The research themes to be addressed in the project are divided into the following seven "focus areas":
----------------------------------------- | | a | b | c | d | e | f | g | |-----------|---|---|---|---|---|---|---| |UIA | | | |[x]| x | x | | |TUB | x | | x | x |[x]| x | x | |LaBRI |[x]| x | x | | x | | | |UNIBREMEN | x | x |[x]| | | x | | |RUL | x |[x]| x | | x | x | | |UNIPISA | | | x | x | x | x |[x]| |UNIROMA1 | x | | | x | x |[x]| x | -----------------------------------------In the research activity of the project various "formal frameworks", that is, mathematical disciplines, will be used. In particular, the following five formal frameworks will be considered: Formal Language Theory, Graph Theory, Algebra and Universal Algebra, Logic, and Category Theory.
A more detailed description of the Research Objectives of GETGRATS is
available in
postscript
and dvi.
Furthermore, for each of the Focus Areas listed above, a Meeting of
more technical nature will be organized, including both presentations of
the work in progress and joint planning and working sessions. If you are
interested to receive timely information about the planning of the Focus
Area Meetings, ask the coordinator
to subscribe the GETGRATS mailing list.
The expertise of UIA covers a number of theoretical aspects as well as application areas. The group has experience concerning the language theoretic aspects of node-based graph rewriting systems, their use as models of computation, and the use of graph transformations in databases. Janssens has made a substantial contribution to the investigation of node-rewriting systems and their languages. More recently he contributed to the development of graph-rewriting models for concurrent and object-oriented computation. This includes the investigation of the models as such (concurrent semantics, modularity, etc.) as well as their relationship to other models (such as Petri nets and pi-calculus), and the study of possible applications (e.g. to protocol verification and design). In cooperation with I. Fisher the use of GTS as semantic model for Actor Systems has been investigated. Paredaens and Van den Bussche are experts in the area of models and languages for databases. They have investigated the potential of GTS as a conceptual tool for object oriented databases; in particular from the viewpoint of expressiveness and complexity of data manipulation languages. Gemis has experience in the use of such GTS tool for the implementation of object oriented databases. The expertise of UIA enables it to contribute to the development of GTS as an important conceptual tool for expressing ideas about the semantics of programming languages.
TRAINING ACTIVITY: The department offers curricula in computing science at the masters (4 year) and ph. D. level. Recent results in Graph Transformation systems have been presented in a research seminar aimed at young researchers. The various members of the staff working on GTS or closely related subjects have supervised and encouraged work by young researchers at various levels, leading to a number of research papers, and theses (masters and Ph.D.).
The algebraic approach to graph transformation has been created in the early seventies at TU Berlin. Since then it became one of the most successful approaches, providing a rich theory for the modeling of concurrent and distributed systems, their structuring and analysis.
The TUB group has been coordinator of the ESPRIT projects COMPUGRAPH "Computing by Graph Transformation" I and II, and member within several national and international projects on formal specification methods as, for example, COMPASS on algebraic specification. Current research projects include the german DFG project "Structuring and Analysis of Algebraic Graph Transformation Systems", the DFG research group project "Petri Net Technology", the ESPRESS project on specification of safety-critical systems using Statecharts and Z, and the cooperation project GRAPHIT with Brazil on integration of formal and informal (graphical) specification techniques.
Major topics of current research, beside graph transformations, are algebraic specifications, high-level Petri nets, and the comparison and integration of different specification techniques. In the area of graph transformations current research activities include structuring, analysis, and semantics, and the application of graph transformation techniques for the specification of parallel and distributed systems. Within GETGRATS the TUB group will contribute to the focus areas Foundation, Unification, Combination and Comparison; Analysis and Verification Techniques; Abstract Semantics; Concurrency Aspects; Modularity Aspects; and Morphisms, Transformations and Operations.
TRAINING ACTIVITY: At TUB several courses are given where graph transformation is treated in different ways. In a basic course called "Rewriting systems" algebraic graph transformation is introduced as one rewriting formalism (among others). This knowledge can be further extended in both the theoretical side and the practical direction, where the students have to specify a software system by graph transformation. Weekly a meeting takes place where all people concerned with graph transformation come together, present their publications, talk about recent ideas and discuss problems. Moreover, TUB offers a Ph.D. program in computer science on communication-based systems. Within this program several seminars have taken place where graph transformation have been applied as specification method for communication-based systems.
The LaBRI (Laboratoire Bordelais de Recherche en Informatique) which gathers more than one hundred researchers from various schools and universities in Bordeaux is considered as one of the best laboratories in France for computer science (especially theoretical computer science). Since 1989 LaBRI has participated to the ESPRIT Working groups COMPUGRAPH I and II, and ASMICS and has developed (often pioneered) research on the following topics: use of Universal Algebra to handle context-free graph grammars of all types and infinite equational graphs (Bauderon, Courcelle); use of monadic second-order logic to describe graph properties and graph transformations, and to obtain efficient algorithms from them such as a good test for minors; incremental algorithms on graphs with bounded tree-width (Courcelle); properties of graphs in the plane, maps, axiomatisation of alignments, placements of graphs with visibility description of distributed graph algorithms in terms of graph relabelling systems (Méetivier) as a tool to prove properties like correctness, (local or global) termination, confluence, ...; use of products and pullbacks in suitable categories of graphs to provide a uniform description of graph rewriting (Bauderon); use of rewriting systems as programming languages, with special interest to efficient compilation of rewriting systems through a technique of specialisation of programs (Strandh).
TRAINING ACTIVITY: Besides classical engineering and Master programs in both practical and theoretical computer science, LaBRI is offering Ph.D. programs in various areas of Computer Science, be they theoretical (Combinatorics, Graph Theory, Graph Rewriting, Transition Systems, ...) or practical (Image Processing and Synthesis, Parallel Computing, Networks and Protocols, ...). Several weekly seminars present recent works in those fields. Moreover, LaBRI is regularly organising "Young Researchers Schools", which on a specific topic gather 30 to 40 researchers from various laboratories in France.
The expertise of the UNIBREMEN team concerns mainly the foundational and theoretical aspects of graph transformation with additional interest in potential applications.
The main areas of research are
The expertise of the RUL group stretches from theoretical to applied
aspects of graph transformations.
Rozenberg, Engelfriet and Hoogeboom have the knowledge and experience
in the language-theoretic, graph-theoretic, algebraic and logical aspects
of graph transformations, in particular concerning 2-structures and context-free
graph grammars.
Engels and Schuerr have the knowledge and experience in applying graph
transformations systems in software engineering, both on the conceptual
level as on the implementation level. In particular this group has considerable
experience in research on parsing, semantics, concurrency, modularity,
and transformation aspects of graph transformation systems.
TRAINING ACTIVITY: RUL runs two research seminars, where also the results on graph transformation systems are reported. Also, currently there are three lectures ("Parsing of Visual Languages", "2-Structures", "Recursive Grammars"), where different aspects of graph transformation systems are discussed. The institute in Leiden offers a stimulating research environment for young researchers, where they can discuss research problems among themselves and with the faculty involved in research on graph transformation systems.
The Dipartimento di Informatica of the University of Pisa was the first established Italian department of Computer Science. It has a faculty of about 40 people, covering most main areas in computer science research, including Algorithms and Data Structures, Parallel and Distributed Architectures, Artifical Intelligence and Robotics, Database and Information Retrieval, Computational Mathematics, Operating Research, Programming Languages, and Software Engineering.
The Models of Computation & Concurrency Group at the Department of Computer Science in Pisa has more than a decade of history of active research in the field of (concurrent) models of computations for process algebras, Petri nets, lambda-calculus, term and graph rewriting systems, shared and distributed memory systems. The group also contributed to the development of tools for protocol verification. Graph Transition Systems have been actively studied especially for what concerns their concurrent aspects. GTS have been employed to provide a truly concurrent semantics of other formalisms, like mobile functional languages (pi-calculus) and concurrent constraint languages.
TRAINING: The Dipartimento di Informatica offers computing curricula both at the Diploma (3 years), Laurea (5 years) and at the Ph.D. level (this year 13 courses for the Ph.D. curriculum are offered). It had a pioneering role in Italy in organizing computing curricula.
The Research Group in Roma consists of members with a history of active research in the field of models computations, algebraic specification of software systems, term and graph rewriting systems, formalization of visual languages. Different members of the group have participated (before and after joining the University of Roma La Sapienza) in various national and international projects including Esprit Working Groups and HCM networks.
The Dipartimento di Scienze dell'Informazione
of the University of Roma La Sapienza was established in 1991. It offers
computing curricula both at the Diploma (3 years), Laurea (5 years) and
Ph.D.level. It has a faculty of about 20 people whose research interests
include Algorithms and Graph Theory, Complexity Theory, Functional and
Logic Programming, Parallel Algorithms and Architectures, Pictorial Computing,
and Formal Methods for System Design.
tel: +39 050 887266
fax: +39 050 887226
elm: andrea@di.unipi.it
tel: +32 3 8202405
fax: +32 3 8202421
elm: dmjans@uia.ua.ac.be
tel: +49 30 31473511/510
fax: +49 30 31423516
elm: ehrig@cs.tu-berlin.de
tel: +33 556 84 69 07 or +33 556 84 58 24
fax: +33 556 84 66 69 or +33 556 84 79 09
elm: bauderon@labri.u-bordeaux.fr
tel: +49 421 2182956
fax: +49 421 2184322
elm: kreo@informatik.uni-Bremen.de
tel: +31 71 5277067
fax: +31 71 5276985
elm: rozenber@wi.leidenuniv.nl
tel: +39 050 887221
fax: +39 050 887226
elm: ugo@di.unipi.it
tel: +39 06 49918361
fax: +39 06 8841964
elm: parisi@dsi.uniroma1.it