[Biocorba-announce-l] Call for Papers - NETTAB 2002

[Paolo Romano]

Dear biocorba members,

I'm glad to announce the launch of the Call for Contributions
for the NETTAB 2002 Workshop on "Agents in Bioinformatics".

I think this is a good chance to improve awareness, understanding
and skills in software agents, also due to the vicinity to the
AAMAS conference.

I hope to see many of you in Bologna on next July.

Bye. Paolo Romano
---

       NETTAB - NETWORK TOOLS AND APPLICATIONS IN BIOLOGY

               Second International Workshop on
                  "AGENTS IN BIOINFORMATICS"

                    Call for contributions
       (oral communications, posters and software demos)

                    July 12th-14th, 2002
                        Bologna, Italy 

                    http://www.nettab.org/

SCOPE

Agents and multi-agent systems are the emerging new way of computing.
The integration of biological data resources will deal, in the
Semantic Web Generation, with agents and software robots.

In the last five years there has been a growing interest in the
application of agent-based systems in different fields such as
e-commerce, transports and health. Agent based systems and
applications are well suited to support bioscientists during the
process of genome analysis and annotation, so as to the problems
of effectively managing and improving the processes that are
involved with protein structure prediction.

Some specialized projects in this topic are beginning to appear.
It may now be a good time to report on the results achieved in
this area, to discuss the benefits (and drawbacks) that agent-based
systems may bring to bioinformatics domains, and also to provide
a list of the research topics that should be tackled in the near
future to make the deployment of bioinformatics agent-based systems
a reality.

The aim of this workshop is to bring together who are working towards
the vision of a genome analysis and annotation using agents-based
systems. The workshop will also aim to inspire collaboration between
these two communities,  to strengthen the relationships within
bioinformatics community, to activate an osmosis cooperation between
bioinformatics and computer science communities, to collect the latest
ideas, achievements and proposals in the application of agents and
multi-agent systems to the bioinformatics area.

The worshop is organized in sessions where invited speakers present
the state of art of relevant ongoing projects, sessions for oral
communications and a tutorial day.
The scientific programme is available at
http://www.nettab.org/2002/progr.html .

TOPICS OF INTEREST

- Co-operation between intelligent agents to improve information
  retrieval in bioinformatics. 
- Multi-agent systems to support eScientists during their daily
  research. 
- Agents applications in bioinformatics. 
- Multi-agent systems that improve the data resources integration. 
- Bioinfomatics agent-based decision support systems. 
- Information agents that gather, compile and organise biological
  knowledge available on Internet. 
- Biological data and knowledge modeling tools 
- Ontologies, Databases and Applications of Semantics in Bioinformatics


PROGRAMME COMMITTEE

- Kevin Bryson, Institut National de la Recherche Agronomique
  (INRA), France 
- Rita Casadio, Centro per le Ricerche Biotecnologiche, University
  of Bologna, Italy
- Paolo Ciancarini, Department of Computer Science, University of
  Bologna, Italy
- Keith Decker, Department of Computer and Information Sciences,
  University of Delaware, USA 
- Angelo Facchiano, Istituto Scienze dell'Alimentazione, CNR, Italy
- Vasant Honavar, Department of Computer Science, Iowa State
  University, USA 
- Ian Horrocks, Department of Computer Science, University of
  Manchester, UK
- Michael Luck, Department of Electronics and Computer Sciences,
  University of Southampton, UK 
- Robin McEntire, SmithKline Beecham, USA 
- Emanuela Merelli, Department of Mathematics and Computer Science,
  University of Camerino, Italy
- Luciano Milanesi, Istituto Tecnologie Biomediche, CNR,
  Milano, Italy 
- Steffen Möller Proteom-Zentrum Rostock, Germany 
- Luc Moreau, Department of Electronics and Computer Sciences,
  University of Southampton, UK  
- Andrea Omicini Dipartimento di Elettronica, Informatica e
  Sistemistica, University of Bologna, Italy
- Paolo Romano Biotechnology Department, National Cancer Research
  Institute,  Genova, Italy
- V. S. Subrahmanian, Computer Science Department, University of
  Maryland, USA 
- Luca Toldo, Merck KGaA, Germany  

SUBMISSION

Authors are encouraged to:
1. submit a full paper (max 6 A4 pages in length, size 12pt,
   in pdf or ps format) as an oral communication
2. submit a research statement by poster (max 2 A4 pages,
   size 12pt, in pdf or ps format)

Full papers (category 1) will be reviewed by the programme committee
for relevance, clarity and the novelty of results. After the event,
a second round of more extensive reviews is planned which is to lead
to the publication of extended versions of selected contributions in
an edited collection.

Accepted full papers and posters (category 2) will be published in the
conference proceedings.

Posters and informal research demonstrations provide an opportunity
to exhibit late-breaking results and to discuss these results with
conference participants in an informal setting.
We encourage submissions that are based on new work, including work
that is in progress. Informal research demos can take place during
poster presentation. Presenters need to bring whatever equipment
they need for their demonstration; Internet connectivity can be made
available upon request. Proposals should consist of a 1-2 page summary
of the work to be presented.

Please upload the contributions through the online form available
at at http://www.nettab.org/2002/rform.html 


DEADLINES AND IMPORTANT DATES

- Paper due for oral ciommunications: April 30, 2002.
- Notifications of acceptance to authors: May 20, 2002.
- Final version of accepted communications: May 31, 2002
- Research statements and Posters due: May 31, 2002
- Early registration (at discounted rates): May 31, 2002

ORGANIZATIONAL DETAILS

The worksop is jointly organized by:

- Biotechnology Department, National Cancer Research
  Institute - Genova, Italy
- Department of Mathematics and Computer Science, University
  of Camerino, Italy
- Department of Computer Science and Biotechnological Center,
  University of Bologna, Italy


STEERING COMMITTEE

Chair: Paolo Romano (paolo.romano@istge.it) 
Co-Chairs: Emanuela Merelli (emanuela.merelli@unicam.it),
           Luca Toldo (luca.toldo@merck.de)
Local Chair: Paolo Ciancarini (cianca@cs.unibo.it) 


WORKSHOP PLACE 

The workshop will be held at at:
Ex scuola Ercolani, Mura Anteo Zamboni, 2b, Bologna


RELATED EVENTS

AUTONOMOUS AGENTS & MULTI-AGENT SYSTEMS (AAMAS 2002)
Palazzo Re Enzo, Bologna, Italy, July 15-19, 2002,
http://lia.deis.unibo.it/aamas2002/
http://www.autonomousagents.org/2002/

THE FOURTH EUROPEAN AGENT SYSTEMS SUMMER SCHOOL 2002
Bologna, 8-12 July, 2002
http://www.agentlink.org/happenings/easss/2002/index.html


ABOUT BOLOGNA

Although not as famous as Venice and Florence, Bologna is indeed one
of the most beautiful towns of Italy, being its medieval historical
center one of the biggest and better preserved in Europe. Bologna
hosts the most ancient university of the world, which is also one
of the biggest in Italy. As everybody knows, Bologna has both the
best food and the best nightlife in Italy. In addition, Bologna is
the ideal place where to stay to visit other wonderful places:
Venice, Florence, Ravenna, and Rimini can all be reached in 1 hour
by train, Rome in 3 hours. The airport of Bologna (BLQ) has frequent
direct connections to all major European Hubs.

-- 
Paolo Romano (paolo.romano@istge.it)
National Cancer Research Institute
Largo Rosanna Benzi, 10, I-16132, Genova, Italy
Tel: +39-010-5737-288  Fax: +39-010-5737-295