In 1984, while I was following his postgraduate course on VLSI design, my supervisor Dr. David Skellern, asked me if I was interested in investigating intelligent approaches to automatic Ie floorplanning. He told me then: "a circuit that works always looks nice, has a clever data and control flow. A fast way to look at students' Ie projects is by looking at their fioorplans.". Later, I took a course on Knowledge Engineering (KE) and Artificial Intelligence (AI) with Professor John Gero, who encouraged me to investigate this area of design automation. The resources for such development were really poor at IS&E as KE was a relatively new field of research in Australia at that time. \'Vhatever the difficulties (a good programmmer never blames his tools as David Skellern used to tell me), I undertook the investigation of Knowledge-Based approaches to Ie ftoor planning as my PhD thesis subject with the help of my supervisor and John Gero and the encouragement of all researchers at IS&E , who provided an exciting environment for my research. This volume reports the results of my research during 1984, 1985, 1986, and 1987. The voulme deals with Ie ftoorplanning from four perspectives: floorplanning strategy, Knowledge Engineering in the Ie domain, the development of knowledge-based fioorplan ning processes and new floorplanning algorithms for use in the overall strategy.

In this book the application of the boundary element method to the solution of the Laplace equation is examined. This equation is of fundamental importance in engineering and science as it describes different types of phenomena, inclu- ding the groundwater flow applications highlighted in this book. Special subjects such as numerical integration, subdi- visionof the domain into regions and other computational aspects are discussed in detail in the first chapters. To demonstrate the accuracy and efficiency of the boundary ele- ment method, results obtained when solving the Laplace equa- tion have been compared against known analytical solutions. Other chapters deal with problems such as steady and unstea- dy flow in addition to infiltration problems. The applica- tions demonstrate that the boundary element method provides a powerful solution technique which can be effectively ap- plied to solve this type of problem.

This book reponds to the increasing demand of computer mo- delling of electrochemical processes in order to improve their speed and efficiency. The fundamental transport equa- tions in dilute solutions are given and it is established in detail under what circumstances a potential model with non- linear boundary conditions, involved by electrode reactions, can beused. Attention is directed towards the most impor- tant solution techniquesFEM, FDM and BEM and towards the solution of the non-linear system of equations (Successive Substitution, Newton-Raphson). Using the BEM, several two- dimensional and axisymmetrical examples of current density distributions are given and quantitative data, obtained in a copper electro-refining cell, are compared with calculated results. Applying Faraday's Law and the BEM, simulation of electro-deposition, electro-chemical levelling and machining are treated. Accuracy and stabilityare emphasized.

This proceedings volume contains 38 papers presented at the 4th Working Conference on "Rel iability· and Optimization of Structural Systems", held at the Technical University of Munich, Germany, September 11- 13, 1991. The Working Conference was organised by the IFIP (Interna tional Federation for Information Processing) Working Group 7.5 of Technical Committee 7 and was the fourth in a series, following similar conferences held at the University of Aalborg, Den mark, May 1987, at the Imperial College, London, UK, September 1988 and at the University of California, Berkeley, California, USA, March 1990. The Working Conference was attended by 54 participants from 16 countries. The objectives of Working Group 7.5 are: • to promote modern structural systems optimization and reliability theory, • to advance international cooperation in the field of structural system optimization and reliability theory, • to stimulate research, development and application of structural system optimization and reli ability theory, • to further the dissemination and exchange of information on reliability and optimization of structural systems • to encourage education in structural system optimization and reliability theory. At present the members of the Working Group are: A. H.-S. Ang, U.S.A. M. Grimmelt, FRG G. A ugwti, Italy N. C. Lind, Canada M. J. Baker, UK H. O. Mad&en, Denmark P. Bjerager, Norway R. E. Melcher~, Australia C. A. Cornell, U.S.A. F. Mo~e~, U.S.A.

This book contains chapters written by eminent scientists on the latest development in computer technology and applica- tions in Japan. The objective of the book is to provide an awareness of the considerable advances being made by Japane- se scientists on the general area of information technology and in the so-called Fifth Generation Computer Systems. In the first chapter, Watanabe of the NEC Corporation, descri- bes advanced architecture and technology of supercomputing systems. This theme is followed by Nakamura of Tohoku Uni- versity in the next chapter. Another type of supercomputer for vector processing, the FACOM VP 2000 Series is then des- cribed by Uchida ofFujitsu Ltd in Chapter 3. Expert systems are presented in the next two chapters by Ue- no and Oomari of Tokyo Denki University and by Koseki and Goto of the NEC Corporation. Important applications in com- puter graphics are described in Chapter Six by Ishii and Mu- rakami of Fujitsu Laboratories. Hayahi from the same Labora- tory then discusses neurocomputers in Japan. The final chap- ter by Noguchi of Tohoku Universityillustrates an important application in communications.

This book presents a new formulation of the boundary element method for two-dimensional and axisymmetric contact problems. The solution procedure includes the effects of non-frictional as well as frictional contact between elastic bodies. Following a literature survey of various experimental and analytical approaches for solving elastic contact problems, a comprehensive review of numerical techniques used for analyses of contact problems is presented. The boundary element formulations for two-, three-dimensional and axisymmetric problems in elasticity are derived and numerical implementation using constant and linear elements is described. For analysis of contact problems, boundary elements are employed to compute flexibility matrices representing the relationship between tractions and displacements only at nodes coming into contact. The contact analysis is performed using the flexibility matrices in conjunction with contact boundary conditions. In this approach, only equations corresponding to the node coming into contact are required and consequently very efficient computation is achieved. Furthermore, the boundary element analysis and the contact analysis are performed separately, which makes it easy to implement the contact analysis procedure into boundary element codes. A new contact criterion for nodes coming into contact is proposed. Load incremental and iterative schemes are used to obtain accurate solutions. Some classical Hertz and non-Hertz contact problems are studied and results are found to be in good agreement with analytical and other numerical solutions.