Symposium Announcement

[Anton Hofland]

          NEURAL NETWORKS AND ENGINEERING APPLICATIONS

           International Symposium 23/24 October 1991


                           Background

The  annual  symposium on aspects of  advanced  process  control, 
organised in collaboration with major engineering companies,  has 
in  the past been highly successful. This year the fifth  meeting 
will  continue this tradition when it takes as its  theme  Neural 
Networks and Engineering Applications.

Learning  systems  of all kinds are presently being  studied  for 
potential application to a wide variety of industrial situations. 
Artificial Neural Networks, in particular, are one of the fastest 
growing  paradigms.  The reason for  the  significant  industrial 
interest  in neural networks is that they hold great promise  for 
solving  problems that have proved to be extremely difficult  for 
standard  techniques. In fact some industries, especially in  the 
USA and Japan, have already transferred the technology through to 
successful  plant  applications. In many  industrial  situations, 
mathematical  models of the processes are either too complex  for 
companies  to  develop  or not accurate enough  to  be  used  for 
control  or  optimisation. Neural networks can enable  rapid  and 
accurate  model development and thus play a significant  role  in 
improving   the  operation  and  control  of  a  wide  range   of 
strategically  important processes. Indeed there is  a  potential 
for their application in virtually every operation in industry.

The   underlying  theme  of  the  Symposium,  organised  by   the 
University  of  Newcastle and the International  Neural  Networks 
Industrial Club, will be to look at the methodology of artificial 
neural  networks and their applications. Industrial studies  will 
be presented with the aim of identifying opportunities for cross-
fertilisation of ideas and technology between industrial  sectors 
and academic research. The speakers are technical authorities  in 
their  area  and  are  drawn  from  international  industry   and 
university  research  centres.  They  will  all  address   issues 
associated  with the technology and the  potential  applications. 
Poster  and  demonstration sessions will also be  mounted.  Ample 
time  will be provided for discussions adding to the spectrum  of 
experience  of  the delegates. In order  to  facilitate  fruitful 
discussion periods the number of delegates will be restricted  to 
75.

The  symposium  will be held at the Imperial Hotel  in  Newcastle 
upon  Tyne, UK. It will start at 1 pm. on the 23rd  October  with 
registration from 12 noon. The Lord Mayor of Newcastle will  host 
a civic reception and dinner on the evening of the 23rd  starting 
at  7.30 pm. The meeting will re-convene on the 24th at  8.30  am 
and finish at 4.30 pm.


                            PROGRAMME

1) Artificial Neural Networks for Process Control.
   Prof. Julian Morris, University of Newcastle UK.

2) Network Training Paradigms.
   Dr. Mark Willis, University of Newcastle, UK.

3) Neural Networks in Process Control.
   Dr. Tom McAvoy, University of Maryland, USA.

4) Autoassociative and Radial Basis Function Networks.
   Dr. Mark Kramer, MIT, USA. 

5) Fault Detection via Artificial Neural Networks.
   Dr. David Himmelblau, University of Texas, USA.

6) Neural Networks in Industrial Modelling and Control.
   Dr. Mike Piovoso, DuPont, USA.

7) Neural Networks in Process Engineering.
   Dr. Gary Montague, University of Newcastle, UK.

8) Time Series Forecasting using Neural Networks.
   Mr. Chris Gent, SD Scicon, UK.

9) Neural Network Tools.
   Dr. Alan Hall, Scientific Computers Ltd., UK.


                          REGISTRATION

Registration  will  close at the 17th October.  More  information 
and/or registration forms can be obtained by contacting :

Prof. A. Julian Morris
Department of Chemical and Process Engineering
Merz Court
Claremont Road
Newcastle upon Tyne NE1 7RU
Telephone : +44-91-2226000 ext. ????
Fax       : +44-91-2611182
e-mail    : julian.morris at newcastle.ac.uk

or

Dr. Gary Montague
Department of Chemical and Process Engineering
Merz Court
Claremont Road
Newcastle upon Tyne NE1 7RU
Telephone : +44-91-2226000 ext. ????
Fax       : +44-91-2611182
e-mail    : gary.montague at newcastle.ac.uk