E-LETTER on Systems, Control, and Signal Processing ISSUE No. 15, 5 October 1988 Editors: Bradley W. Dickinson Dept. of Electrical Engineering Princeton University Princeton, NJ 08544 bradley@princeton.edu Eduardo D. Sontag Dept. of Mathematics Rutgers University New Brunswick, NJ 08903 sontag@fermat.rutgers.edu (arpanet) or sontag@pisces (bitnet) Welcome to the fifteenth issue of the E-LETTER. We remind you that items for posting can be emailed to either of the editors. PLEASE SEND CONTRIBUTIONS, since the eletter can only be useful if everyone participates! Back issues of the newsletter can be requested from Sontag at either of the above addresses. NOTE: if you are using an editor to read this mailing and if at any point you wish to skip to the next article, you can accomplish this by searching for the string: *.** Contents Editorial message: ELETTER items in bibliographies Changes to mailing list Call for special session papers - 1989 ACC - October 21 deadline! Correction to `Decentralized Detection with a Large Number of Sensors' Frequency domain identificaton references sought Faculty positions available at Notre Dame Announcement for workshop on Riccati equation: Como, Italy, June 1989 Faculty position available at Univ. of Rhode Island News item: electronic networks and Eastern Europe Call for papers: 1989 IEEE ICIP: Singapore, September 1989 Conference and workshop announcements: Workshop on Higher-Order Spectral Analysis SIAM Conference on Control in the 90's IFAC Symposium on Nonlinear Control Systems Design Workshop on Decisional Structures in Automated Manufacturing Conference on Information Sciences and Systems News item: Tom Kailath named Hitachi America Professor Titles of recent Rutgers SYCON technical reports *.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.** Editorial message: >From time to time, the ELETTER contains items which readers might wish to cite in bibliographies. For example, see the contribution from J. Tsitsiklis in this issue. We suggest the following form for bibliographic citations: Author's name, Article title, E-LETTER on Systems, Control, and Signal Processing, issue no., date. The author's name is the contributor of the item as listed in the ELETTER; if no title is provided in the article itself, the descriptive listing in the Contents section of the ELETTER will suffice. *.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.** CHANGES TO MAILING LIST The following are changes and additions to our list of electronic addresses. The complete list can be obtained from sontag@fermat.rutgers.edu. As usual, you may have to adjust the format depending on your mailer. Here we mix uucp, CSNET, BITNET, and ARPANET formats. Changes: roy@pender.ee.upenn.edu (Prof. Sumit Roy, Univ. of Pennsylvania) wmm@whuxr.att.com (Wendell Miyaji) costello@ndsun.ee.nd.edu (Dan Costello, Notre Dame Univ.) laffer@acf8.nyu.edu (Gerardo Lafferriere, New York Univ.) munnari!nucs.cs.nu.oz.au!evans (Rob Evans and Newcastle Control Group) U32964@UICVM.UIC.EDU (Robert Grossman, Univ. of Illinois, Urbana) rajeev@phaeton.ee.cornell.edu (Rajeev Krishnamoorthy) dls@saturn.wustl.edu (Donald Snyder, Washington Univ., St. Louis) jfk@thumper.bellcore.com (Jim Kaiser) TWHUIB@HENUT5.BITNET (Huibert Kwakernaak, Twente Univ.) laub%lanczos@hub.ucsb.edu (Alan J. Laub, Univ. of Calif. at Santa Barbara) rli%bode.usc.edu@oberon.usc.edu (Rongsheng Li) Additions: #lxrodm@wmmvs.bitnet (Leiba Rodman, College of William and Mary) jacobson@vaxe.coe.noetheastern.edu (Clas A. Jacobson) u12688@uicvm.uic.edu (Floyd B. Hanson, Univ. of Illinois, Chicago) RIMVALL@ge-crd.arpa (Magnus Rimvall, General Electric, Schenectady) BHATT@ee.tamu.edu (Shankar Bhattacharyya, Texas A&M Univ.) DPC@ibm.com (Daniel Connors) hager@beach.cis.ufl.edu (Bill Hager, Univ. of Florida) mat@brownvm.bitnet (Matthew Ronald James, Brown Univ.) C51160@JPNKUDPC.bitnet (Yutaka Yamamoto) KWL@nuseev.bitnet (Khiang-Wee Lim, Singapore Nat'l. Univ.) brkld@math.purdue.edu (Len Berkovitz) eedept@pittvms.bitnet (Ed Kamen, Univ. of Pittsburgh) gragg@nps-cs.arpa (Bill Gragg, Naval Postgrad School, Monterey, CA) ahaddad@eecs.nwu.edu (Abe Haddad, Northwestern Univ.) FSCLR@NOBERGEN.BITNET (Lothat Reichel, Bergen Scientific Center, Norway) poul%bmeucl@medcor.mcgill.ca (Poul Nielsen) nett@ge-crd.arpa (Carl Nett, General Electric, Schenectady) QZBG@utdalvm1.bitnet (Gilead Tadmor, Univ.of Texas, Dallas) GA3593@siucvmb.bitnet (Dean A. Carlson, So. Illinois. Univ.) dj@bellcore.com (D.J. Hajela) mvr%mimir.dmt.oz.au (Vaughan Roberts, CSIRO, Melbourne) mcdonn@nosc.mil (John R. McDonnell, Naval Ocean Systems Center) PSILVEST@ESTEC.BITNET (P. Silvestrin, European Space Res. and Tech. Centre) FAC1729@UOFT01.BITNET (S.R. Kolla, Univ. of Toledo) C51160@JPNKUDPC.BITNET (Yutaka Yamamoto, Kyoto University) UMEZ020@frors31.bitnet (Claude H. Moog, Lab.d'Automatique de Nantes) lin%LODE@outlaw.uwyo.edu (Tao Lin, Univ. of Wyoming) *.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.** Contributed by Daniel Abramovitch Call for papers for a Proposed Invited Session of 1989 ACC: Control Theoretic Aspects of Communication Systems Session Co-Chairs: Dr. Daniel Abramovitch and Dr. Michael Workman HP Labs IBM Corp. Abstract We are trying to organize an invited session that deals with the use of control theory in communications systems and/or the use of communications theory in control systems. If anybody has been working in this area and would like to contribute an abstract or paper for presentation at the ACC, we will try to get this organized. * Please send 5 copies of detailed abstract (completed papers preferred). * Deadline for submission of abstracts: October 21, 1988. * Abstracts in the form of a LaTeX or troff input file may be sent via e-mail to: danny@isl.stanford.edu * Deadline for submission of session to ACC program committee: November 1, 1988. * Notification date for selection of proposed session by ACC Program Committee: February 1, 1989. * Deadline for typed conference mats: March 15, 1989. * Yes, we know it is short notice! Please send abstracts/papers to: Dr. Daniel Abramovitch Hewlett Packard Laboratories Building 2-Upper 1501 Page Mill Road Palo Alto, CA 94304 (415) 857-3806 *.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.** Contributed by John N. Tsitsiklis %% TeX file describing a correction to a recently published paper %% \centerline{CORRECTION} \medskip \centerline{\bf Decentralized Detection with a Large Number of Sensors} \centerline{MCSS, Vol. 1, 1988, pp. 167--182} \centerline{John N. Tsitsiklis} \medskip\par Example 1 on page 174 of the paper is incorrect. This is because calculations were carried out as if $\mu_{ij}(\gamma,s)$ were the same for all $i$, $j$, $\gamma$ for which $\mu_{ij}(\gamma,s)$ is not identically equal to zero. However, it is seen >from the definition of $\mu_{ij}(\gamma,s)$ [cf.\ Eq.\ (1)] that $\mu_{ij}(\gamma,s)=\mu_{ji}(\gamma,1-s)$, which is different than $\mu_{ji}(\gamma,s)$, in general. \par The correct solution to the problem considered in Example 1 proceeds as follows. We have $\mu_{23}(\gamma_1,s)=\mu_{13}(\gamma_2,s) =\mu_{12}(\gamma_3,s) =0$. Also, there exists a function $\nu(s)$ such that $\mu_{ij}(\gamma_i,s)=\nu(s)$ and $\mu_{ij}(\gamma_j,s)=\nu(1-s)$, for every $i$, $j$, and $s$. Thus, the optimization problem that has to be solved in order to compute the optimal exponent $\Lambda^*$ is $$\eqalign{\Lambda^*= \min_{x_1,x_2,x_3}\max\Bigl\{ & \min_{s\in [0,1]}\bigl[x_1\mu_{12}(\gamma_1,s)+x_2\mu_{12}(\gamma_2,s) +x_3\mu_{12}(\gamma_3,s)\bigr],\cr & \min_{s\in [0,1]}\bigl[x_1\mu_{13}(\gamma_1,s)+x_2\mu_{13}(\gamma_2,s) +x_3\mu_{13}(\gamma_3,s)\bigr],\cr & \min_{s\in [0,1]}\bigl[x_1\mu_{23}(\gamma_1,s)+x_2\mu_{23}(\gamma_2,s) +x_3\mu_{23}(\gamma_3,s)\bigr]\Bigr\}\cr =\min_{x_1,x_2,x_3} \max\Bigl\{& \min_{s\in[0,1]} \bigl[x_1\nu(s)+x_2\nu(1-s)\bigr],\cr &\min_{s\in[0,1]} \bigl[x_1\nu(s)+x_3\nu(1-s)\bigr],\cr &\min_{s\in[0,1]} \bigl[x_2\nu(s)+x_3\nu(1-s)\bigr]\Bigr\}.\cr}$$ (The outer minimization is over all nonnegative $x_1$, $x_2$, $x_3$ which sum to 1.) Unfortunately, symmetry considerations alone are not sufficient to ascertain that the symmetrical solution ($x_i=1/3$ for each $i$) is the optimal one, as we now indicate. The exponent corresponding to the symmetrical solution is seen to be ${1\over 3}\min_{s\in[0,1]}[\nu(s)+\nu(1-s)]={2\over 3}\nu({1\over 2})$. On the other hand, the nonsymmetric solution $x_1=x_2={1\over 2}$, $x_3=0$, results to an exponent equal to $$\max\Big\{ \nu({1\over 2}),{1\over 2}\min_{s\in[0,1]}\nu(s)\Big\}.$$ In particular, if ${1\over 2}\min_{s\in[0,1]}\nu(s)<{2\over 3}\nu({1\over 2})$, then the symmetric solution is not optimal. An analytical method for determining whether this is the case is not apparent. \bye *.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.** Contributed by Vaughan Roberts I am interested in obtaining references on frequency domain identification and estimation. If anybody has some references, could they forward them to me? Thanks, Vaughan Roberts, PHONE: +61 3 487-9260 CSIRO Division of ACSNET or CSNET:mvr@mimir.dmt.oz.au Manufacturing Technology, ARPA: mvr%mimir.dmt.oz.au@uunet.uu.net Melbourne, Australia. UUCP: {uunet,ukc,mcvax}!munnari!mimir.dmt!mvr *.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.** Contributed by Y.F. Huang ********************* Academic Positions Open ********************* *** University of Notre Dame *** The Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering seeks applicants for faculty positions in the area of digital signal and image processing. Qualified applicants should have an earned Ph.D. degree. The ECE Faculty at Notre Dame has earned national and international reputation in several areas of Electrical Engineering, especially in the areas of circuits and systems, communications, and control. Successful candidates will join a dynamic faculty with a strong committment to first-rate teaching and research. Please send your resume and three names of references to: Dr. William B. Berry, Acting Chairman, Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, University of Notre Dame, Notre Dame, IN 46556. TEL: (219)239-5480 Notre Dame is an affirmative action/equal opportunity employer. *.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.** Contributed by Alan J. Laub ---------------------------------------------------------------- THE RICCATI EQUATION IN CONTROL, SIGNALS, AND SYSTEMS VILLA GALLIA, COMO (ITALY) -- JUNE 26-29, 1989 A WORKSHOP sponsored by C.N.R. -- Consiglio Nazionale delle Ricerche co-sponsored by I.F.A.C. -- International Federation of Automatic Control S.I.A.M. -- Society for Industrial and Applied Mathematics with the participation of the I.E.E.E. Control Systems Society * * * Politecnico di Milano Dipartimento di Elettronica and Centro di Teoria dei Sistemi C.N.R. PURPOSE OF THE MEETING: To present a coherent picture of the main results achieved in the last 30 years on the Riccati Equation. Theory, applications, and numerical algorithms will be considered with emphasis on its relevance to optimal control and filtering, Linear-Quadratic- Gaussian problems, H-infinity optimization, network synthesis, etc. There will be an opening lecture by R.E. Kalman -- Swiss Federal Institute of Technology, Zurich, Switzerland and Univer- sity of Florida, USA, three tutorial lectures (by A.J. Laub -- University of California, Santa Barbara, USA, M.A. Shayman -- University of Maryland, USA, and J.C. Willems -- University of Groningen, The Netherlands), invited lectures, and contributed papers. The language of the meeting is English. PROGRAM COMMITTEE: S. Bittanti -- Politecnico di Milano, Italy A.J. Laub -- University of California, Santa Barbara, U.S.A. J.C. Willems -- Groningen University, The Netherlands H.H. Wimmer -- Universitat Wurzburg, West Germany INVITED SPEAKERS: R.R. Bitmead -- Australian National University, Australia S. Bittanti -- Politecnico di Milano, Italy R.S. Bucy -- University of Southern California, USA R. Byers -- University of Kansas, USA A. Bunse-Gerstner -- Universitat Bielefeld, West Germany M. Gevers -- Universite Catholique Louvain, Belgium K. Glover -- Cambridge University, UK D. Hinrichsen -- Universitat Bremen, West Germany T. Kailath -- Stanford University, USA V. Kucera -- Czechoslovak Academy of Science, Czechoslovakia V. Mehrmann -- Universitat Bielefeld, West Germany J.B. Moore -- Australian National University, Australia T. Nishimura -- Institute of Space and Astronautical Science, Japan L. Rodman -- College of William and Mary, USA L.M. Silverman -- University of Southern California, USA J.L. Speyer -- University of Texas at Austin, USA H.L. Trentelman -- Technische Universiteit Eindhoven, The Netherlands J.L. Willems -- University of Ghent, Belgium H.H. Wimmer -- Universitat Wurzburg, West Germany CONTRIBUTED PAPERS: There is time allotted for high quality contributed papers. Only papers with original results will be accepted. Prospective au- thors are invited to submit 5 copies of an extended summary or draft manuscript in English to the Chairman at the following ad- dress: Professor S. Bittanti Dipartimento di Elettronica Politecnico di Milano Piazza Leonardo da Vinci 32 20133 Milano ITALY Telefax 2.23993587 Telex 333467 POLIMI-I The length of the draft should be approximately 5 double-spaced pages. Authors should also provide a title page, with a 350-word abstract, 5 keywords, full address, telephone or telefax number, and e-mail address if available. DEADLINES: November 30, 1988 5 copies of a 5 page extended summary or draft plus a title page to be mailed to the chairman February 28, 1989 Acceptance notification for contributed drafts April 30, 1989 Full manuscript due WORKSHOP LOCATION: The meeting will be held at Villa Gallia, an 18th Century villa located on the shore of Lake Como in Como, Italy. The historic town of Como is easily reachable from Milan either by car (motor- way A9) or train. Frequent trains start from Stazione Ferrovie Nord in Milan, but there are trains from the Stazione Centrale or Stazione Porta Garibaldi as well. Alternatively, Como can be reached from the Zurich airport by train or by car. ORGANIZING COMMITTEE: S. Bittanti -- Politecnico di Milano, Italy P. Bolzern -- Politecnico di Milano, Italy P. Colaneri -- Centro di Teoria dei Sistemi C.N.R., Italy C. De Nicolao -- Centro di Teoria dei Sistemi C.N.R., Italy In organizing the workshop, the organizers are being assisted by the Centro di Cultura Scientifica A. Volta, Villa Olmo (Como). The assistance of the Centro di Teoria dei Sistemi C.N.R., Mi- lano, and the Dipartimento di Elettronica del Politecnico di Mi- lano is also gratefully acknowledged. LOCAL ARRANGEMENTS: The Centro di Cultura Scientifica A. Volta will take care of the local organization, including hotel reservations. An early reservation is recommended since Como is already crowded with tourists in June. The address of the Centro is: Centro di Cultura Scientifica A. Volta Villa Olmo Via Cantoni 1 22100 Como ITALY Phone number: 31.552563 or 31.572213 Telex: 380547 CAM CO I Electronic mail: GCASATI@IMICLVX.BITNET *.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.** Contributed by Rick Vaccaro ASSISTANT PROFESSOR POSITION DEPARTMENT OF ELECTRICAL ENGINEERING UNIVERSITY OF RHODE ISLAND The University of Rhode Island is seeking applicants for a tenure-track position, at the Assistant Professor level, in the Electrical Engineering Department. Areas of interest include: Systems and Control Theory, Communications, Microwave Electronics, Optical Communications, Computer Vision and Robotics, Biomedical Engineering, Electromagnetics, and Electronics. Candidates should possess a Ph.D. in Electrical Engineering and have a strong commitment to research and to teaching at the undergraduate and graduate levels. The department has extensive computing facilities. It offers the B.S., M.S., and Ph.D. degrees and has 22 faculty, 500 undergraduate students and 100 resident graduate students. Applications will be accepted until the position is filled and should be sent to Dr. Steven Kay, Search Committee Chair, Assistant Professor, Electrical Engineering Position, The University of Rhode Island, P.O. Box G, Kingston, RI, 02881. The University of Rhode Island is an equal opportunity employer. Additional information may be obtained from Prof. Rick Vaccaro, (401)792-5816; Email address: vaccaro%ecl1.span@star.stanford.edu *.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.** Contributed by Hank Nussbacher Topic: Network connections with Eastern Europe, and the EARN European net (Note from the Editors: We saw this in a different Electronic BBoard and asked permission from the author to reproduce here.) USSR Academy of Sciences and EARN This letter is from the Feedback section of the BITNET publication NetMonth, August 1988 edition, edited by Chris Condon. The topic is that of the USSR Academy of Sciences having requested a connection to the EARN network for their computers ... From: Subject: More on Russia and networking... Some comments on David Hibler's July editorial: First, let me correct you on one point. The Soviet Union has requested connection to the network but not to BITNET - rather to EARN. If you are in favor of open communication paths then perhaps the United States and people within BITNET should stop using geocentricism when assuming that all networks revolve around them. True, many do, but the fact that Russia (and Hungary and Bulgaria) have requested EARN membership and not BITNET membership should say something to you. The major problem of connecting all these communist countries to the network is not a security fear. It is the US Dept of Commerce that forbids it. Whenever any country buys a supercomputer from the United States (Cray or ETA for example) they are required to sign a very stringent agreement with the US Dept of Commerce that that supercomputer will not be made in any way shape or form available to communist countries - which includes via electronic methods. The US Dept of Commerce realized that one way around the trade ban would be for a non- aligned nation to order a Cray XMP/48 and install an M1 (2Mb) line to Moscow. True, the computer never made it over the border, but its computing power would be sent over the border. So, all EARN sites (as well as many Canadian sites) that have a super computer connected directly or indirectly to BITNET or EARN would have to *renegotiate* their contract with the US Dept of Commerce. Feelers are being made in that direction, but the game is just in the early innings so it is too early to tell if the US Dept of Commerce will relent and alter the supercomputer licences already issued. EARN has been working over the past year on accepting various new countries to their network. Voting was concluded last year for four new countries and their ratification was formally approved: Algeria - University of Annaba Cyprus - University of Cyprus Luxembourg - CEPS/INSTEAD Yugoslavia - UNESCO International Centre Last month two new countries have been ratified as valid for EARN and they are: Morocco - EMI India - Tata Institute Currently, EARN is discussing requests from 3 eastern countries to join EARN, principal among them is the USSR: Hungary USSR - USSR Academy of Sciences Bulgaria There are various legal problems with this and it may be some time before a formal decision is reached. Just thought I'd let you all know how things are currently rather than the usual speculation and philosophy behind this topic. Hank Nussbacher *.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.** Contributed by K.W. Lim ------------------------------------------------------------ IEEE INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE ON IMAGE PROCESSING (ICIP'89) 5-8 September, 1989, Singapore CALL FOR PAPERS (Updated) The 1989 IEEE International Conference on Image Processing (ICIP'89) will be held in Singapore on 5-8 September, 1989. The conference is jointly organized by the Computer Chapter, IEEE Singapore Section and the Department of Electrical Engineering, National University of Singapore. The conference will include regular sessions on all aspects of the theory and applications of image processing. In addition, tutorials by eminent speakers presenting the state-of-the-art in selected areas of image processing will be offered. An exhibition will be held in conjunction with the conference. Papers describing original work in all aspects of image processing are invited. Topics for regular sessions include, but are not limited to, the following : Image analysis/modeling Office image processing Image restoration/enhancement Machine vision Video communications AI vision techniques Image pattern recognition VLSI implementation Remote sensing System architecture Biomedical imaging Color image processing Authors are invited to submit four copies of an extended summary of at least 1000 words to : Technical Program Chairman, ICIP'89 c/o Meeting Planners Pte Ltd 100 Beach Road, #33-01 Shaw Towers, Singapore 0718 Republic of Singapore Telex : RS40125 MEPLAN Fax : (65) 2962670 E-mail : OSH@NUSEEV.BITNET The summary should contain sufficient detail, including a clear description of the salient concepts and novel features of the work. The summary should include the authors' names, addresses, affiliations, and telephone, telex and fax numbers. The authors should also indicate one or more of the above topics that best describe the contents of the paper. Proposals for tutorials and special sessions are also welcome and should be addressed to the Technical Program Chairman before 16 January 1989. AUTHORS' SCHEDULE Submission of summary 1 February 1989 Notification of acceptance 31 March 1989 Submission of final manuscripts 1 June 1989 *.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.** Compiled by the Editors: Brief conference and workshop announcements. (Sources for complete information are indicated. Are there readers wishing to contribute full electronic text for a future E-LETTER?) Call for Papers. Workshop on Higher-Order Spectral Analysis: Vail, Colorado, June 28-30, 1989. Co-Chairmen: C.L. Nikias and J.M. Mendel. Deadline for submission of summary: January 15, 1989. For information, contact M.R. Raghuveer, Dept. of EE, Rochester Inst. of Technology, 1 Lomb Memorial Dr., PO Box 9887, Rochester, NY 14623-0887; Tel. 716-475-2185. Call for Papers. SIAM Conference on Control in the 90's: San Francisco, May 17-19, 1989. Deadline for contributed presentations: December 7, 1988; deadline for minisymposium proposals: November 21, 1988. For information, contact SIAM Conference Coordinator, (email) siam@wharton.upenn.edu. Meeting announcement. IFAC Symposium on Nonlinear Control Systems Design: Capri, Italy, June 14-16, 1989. Symposium Chairman: A. Isidori. The deadline for submissions is past. For information, contact IFAC Symposium - NOLCOS 89, Dipartimento di Informatica e Sistemistica, Universita di Roma "La Sapienza", Via Eudossiana 18, 00184 Rome, Italy. Call for Papers. IFAC - CIRP - IFIP - IFORS International Workshop on Decisional Structures in Automated Manufacturing: Genova, Italy, September 18-21, 1989. Chairmen: Y.C. Ho and A. Villa. Deadline for submission of abstract: November 15, 1988. For information, contact Prof. Agostino Villa, Dipartimento di Tecnologia e Sistemi di Produzione, Politecnico Torino, corso Duca degli Abruzzi - 24 , I-10129 Torino, Italy. Call for Papers. Conference on Information Sciences and Systems: The Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, MD, March 22-24, 1989. Program directors: H.L. Weinert and G.G.L. Meyer. Deadline for submission of papers: January 16, 1989. For information, contact 1989 CISS, Dept. of Electrical and Computer Engineering, The Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, MD, 21218. *.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.** News item contributed by the Editors: Prof. Tom Kailath, well known to readers of the E-LETTER, has been named the first Hitachi America Professor of Engineering at Stanford University. Our warmest congratulations to Tom for this honor! *.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.** Contributed by E.Sontag (sontag@fermat.rutgers.edu) SYCON -- Rutgers Center for Systems and Control TITLES OF RECENT SYCON REPORTS Note: Electronic versions of abstracts available from sycon@fermat.rutgers.edu 88-08: "Backpropagation can give rise to spurious local minima even for networks without hidden layers," Eduardo D. Sontag and Hector J. Sussmann, Sept 88. 88-09: "Controllability of nonlinear discrete time systems: a Lie-algebraic approach," Bronislaw Jakubczyk and Eduardo D. Sontag, Aug 88. 88-10: "Further comments on the stabilizability of the angular velocity of a rigid body," Eduardo D. Sontag and Hector J.Sussmann, Sept 88. 88-11: "Finite-dimensional computability of filters in the presence of entrance boundaries," Daniel Ocone, Oct. 88 *.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.** End of E-LETTER Issue 15