This book highlights recent advances in natural computing, including biology and its theory, bio-inspired computing, computational aesthetics, computational models and theories, computing with natural media, philosophy of natural computing and educational technology. It presents extended versions of the best papers selected from the symposium "7th International Workshop on Natural Computing" (IWNC7), held in Tokyo, Japan, in 2013. The target audience is not limited to researchers working in natural computing but also those active in biological engineering, fine/media art design, aesthetics and philosophy.

This book reviews the active faults around nuclear power plants in Japan and recommends an optimal method of nuclear power regulation controlled by the Nuclear Regulation Authority of Japan. The active faults around nuclear power plants have been underestimated in Japan since the latter half of the 20th century. However, based on the lessons learned from the Fukushima nuclear power plant accident, the book sheds light on why the risks of active faults were underestimated, and discusses the optimal scientific method of assessing those risks. Further, the author shares his experiences in the new standard for nuclear regulation creation team and in the active fault survey at the Nuclear Regulation Authority of Japan. This book is a valuable resource for students, researchers, academic and policy-makers, as well as non-experts interested in nuclear safety.

Disaster Resilient Cities: Concepts and Practical Examples discusses natural disasters, their complexity, and the exploration of different ways of thinking regarding the resilience of structures. The book provides a blueprint for structural designers to better prepare structures for all types of natural hazards during the design stage. Brief and readable, this book analyzes various examples of disaster damage from earthquakes, tsunamis, and floods, together with their causal mechanisms. Practical methods to plan and design structures based on their regions, cities, as well as the particular countermeasures are also included for study.

This book highlights recent advances in natural computing, including biology and its theory, bio-inspired computing, computational aesthetics, computational models and theories, computing with natural media, philosophy of natural computing and educational technology. It presents extended versions of the best papers selected from the symposium "7th International Workshop on Natural Computing" (IWNC7), held in Tokyo, Japan, in 2013. The target audience is not limited to researchers working in natural computing but also those active in biological engineering, fine/media art design, aesthetics and philosophy.

This book deals with one of the most novel advances in natural computing, namely, in the field of tactile sense analysis. Massage, which provides relaxation and stimulation for human beings, is analyzed in this book for the first time by encoding the motions and tactile senses involved. The target audience is not limited to researchers who are interested in natural computing but also includes those working in ergonomic design, biomedical engineering, Kansei engineering, and cognitive science.

This book contains the joint proceedings of the Winter School of Hakodate (WSH) 2011 held in Hakodate, Japan, March 15-16, 2011, and the 6th International Workshop on Natural Computing (6th IWNC) held in Tokyo, Japan, March 28-30, 2012, organized by the Special Interest Group of Natural Computing (SIG-NAC), the Japanese Society for Artificial Intelligence (JSAI). This volume compiles refereed contributions to various aspects of natural computing, ranging from computing with slime mold, artificial chemistry, eco-physics, and synthetic biology, to computational aesthetics.

Most natural and artificial systems transform information in a predictable or programmable way; such transformation can be interpreted as harnessing nature for computing. Recently we have witnessed a burst of research in unconventional computing, resulting in the development of experimental prototypes of natural computers, plasmodium computers, reaction-diffusion processors, and DNA computers as well as theoretical paradigms of natural computation such as cellular automata, artificial chemistry, evolutionary computing, and neural networks. The International Workshop on Natural Computing (IWNC) brings together computer scientists, biologists, mathematicians, electronic engineers, physicists, and others to critically assess present findings in the field, and to outline future developments in nature-inspired computing. This compilation of papers presented at the most recent workshop, held in Nagoya, Japan, makes a valuable contribution to the understanding of natural computing.