This book covers advances made since the 2004 Springer volume "Polarized Light in Animal Vision" edited by Horvath and Varju, but also provides reviews and synopses of some areas. Part I examines polarization sensitivity across many animal taxa including vertebrates and invertebrates and details both terrestrial and aquatic life. Part II is devoted to the description of polarized light in nature and explores how the physics of light must be taken into account when understanding how polarized light is detected by the visual system. This includes underwater polarization due to scattering; polarization patterns reflected from freshwater bodies; polarization characteristics of forest canopies; normal and anomalous polarization patterns of the skies; skylight polarization transmitted through Snell's window and both linearly and circularly polarized signals produced by terrestrial and aquatic animals. This Part also examines polarized "light pollution" induced by anthropogenic factors such as reflection off asphalt surfaces, glass panes, car bodies, and other man-made structures that are now known to form ecological traps for polarotactic insects. Part III surveys some of the practical applications of polarization vision including polarization-based traps for biting insects, ground-based polarimetric cloud detectors and an historical examination of the navigational abilities of Viking seafarers using the sky polarization compass. The deterrent qualities of ungulate pelage to polarization-sensitive biting insects is also examined in this section.

This book constitutes the refereed proceedings of the 21st International Conference on Analytical and Stochastic Modelling Techniques and Applications, ASMTA 2014, held in Budapest, Hungary, in June/July 2014. The 18 papers presented were carefully reviewed and selected from 27 submissions. The papers discuss the latest developments in analytical, numerical and simulation algorithms for stochastic systems, including Markov processes, queueing networks, stochastic Petri nets, process algebras, game theory, etc.

It is our great pleasure to present the proceedings of the 16th International ConferenceonAnalyticalandStochasticModellingTechniquesandApplications (ASMTA 2009) that took place in Madrid. The conference has become an established annual event in the agenda of the experts of analytical modelling and performance evaluation in Europe and internationally. This year the proceedings continued to be published as part of Springer's prestigiousLecture Notes in Computer Science (LNCS) series. This is another sign of the growing con?dence in the quality standards and procedures followed in the reviewing process and the program compilation. Following the traditions of the conference, ASMTA 2009, was honored to have a distinguished keynote speaker in the person of Kishor Trivedi. Professor Trivedi holds the Hudson Chair in the Department of Electrical and Computer EngineeringatDukeUniversity, Durham, NC, USA. HeistheDuke-SiteDirector of an NSF Industry-University Cooperative Research Center between NC State University and Duke University for carrying out applied research in computing and communications. He has been on the Duke faculty since 1975. He is the author of a well-known text entitled Probability and Statistics with Reliability, Queuing and Computer Science Applications, published by Prentice-Hall, the secondeditionofwhichhasjustappeared. Hehasalsopublishedtwootherbooks entitled Performance and Reliability Analysis of Computer Systems, published by Kluwer Academic Publishers, and Queueing Networks and Markov Chains, by John Wiley. He is also known for his work on the modelling and analysis of software aging and rejuvenation. The conference maintained the tradition of high-quality programs with an acceptance rate of about 40%.

Arthropods as pests in crops, vectors of diseases, pollinators, and natural enemies of pests are of huge economic importance. They affect livestock, human health and food supplies around the world. This unique book examines and reviews how light and colour can be used to enhance pest management in agricultural and medical applications by manipulating the optical responses of arthropods. Arthropods use optical cues to find food, oviposition sites and to navigate. Light also regulates their diurnal and seasonal activities. Plants use optical cues to attract or deter various species of arthropod. In this book, an international team of experts show how light can be used successfully to attract, arrest, confuse and deter arthropods as well as to disrupt their biological clocks. The book: Presents an up-to-date and thorough summary of what is known about how arthropods of agricultural and medical importance respond to visual cues. Describes techniques that use light to manipulate pests and beneficial insects and mites. Presents a broad discussion of the potential use of optical manipulation of arthropods to improve the health of plants, domestic animals and humans.

The surface of dry or wet asphalt roads reflect partially linearly polarised light, the degree of linear polarisation of which depends on the darkness and roughness of asphalt: the darker and/or the smoother the asphalt, the higher the p of light reflected from it. If the asphalt is sunlit and the direction of view is parallel to the solar-antisolar meridian, then the direction of polarisation of asphalt-reflected light is horizontal. In this case the asphalt surface can attract water-seeking aquatic insects, because they detect water by means of the horizontal polarisation of light reflected from the water surface. This phenomenon is called positive polarotaxis. This book proposes the use of these remedies on asphalt roads running near emergence sites of endangered aquatic insects, especially in the vicinity of wetlands, rivers and lakes.