-------- Original-Nachricht -------- Betreff: [computational.science] Call for papers: A Special Issue on Advances in Agent-mediated Automated Negotiations--in Multiagent and grid Systems Datum: Tue, 23 Dec 2008 09:36:15 +1100 Von: Minjie Zhang minjie@uow.edu.au Organisation: "OptimaNumerics" An: Computational Science Mailing List computational.science@lists.optimanumerics.com

*Call for papers for a special issue in* *Multiagent and Grid Systems --- an International Journal* * * *Title: Advances in Agent-mediated Automated Negotiations* Guest Editors: Minjie Zhang (University of Wollongong), and Takayuki Ito (Nagoya Institute of Technology)

Electronic Automated Negotiations have been widely studied and are becoming an important, emerging area in the field of Autonomous Agents and Multi-Agent Systems, as well as agent-based applications. In general, automated negotiations between agents can be in many different contexts. For instance, designing agents that can negotiate deals on behalf of human traders is essential for developing the next generation of e-commerce and e-trading systems, since there are a lot of factors that characterize such negotiations. These factors include the number of issues, dependency between issues, representation of utility, negotiation protocols, negotiation forms (bilateral or multi-party), time constraints, etc. Software agents can support automation or simulation of such complex negotiations on the behalf of their owners, and provide them with adequate bargaining strategies. In many multi-issue bargaining settings, negotiation becomes more than a zero-sum game, so bargaining agents have an incentive to cooperate in order to achieve efficient win-win agreements. Also, in a complex negotiation, there could be multiple issues that are interdependent. Thus, agent's utility will become more complex than simple utility functions. Further, negotiation forms and protocols could be different between bilateral situations and multi-party situations.

This special issue hopes to bring together researchers working in the broad areas of agent negotiation, multi-issue negotiations, auctions, mechanism design, electronic commerce, Grid resource management, and co-operation mechanisms. It serves to provide a forum for researchers to present their results and to highlight recent research achievements in the areas. Topics include but are not limited to:

* Negotiation Protocols * Multi-Issue Negotiations * Concurrent, Multiple, and Sequential Negotiations * Bilateral Negotiations * Multilateral Negotiation * Negotiation and Coordination Mechanisms * Negotiation under Asymmetric Information * Large Scale Negotiation * Matchmaking and Brokering Mechanisms * Coordination for Local and Global Consistency * 2-sided Matching * Predicting Opponent's Behaviours in Negotiation. * Utility Models and Preference Models * Complexity Aspects of Multi-issue Negotiation * Negotiation Simulation

*The deadline for submission:* March 30, 2009

Inquiries and manuscripts should be sent to one of the Guest Editors: Minjie Zhang < minjie@uow.edu.au> or Takayuki Ito ito.takayuki@nitech.ac.jp.

The Instruction for Authors is available at: http://www.iospress.nl/html/15741702.php