A joint research project of algebraists from the universities of Antwerp, Biele- feld, Essen, Leeds, Paris VI and Trondheim on "Invariants and Representations of Algebras" has been supported from 1991 to 1997 by the European Union programmes "Science" and "Human Capital and Mobility", it was coordinated by Mme M. -P. Malliavin (Paris VI). Later, algebraists from the universities of Edinburgh, Ioannina, Murcia and Torun joined the collaboration. This network is now coordinated by C. M. Ringel (Bielefeld). It has received funds from the European Commission in order to organize four conferences as part of the pro- gramme "Training and Mobility of Researchers", to be held during the period 1997-1999 at Essen, Murcia, Bielefeld and Ioannina. The first Euroconference of this series took place at the University of Essen, April 1-4, 1997. It was devoted to "Computational Methods for Representations of Groups and Algebras" . The organizers were P. Draxler (Bielefeld) and G. Michler (Essen). This volume collects most of the material presented at the conference. There had been an additional introductory lecture by H. Gollan; it is not included here, since its contents is available in the lecture notes: P. Fleischmann, G. O. Michler, P. Roelse, J. Rosenboom, R. Staszewski, C. Wagner, M. Weller, "Linear algebra over small finite fields on parallel machines", Vorlesungen Fachbereich Math. Univ. Essen, 23 (1995). Together with these notes, this volume will provide a survey on the present state of art.

These papers were presented at the workshop on High Performance Computing and Gigabit Wide Area Networks held in September 1998 in Essen, Germany. The aim of the workshop was to analyse the interplay between computer network technology, communication software and the performance of mathematical algorithms used for large scale computations in wide area high speed computer networks. Only through interdisciplinary research with the co-operation of electrical engineers, mathematicians and computer scientists will it be possible to determine the most efficient combinations of parallel algorithms, protocols and network hardware. This workshop brought together scientists working in computer networks, network protocols and numerical and linear algebra and new insights were gained that have previously been unattainable. This volume contains 22 refereed research articles that reflect the exciting new developments in this field.

The combination of fast, low-latency networks and high-performance, distributed tools for mathematical software has resulted in widespread, affordable scientific computing facilities. Practitioners working in the fields of computer communication networks, distributed computing, computational algebra and numerical analysis have been brought together to contribute to this volume and explore the emerging distributed and parallel technology in a scientific environment. This collection includes surveys and original research on both software infrastructure for parallel applications and hardware and architecture infrastructure. Among the topics covered are switch-based high-speed networks, ATM over local and wide area networks, network performance, application support, finite element methods, eigenvalue problems, invariant subspace decomposition, QR factorization and Todd-Coxseter coset enumeration.