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NIC 2018 - Workshop on Nature Inspired Computing
27 - 29 March 2018 – Naples, Italy
In conjunction with the 6th World Conference on Information Systems and Technologies - WorldCIST'18
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Scope

WorldCIST'18 – 6th World Conference on Information Systems and Technologies, to be held at Naples, Italy, 27 - 29 March 2018, is a global forum for researchers and practitioners to present and discuss the most recent innovations, trends, results, experiences and concerns in the several perspectives of Information Systems and Technologies.

Nature- and bio-inspired computation (NIC, BIC) and its algorithms, including neural networks and swarm intelligence, have become effective in recent years in solving a diverse range of optimization and scheduling problems in real-world applications. This workshop aims at bringing together international researchers and practitioners from different disciplines in order to provide a platform for presenting state-of-the-art developments in this area, to discuss recent advances and to exchange ideas on the current state of the art of nature-inspired computing methods and algorithms. Authors are invited to submit unpublished work, contributing with research papers, case studies and applications that present original scientific results, methodological aspects, concepts and approaches in the field of NIC.

Topics

Workshop topics include, but are not limited to:

• Nature inspired algorithms in cloud computing
• Physics-Based Algorithms
• Biology-Based Algorithms
• Evolutionary Computing
• Artificial Neural Networks
• Artificial Intelligence
• Hyperheuristics
• Swarm Intelligence
• Algorithm analysis, improvement and implementation
• Heuristic methods for system simulation and control
• Case studies in engineering and industrial applications
• Applications of NIC for image analysis and image processing
• Applications of NIC for text processing and text mining
• Applications of NIC for audio analysis and speech processing
• Applications of NIC in robotics, e-health systems, etc.
• Applications of NIC for information systems and databases
• Applications of NIC for queueing and scheduling

Submission and Paper Format

Submissions must be of one of two types:
Full paper: Finished and consolidated R&D works. These papers are assigned a 10-page limit; and
Short paper: Ongoing works with relevant preliminary results open to discussion. These papers are assigned a 7-page limit.
Submitted papers must comply with the format of Advances in Intelligent Systems and Computing Series (see Instructions for Authors at Springer Website or download a DOC example) be written in English, must not have been published before, not be under review for any other conference, workshop or publication and not include any information leading to the authors’ identification. Therefore, the authors’ names, affiliations and bibliographic references should not be included in the version for evaluation by the Program Committee. This information should only be included in the camera-ready version, saved in Word or Latex format and also in PDF format. These files must be accompanied by the Publication form filled out, in a ZIP file, and uploaded at the conference management system.
All papers will be subjected to a “double-blind review” by at least two/three members of the Program Committee. Based on Program Committee evaluation, a paper can be rejected or accepted by the Conference Chairs. In the later case, it can be accepted as the type originally submitted or as another type. Thus, full papers can be accepted as short papers. The authors of accepted full papers will have 15 minutes to present their work in a Conference Work Session; approximately 5 minutes of discussion will follow each presentation. The authors of accepted short papers will have 10 minutes to present their work in a Conference Work Session; approximately 5 minutes of discussion will follow each presentation.
All papers should be submitted using the EasyChair system, available in the following link: https://easychair.org/conferences/?conf=worldcist-workshops2018 and select the NIC Workshop

Publication and Indexing

Workshop papers will be published in the Springer Conference Proceedings. To ensure that a paper is published in the Proceedings, at least one of the authors must be fully registered by 7th of January 2018, and the paper must comply with the suggested layout and page-limit. Additionally, all recommended changes must be addressed by the authors before they submit the camera-ready version. No more than one paper per registration will be published in the Conference Proceedings. An extra fee must be paid for publication of additional papers, with a maximum of one additional paper per registration.
Full and short papers will be published in Proceedings by Springer, in Advances in Intelligent Systems and Computing Series. Published full and short papers will be submitted for indexation by ISI, EI-Compendex, SCOPUS, DBLP and Google Scholar, among others, and will be available in the SpringerLink Digital Library.
Extended versions of the best papers accepted and presented at this workshop will be considered for publication in a Special Issue of Information Technology and Control journal indexed by Clarivate Analytics Web of Science (IF = 0.475).

Workshop Co-Chairs

Robertas Damaševičius – Kaunas University of Technology, Kaunas, Lithuania
Marcin Woźniak – Silesian University of Technology, Gliwice, Poland
Christian Napoli – University of Catania, Catania, Italy
Wei Wei - Xi’an University of Technology, Xi'an, China

International Programme Committee

Robertas Damaševičius - Kaunas University of Technology
Salvo Alaimo - University of Catania
Eric Matson - Purdue University
Marcin Woźniak - Silesian University of Technology, Gliwice
Piotr Artiemjew - University of Warmia and Mazury
Rytis Maskeliunas - Kaunas University of Technology
Vidas Raudonis - Kaunas University of Technology
Christian Napoli - University of Catania
Emiliano Tramontana - University of Catania
Salvatore Riccobene - University of Catania
Giacomo Capizzi - University of Catania
Grazia Lo Sciuto - University of Roma Tre
Ignas Martisius - Kaunas University of Technology
Wei Wei - Xi’an University of Technology
Tomas Krilavičius - Vytautas Magnus University
Leon Kosmider - VCU
Marcin Paprzycki - IBS PAN and WSM
Olga Kurasova - Institute of Mathematics and Informatics
Rafal Scherer - Częstochowa University of Technology
Ivan Ganchev - University of Limerick