Workshop

This workshop will emphasize constructions and computational methods for combinatorial designs and the growing number of new and useful applications of designs in biology/biotechnology, computer science, information theory, and numerical finance. Examples of areas of application in computer science include data mining, storage in disk arrays, the design of parallel algorithms, software testing, database formatting, file organization, the analysis of algorithms, the design of networks, and interconnection strategies for networks. Examples of other applications in information theory include wireless networking (the design of radio and satellite networks), internet communication protocols, signal processing, and multiaccess communications. Many of the applications in molecular biology/biotechnology come from the human genome project: mapping genomes, forming the clone libraries, and designing chips for DNA probes. In the past year and a half, a new application of designs has come out of Wall Street; (t,m,s)-nets are being used in numerical integration problems in financial mathematics. All of these applications share a common feature; they require the construction of highly structured combinatorial designs.