Processing
- Home, Laboratory, and Service
- Human-Machine Interaction and Coordination
- Instrumentation & Measurement
- Intelligent Transportation
- Internet Automation, Search Engine and Web Services 
- Laboratory Automation
- Manufacturing Automation
- Maintenance and Diagnosis
- Multi-sensor Fusion and Integration
- Micro/Nano-scale Automation and Assembly
- Product Design, Development, and Prototyping 
- Planning, Scheduling, and Coordination
- Reconfigurable Manufacturing
- RFID Application
- Risk Management and Applications
- Semiconductor Manufacturing
- System Modeling, Analysis, and Performance Evaluation
- Vision in Automation
- Workflow Analysis and Management

Paper Submissions: Author(s) should submit full papers electronically
in double column IEEE-compliant PDF format. All papers will be
peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will have a choice for oral and/or
poster presentations, and published in the CD-ROM Proceedings to be
indexed by Elsevier databases Engineering Index (EI) and Compendex. 
Posters will be displayed throughout the conference and Poster Sessions
will be scheduled for author/audience interaction. Six pages are
allowed per paper, and detailed instructions for paper preparation and
submission will be available on the conference web site:
http://www.ieee-case.org. 

Venue: The venue for the conference is Key Bridge Marriott ($129 per
night) (www.keybridgemarriott.com). This hotel is a five minute walk to
the Key Bridge, linking Arlington, Virginia to the Capitol District. 
The Iwo Jima Memorial, Arlington National Cemetery, the Pentagon, the
Kennedy Center, NSF, ARPA, NASA, and downtown Georgetown are all a
short distance.

Important Dates: 
- February 15, 2008: Proposal for special sessions and tutorials
- February 29, 2008: Submission of full papers
- May 30, 2008: Paper acceptance notification 
- June 27, 2008: Final paper submission due

General Chair: MengChu Zhou
New Jersey Institute of Technology, USA
zhou@njit.edu or mengchu@ieee.org

General Co-Chair: ZhiWu Li
Xidian University, China
zhwli@xidian.edu.cn

Program Chair: Kazuhiro Saitou
University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, USA
kazu@umich.edu 

Publicity Chair: Spyros Reveliotis
Georgia Institute of Technology, USA
spyros@isye.gatech.edu

web site: click here

Contributed by: Pierre L'Ecuyer <lecuyer@iro.umontreal.ca>

EIGHTH INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE ON MONTE CARLO AND QUASI-MONTE CARLO
METHODS IN SCIENTIFIC COMPUTING
Montreal
July 6 - 11, 2008

Dear colleague,

Make sure you don't miss the primary event in the area
of Monte Carlo and quasi-Monte Carlo methods in 2008:

The Eighth International Conference on Monte Carlo and
Quasi-Monte Carlo Methods in Scientific Computing,
to be held in Montreal, Canada, July 6--11, 2008.

Details can be found at the conference web page:
http://www.crm.math.ca/mcqmc08/index_e.shtml

Abstract submission is now open; see
http://www.crm.math.ca/mcqmc08/contributions_e.shtml
Deadline: February 15.
To propose a full session, the (extended) deadline is January  25.

Registration will open in a few days.
Please mark your agenda prepare a short abstract right away!
We look forward to welcome you in Montreal!

web site: click here

Contributed by: Ryan Leduc <leduc aT mcmaster dOt cA>

IFAC SYMPOSIUM ON SYSTEM IDENTIFICATION, SYSID'09
Saint-Malo, France
July 6 - 8, 2009

SYSID'09 - Preliminary announcement and call for papers


As announced during SYSID'06 in Newcastle, Australia, the 15th edition
of the IFAC Symposium on System Identification, SYSID'09, will take
place in Saint-Malo, France, on July 6-8, 2009.

SYSID 2009 is sponsored by the IFAC Technical Committees on Modeling,
Identification and Signal Processing, on Adaptive and Learning Systems,
on Discrete Events and Hybrid Systems, and on Stochastic Systems.

The symposium covers all major aspects of system identification,
experimental modelling, signal processing and adaptive control, ranging
from theoretical, methodological and scientific developments to a large
variety of application areas. The aim of the meeting is to promote the
research activities and the cooperation between researchers in these
areas. To enhance the applications and industrial perspective of the
symposium, participation of authors from industry is particularly
encouraged.

All the papers presented at SYSID 2009 will be freely available on-line
on the IFAC-PapersOnLine.net website.

Saint-Malo is an historical city located on the north coast of
Brittany, western part of France, and reachable by TGV (very fast
train). The Palais du Grand Large, Saint-Malo convention center, offers
all modern congress facilities and services. The social program
includes a guided tour of the Mont Saint-Michel, labelled as UNESCO
world heritage.

Key dates:
Paper Submission Opens: August 1, 2008.
Deadline for paper submissions: October 31, 2008.
Author Notification: January 31, 2009.
Registration Opens: February 2, 2009.
Submission of final papers: March 31, 2009.
Advance Registration Deadline: May 15, 2009.
Conference dates: Monday-Wednesday, July 6-8, 2009.

Information and contact:
Symposium website: http://sysid2009.org
Contact: secretariat@sysid2009.org

Michele Basseville (NOC chair), Antonio Vicino (IPC chair), Patrick
Panciatici (vice-chair from industry), Eric Walter (editor).

web site: click here

Contributed by: Ryan Leduc <leduc aT mcmaster dOt cA>

SELECTIONS FROM IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON ROBOTICS
VOLUME: 23, ISSUE: 6
DECEMBER, 2007

1)  Decentralized Cooperative Policy for Conflict Resolution in
Multivehicle Systems

Pallottino, L.	  Scordio, V. G.    Bicchi , A.    Frazzoli, E.   

Abstract: 

In this paper, we propose a novel policy for steering multiple vehicles
between assigned start and goal configurations, ensuring collision
avoidance. The policy rests on the assumption that all agents are
cooperating by implementing the same traffic rules. However, the policy
is completely decentralized, as each agent decides its own motion by
applying those rules only on the locally available information, and
scalable, in the sense that the amount of information processed by each
agent and the computational complexity of the algorithms do not
increase with the number of agents in the scenario. The proposed policy
applies to systems in which new vehicles may enter the scene and start
interacting with existing ones at any time, while others may leave.
Under mild conditions on the initial configurations, the policy is
shown to be safe, i.e., it guarantees collision avoidance throughout
the system evolution. In the paper, conditions are discussed on the
desired configurations of agents, under which the ultimate convergence
of all vehicles to their goals can also be guaranteed. To show that
such conditions are actually necessary and sufficient, which turns out
to be a challenging liveness-verification problem for a complex hybrid
automaton, we employ a probabilistic verification method. The paper
finally presents and discusses simulations for systems of several tens
of vehicles, and reports on some experimental implementation showing
the practicality of the approach.

web site: click here