The Computer Journal - Special Issue on Spatial Computing

[Stefan]

Spatial computing can be viewed as a new way to link spatial features
in physical or virtual spaces with the specific computational actions
that are taken in these points in space, on the data and active
computational processes that may be located there as well as in their
vicinity. Thus spatial computing implies some distance or other metric
within which certain computational steps can be taken among data and
processes that are within that neighborhood. Spatial computing is also
intrinsically parallel, with the assumption that all computations can
take place simultaneously in discrete or continuous and asynchronous
time steps.

Many systems can be viewed as “spatial computers”, i.e. as collections
of local computational devices distributed through a physical space,
in which:

- the difficulty of moving information between any two devices is
strongly dependent on the distance between them, and

- the “functional goals” of the system are generally defined in terms
of the system's spatial structure.

Examples include peer-to-peer wireless networks, engineered biological
cells, wireless sensor networks, robotic swarms and reconfigurable
computing platforms (e.g. FPGAs), as well as natural systems like
animal swarms and cells during morphogenesis.

The Computer Journal is soliciting submissions on any topic in spatial
computing. Of particular interest is research that applies general
spatial computing principles to particular domains and cross-cutting
work that is relevant

Instructions for authors

Original and high quality contributions that have not yet been
published or are not currently under review by other journals or peer-
reviewed conferences are sought. The manuscripts will be accepted or
rejected in line with the usual standards of The Computer Journal.

The submitted papers should be formatted according to the journal
style. For more detailed information concerning the requirements for
submission, please refer to the journal homepage at:

www.oxfordjournals.org/our_journals/computer_journal/for_authors/msprep_submission.html

All manuscripts and any supplementary material should be submitted
through the online submission system available at http://mc.manuscriptcentral.com/compj.
Authors must state that their paper is for the special issue “Spatial
Computing”.

Important dates

Submission deadline: 15 December 2011
Acceptance/rejection notification: End of February 2012

Guest editors

Dr Jacob Beal (BBN Technologies)
Prof. Stefan Dulman (Delft University)
Prof. Olivier Michel (Paris Est University)
Dr. Antoine Spicher (Paris Est University)