Springer Progress in Industrial Mathematics at ECMI 2002: 5 (Mathematics in Industry, 5)

This volume contains the proceedings of the twelfth conference of the Euro pean Consortium for Mathematics in Industry. ECMI was founded in 1986 in to foster research and education in Mathematics in Industry in Europe order and these biannual conferences are the show case for ECMI's research. It is a pleasure to see that six of the plenary speakers have submitted papers for this volume. Their contributions illustrate the breadth of applica tions and the variety of mathematical and computational techniques that are embraced by ECMI. ECMI is also committed to the education of students and it is encouraging that a number of the papers are given by students. The Wacker Prize, which is offered for a Masters Level thesis on an industrial problem, always attracts excellent entries and this year's winner, Nicole Marheineke, is no exception. This is the first time that an ECMI conference has been held in Eastern Europe and the ECMI Council is very grateful to Professor Andris Buikis and his colleagues in Latvia and Lithuania for the excellent job they have done. Thanks too go to the European Union which supported 30 delegates at this conference via TMR Contract No ERBFMRXCT 97-0117 'Differential Equations in Industry and Commerce'. The final meeting of this network was held during this conference which provided a platform for network members to describe their work to a wider audience.