This book is a collection of articles studying various Steiner tree prob lems with applications in industries, such as the design of electronic cir cuits, computer networking, telecommunication, and perfect phylogeny. The Steiner tree problem was initiated in the Euclidean plane. Given a set of points in the Euclidean plane, the shortest network interconnect ing the points in the set is called the Steiner minimum tree. The Steiner minimum tree may contain some vertices which are not the given points. Those vertices are called Steiner points while the given points are called terminals. The shortest network for three terminals was first studied by Fermat (1601-1665). Fermat proposed the problem of finding a point to minimize the total distance from it to three terminals in the Euclidean plane. The direct generalization is to find a point to minimize the total distance from it to n terminals, which is still called the Fermat problem today. The Steiner minimum tree problem is an indirect generalization. Schreiber in 1986 found that this generalization (i.e., the Steiner mini mum tree) was first proposed by Gauss."

The research and development of pattern recognition have proven to be of importance in science, technology, and human activity. Many useful concepts and tools from different disciplines have been employed in pattern recognition. Among them is string matching, which receives much theoretical and practical attention. String matching is also an important topic in combinatorial optimization. This book is devoted to recent advances in pattern recognition and string matching. It consists of twenty eight chapters written by different authors, addressing a broad range of topics such as those from classifica tion, matching, mining, feature selection, and applications. Each chapter is self-contained, and presents either novel methodological approaches or applications of existing theories and techniques. The aim, intent, and motivation for publishing this book is to pro vide a reference tool for the increasing number of readers who depend upon pattern recognition or string matching in some way. This includes students and professionals in computer science, mathematics, statistics, and electrical engineering. We wish to thank all the authors for their valuable efforts, which made this book a reality. Thanks also go to all reviewers who gave generously of their time and expertise."

Wireless networking enables two or more computers to communicate using standard network protocols without network cables. Since their emergence in the 1970s, wireless networks have become increasingly pop ular in the computing industry. In the past decade, wireless networks have enabled true mobility. There are currently two versions of mobile wireless networks. An infrastructure network contains a wired backbone with the last hop being wireless. The cellular phone system is an exam ple of an infrastructure network. A multihop ad hoc wireless network has no infrastructure and is thus entirely wireless. A wireless sensor network is an example of a multihop ad hoc wireless network. Ad hoc wireless networking is a technique to support robust and ef ficient operation in mobile wireless networks by incorporating routing functionality into mobile hosts. This technique will be used to realize the dream of "anywhere and anytime computing," which is termed mo bile computing. Mobile computing is a new paradigm of computing in which users carrying portable devices have access to shared infrastruc ture in any location at any time. Mobile computing is a very challenging topic for scientists in computer science and electrical engineering. The representative system for ad hoc wireless networking is called MANET, an acronym for "Mobile Ad hoc NETworks." MANET is an autonomous system consisting of mobile hosts connected by wireless links which can be quickly deployed."

Wireless networking enables two or more computers to communicate using standard network protocols without network cables. Since their emergence in the 1970s, wireless networks have become increasingly pop ular in the computing industry. In the past decade, wireless networks have enabled true mobility. There are currently two versions of mobile wireless networks. An infrastructure network contains a wired backbone with the last hop being wireless. The cellular phone system is an exam ple of an infrastructure network. A multihop ad hoc wireless network has no infrastructure and is thus entirely wireless. A wireless sensor network is an example of a multihop ad hoc wireless network. Ad hoc wireless networking is a technique to support robust and ef ficient operation in mobile wireless networks by incorporating routing functionality into mobile hosts. This technique will be used to realize the dream of "anywhere and anytime computing," which is termed mo bile computing. Mobile computing is a new paradigm of computing in which users carrying portable devices have access to shared infrastruc ture in any location at any time. Mobile computing is a very challenging topic for scientists in computer science and electrical engineering. The representative system for ad hoc wireless networking is called MANET, an acronym for "Mobile Ad hoc NETworks." MANET is an autonomous system consisting of mobile hosts connected by wireless links which can be quickly deployed."

The research and development of pattern recognition have proven to be of importance in science, technology, and human activity. Many useful concepts and tools from different disciplines have been employed in pattern recognition. Among them is string matching, which receives much theoretical and practical attention. String matching is also an important topic in combinatorial optimization. This book is devoted to recent advances in pattern recognition and string matching. It consists of twenty eight chapters written by different authors, addressing a broad range of topics such as those from classifica tion, matching, mining, feature selection, and applications. Each chapter is self-contained, and presents either novel methodological approaches or applications of existing theories and techniques. The aim, intent, and motivation for publishing this book is to pro vide a reference tool for the increasing number of readers who depend upon pattern recognition or string matching in some way. This includes students and professionals in computer science, mathematics, statistics, and electrical engineering. We wish to thank all the authors for their valuable efforts, which made this book a reality. Thanks also go to all reviewers who gave generously of their time and expertise."