*   ______________________________________________________________________   *

    The RCRA group (Knowledge Representation & Automated Reasoning) of the
           AI*IA (Italian Association for Artificial Intelligence)
                              http://rcra.aixia.it

                                   organises

                           the special RCRA session on
                 "Experimentation of Combinatorial Algorithms"
                          at the XI Conference of the
          Italian Association for Artificial Intelligence (AI*IA 2009)

                                   and the

                             16th RCRA workshop:
               Experimental evaluation of algorithms for solving
               problems with combinatorial explosion  (RCRA 2009)


    Email:               rcra.aixia.09@gmail.com
    RCRA group web site: http://rcra.aixia.it/
    Workshop web site:   http://rcra.aixia.it/rcra2009

*   ______________________________________________________________________   *

    These events follow the series of the RCRA (Knowledge Representation
    and Automated Reasoning) annual meetings, held since 1994.
    The success of the previous events shows that RCRA is becoming a major
    forum for exchanging ideas and proposing experimentation methodologies
    for algorithms in artificial intelligence.

*   ______________________________________________________________________   *

NEWS!!!
 This year the RCRA working group organises two events:
 - RCRA Session @AI*IA 2009. A special session of the XI Conference of the
   Italian Association for Artificial Intelligence (AI*IA 2009), with formal
   proceedings published on Springer LNAI
 
 - RCRA 2009. The 16th International RCRA workshop with original and
   already published papers.

As in previous editions, authors of papers presented at either event
will have the opportunity to participate to the selection of a special issue
that will appear in a prestigious international journal.

DATES
 11-12 december 2009, co-located with AI*IA 2009
 http://www.aixia09.unimore.it/

VENUE
 Reggio Emilia, Italy

AIMS AND SCOPE
  Many problems in Artificial Intelligence show an exponential explosion of the
  search space.  Although stemming from different research areas in AI, such
  problems are often addressed with algorithms that have a common goal: the
  effective exploration of huge state spaces.  Many algorithms developed in one
  research area are applicable to other problems, or can be hybridised with
  techniques in other areas. Artificial Intelligence tools often exploit or
  hybridise techniques developed by other research communities, such as
  Operations Research.
  In recent years, research in AI has more and more focussed on experimental
  evaluation of algorithms, the development of suitable methodologies for
  experimentation and analysis, the study of languages and the implementation of
  systems for the definition and solution of problems.

  Scope of the workshop is fostering the cross-fertilisation of ideas stemming
  from different areas, proposing benchmarks for new challenging problems,
  comparing models and algorithms from an experimental viewpoint, and, in
  general, comparing different approaches with respect to efficiency, problem
  modelling, and ease of development.

  Topics of interest include, but are not limited to:
  * Experimental evaluation of algorithms for
       o knowledge representation
       o automated reasoning
       o planning
       o scheduling
       o machine learning
       o model checking
       o boolean satisfiability (SAT)
       o constraint programming
       o constraint satisfaction
       o quantified boolean formulae and quantified constraints
       o modal logics
       o logic programming
       o disjunctive logic programming
       o temporal reasoning
       o combinatorial optimization
  * Definition and construction of benchmarks
  * Experimentation methodologies
  * Metaheuristics
  * Algorithm hybridisation
  * Static analysis of combinatorial problems
  * Languages and systems for definition and solution of problems
  * Comparisons between systems and algorithms
  * Application experiences


WORKSHOP CHAIRS
 * Marco Gavanelli, Università degli Studi di Ferrara, Italy
 * Toni Mancini, Sapienza Università di Roma, Italy

WORKSHOP PROGRAM COMMITTEE
 * Slim Abdennadher, German University in Cairo, Egypt
 * Gilles Audemard, Université d'Artois, France
 * Francesco Calimeri, Università della Calabria, Italy
 * Gianluca Caminiti, Università Mediterranea di Reggio Calabria, Italy
 * Khalil Djelloul, Université d'Orléans, France
 * Agostino Dovier, Universita` di Udine, Italy
 * Esra Erdem, University of Texas at Austin, USA
 * Wolfgang Faber, Università della Calabria, Italy
 * Pierre Flener, Uppsala University, Sweden
 * Marco Gavanelli, Università di Ferrara, Italy
 * Hector Geffner, Universitat Pompeu Fabra, Spain
 * Daniel Le Berre, Université d'Artois, France
 * Ines Lynce, Universidade Técnica de Lisboa, Portugal
 * Toni Mancini, Sapienza Università di Roma, Italy
 * Marco Maratea, Università di Genova, Italy
 * Joao Marques-Silva, University College Dublin, Ireland
 * Pedro Meseguer, Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Científicas, Spain
 * Massimo Narizzano, Università di Genova, Italy
 * Ilkka Niemelä, Helsinki University of Technology, Finland
 * Angelo Oddi, ISTC-CNR, National Research Council, Italy
 * Andrea Omicini, Università di Bologna, Italy
 * Steve Prestwich, Cork Constraint Computation Centre, Ireland
 * Daniel Riera, Universitat Oberta de Catalunya, Spain
 * Andrea Schaerf, Università di Udine, Italy
 * Kostas Stergiou, University of the Aegean, Greece
 * Mirek Truszczynski, University of Kentucky, USA


HOST ORGANIZATION
 Università di Modena e Reggio-Emilia, Italy

LOCAL COMMITTEE
 * To be announced


SUBMISSIONS
  This year RCRA will have a regular session in the conference AI*IA 2009,
  plus an informal workshop. Authors of papers appearing either in the RCRA session
  of AI*IA or in the RCRA workshop will be invited to submit to a special issue that
  will appear in a prestigious international journal (cf. workshop web-site for
  the latest information).

RCRA Session @AI*IA 2009
  Authors interested in the RCRA session of AI*IA 2009 are encouraged to submit
  to AI*IA, indicating clearly that the main topic of the paper is

                        "Experimentation of Combinatorial Algorithms".

  Papers must describe original work; deadline 24 May 2009.
  Submission details are available on

  http://www.aixia09.unimore.it/

  Papers accepted to the AI*IA conference will be published as a volume of the
  Springer Lecture Notes in Artificial Intelligence series.


RCRA Workshop
  Authors are invited to submit either original papers, or papers that appear on
  conference proceedings (different than AI*IA 2009).

  Publications showing negative results are welcome, provided that the approach
  was original and very promising in principle, the experimentation was
  well-conducted, the results obtained were unforeseeable and gave important
  hints in the comprehension of the target problem, helping other researchers to
  avoid unsuccessful paths.

  At the time of submission, authors are requested to clearly specify whether their
  submission is original or already published.

  Workshop submissions must be in PDF format, do not exceed 15 pages, and should be
  written in LaTeX, using the RCRA 2009 style available on the workshop web site.
  Submissions will be reviewed by at least three members of the
  program committee.
  Papers accepted at the workshop will be electronically published on the
  workshop web site and as an issue of the CEUR Workshop Proceedings series.

  Submissions should be sent to the address: rcra.aixia.09@gmail.com


SELECTION FOR THE POST-PROCEEDINGS
  Few weeks after the workshop, authors of papers presented either at the
  RCRA workshop, or at the RCRA session of AI*IA will have the
  opportunity to participate to the selection for the post-proceedings
  by submitting an extended version of their work.

  Workshop post-proceedings will appear in a special issue of a prestigious
  international journal, provided that a sufficient amount of high quality
  papers is collected.

  All candidate articles must be original: they cannot have already been published
  in journals, and must contain significant additional material with respect to any
  previous version already published in formal conference proceedings
  (including the proceedings of AI*IA 2009).

  Such papers will go through a second formal selection process, and will be
  reviewed by at least three reviewers. The selection process will be kept very
  short, and at most one re-submission stage will be allowed (cf. important
  dates). Hence, authors are invited to work on their paper mainly before the
  workshop date.



IMPORTANT DATES
  * Final version due:                         30 November 2009
  * RCRA session@AI*IA:                        11 December 2009
  * RCRA workshop:                          11-12 December 2009