This symposium on 'Computerized Basin Analysis for Prognosis of Energy - and Mineral Resources' was organized by Dr. Jan Harff, chairman ofthe Scientific Committee for the meeting, in Giistrowin what was then East Germany. Sponsors ofthis meeting were the International Union of Geological Sciences' Commission on Storage, Automatic Pro cessing and Retrieval of Geologic Data (COGEODATA), Academy of Sciences of the German Democratic Republic (GDR), National Oil and Gas Trustofthe GDR, and the International Association for Mathematical Geology (IAMG). Main topics of the symposium, held from 19-22 June 1990, were application of computer methods to the exploration and exploitation of oil and gas, coal, and other energy and mineral resources. There were computer demonstrations as well as a one-day field trip to the geothermic heating plant in Waren. The Regional Group for Eastern Europe of COG EO DATA also met during the conference. Fifty-one papers were presented including eight poster sessions by authors from 14 countries. As was to be expected, there was a large percentage of papers from the East Bloc of European countries, especially the GDR, USSR, and the CSSR with a fair representation from the FRG and USA and a smattering from the nine others. Most of the papers were application oriented and related to the mineral industries. There was ample time for exchange of ideas and dissemination of material.

Geothermics in Basin Analysis focuses on the study of sedimentary basins, stressing essential parts of problems in which geothermics is involved. Subject matter includes the measuring of temperature logs and capturing of industrial temperature data and their interpretation to delineate subsurface conditions and processes, the importance of porosity and pore filling for modeling thermal fields, the thermal insulation of shales, geothermal anomalies associated with mud diapirs and basin hydrodynamic regimes, temperatures related to magmatic underplating and plate tectonics.

This volume is a compendium of papers on the subject, as noted in the book title, of modeling and mapping. They were presented at the 25th Anniversary meeting of the International Association for Mathematical Geology (IAMG) at Praha (Prague), Czech Republic in October of 1993. The Association, founded at the International Geological Congress (IGC) in Prague in 1968, returned to its origins for its Silver Anniversary celebration. All in all 146 papers by 276 authors were offered for the 165 attendees at the 3-day meeting convened in the Hotel Krystal. It was a time for remembrance and for future prognostication. The selected papers in Geologic Modeling and Mapping comprise a broad range of powerful techniques used nowadays in the earth sciences. Modeling stands for reconstruction of geological features, such as subsurface structure, in space and time, as well as for simulation of geological processes both providing scenarios of geologic events and how these events might have occurred. Mapping stands for spatial analysis of data, a topic that always has been an extremely important part of the earth sciences. Because both modeling and mapping are used widely in conjunction, the book title should reflect the close relation of the subjects rather than a division. Here, we bring together a collection of papers that hopefully contribute to the growing amount of knowledge on these techniques.

Modeling and simulation were introduced to the earth sciences about four decades ago. Modeling has proven its worth and now it is an accepted procedure for analyzing and solving geological problems. The papers in this collection are focused on modeling sediment deposition and sedimentary sequences and have a decidedly practical flavor. Some of the leading simulation packages, such as CORRELATOR, SEDFLUX, SEDpak, SEDSIM, STRATA, and STRATSIM are applied to problems in hydrocarbon exploration, oil production, groundwater development, coal-bed appraisal, geothermics, and environmental diagnosis. All of these subjects fall under the broad heading of sedimentary basin analysis. The fifteen papers in this volume are written by internationally recognized experts from academia and industry. The contributions represent the status of geologic modeling and simulation at the start of the 21st century, and will give the reader an insight into current research problems and their possible solutions.

Fractal geometry allows the description of natural patterns and the establishment and testing of models of pattern formation. In particular, it is a tool for geoscientists. The aim of this volume is to give an overview of the applications of fractal geometry and the theory of dynamic systems in the geosciences. The state of the art is presented and the reader obtains an impression of the variety of fields for which fractal geometry is a useful tool and of the different methods of fractal geometry which can be applied. In addition to specific information about new applications of fractal geometry in structural geology, physics of the solid earth, and mineralogy, proposals and ideas about how fractal geometry can be applied in the reader's field of studies will be put forward.