Many novel cooperative phenomena found in a variety of systems studied by scientists can be treated using the uniting principles of synergetics. Examples are frustrated and random systems, polymers, spin glasses, neural networks, chemical and biological systems, and fluids. In this book attention is focused on two main problems. First, how local, topological constraints (frustrations) can cause macroscopic cooperative behavior: related ideas initially developed for spin glasses are shown to play key roles also for optimization and the modeling of neural networks. Second, the dynamical constraints that arise from the nonlinear dynamics of the systems: the discussion covers turbulence in fluids, pattern formation, and conventional 1/f noise. The volume will be of interest to anyone wishing to understand the current development of work on complex systems, which is presently one of the most challenging subjects in statistical and condensed matter physics.

Inhalt

I New Type of Phase Transitions in Frustrated Systems, Polymers, etc..- Statistical Physics of Domain Walls and Grain Boundaries in Ordering Kinetics.- Super-Effective-Field CAM Theory of Dynamical Complexity.- Some Recent Experiments in Turbulently Stirred Fluids.- A Numerical Study of Defect Dynamics in a Three-Dimensional Complex Field.- Monte Carlo-Molecular Dynamics Simulation in Two-Dimensional Spin Systems.- Can Rod-like Molecules Form a Smectic Phase Without Attractive Forces?.- Martensitic Transformation: Nonlinear Order Parameter.- Successive Magnetic Ordering in a Triangular Lattice Antiferromagnet CsNiCl3.- Evidence for Z2-Vortex Excitations in the Quasi-Two-Dimensional Triangular Lattice Antiferromagnets HCrO2 and LiCrO2.- Soliton Dynamics in Impure Ising-like Antiferromagnetic Chains.- Soliton-Mediated Magnetic Phase Transition in the Frustrated Antiferromagnet CsCoCl3.- Computer Experiment on Sublattice Dynamics of Antiferromagnetic Triangular Lattice Systems with 1/fn Fluctuations: Proposal of SSA for the Study of Frustrated Systems.- A New Approach to the Frustrated Two-Dimensional Ising Models.- New Type of Phase Transition in an Antiferromagnetic Ising Model on a Stacked Triangular Lattice by the Interface Method.- Spin Dynamics of an Ising-like S = 1/2 Antiferromagnet on Finite Chains and Triangular Lattices.- Higher-Order Commensurate, Incommensurate and Liquid Phases of an Atomic Monolayer System on a Periodic Substrate.- Critical Phenomena of a Quantum Heisenberg-like Antiferromagnet.- Ground-State Long-Range Order of the Two-Dimensional Quantum Antiferromagnet.- Random Interfaces and the Physics of Microemulsions.- Dynamical Aspects of Volume Phase Transition and Pattern Formation in Polymer Gels.- Coherent-Anomaly Method in Polymer Physics.- Computer Modelling of Pattern Formation in Gels.- Molecular Theory of Thermoreversible Gelation.- Electrostatic Effects and Counterion Condensation in Gels.- Role of Fluctuations in Fluid Mechanics and Dendritic Solidification.- Phase Transition and Fractals: Fractal Configurations of the Ising Models.- Aggregation of Particles with Deterministic Trajectories.- Anomalous Diffusion in a Fractal Potential.- Dynamical Behavior of Fractal Clusters via Aggregation and Evaporation Processes.- Growth of Clusters Through Evaporation-Condensation Processes.- II Spin Glasses and Related Random Systems.- Slow Relaxations in Spin Glasses and Related Random Systems.- Models for Slow Relaxation in Glassy Systems.- Experimental Study of the Slow Dynamics in the Spin-Glass Phase.- Scaling Theory of the Ordered Phase of Real Spin Glasses.- Phase Diagram and Critical Properties of the Finite-Dimensional Spin Glasses.- Griffiths Singularities and the Dynamics of Random Systems.- Moment Instabilities and Reentrant Spin Glass Behavior in 3d Transition Metal Alloys.- Ultradiffusion in the SK Spin Glass.- Critical Behavior of the Uniaxially Anisotropic Spin Glass ZnMn.- Mixed Phase in the Reentrant Ising System FexMn1-xTiO3.- Dynamic Properties of a Reentrant Spin Glass Pd1-x-yFexMny.- Time Dependent Magnetic Phenomena in Dilute Ising Systems Fe1-xMgxCl2.- Nonlinear Susceptibility and Magnetic Ordering of MCl2-GICs.- On the Three-Dimensional ± J Ising Model by the Transfer Matrix Method.- Application of the Coherent Anomaly Method to d-Dimensional Ising Spin Glasses.- The Frequency Dependence of the AC Susceptibility in Spin Glasses.- Dynamics of Nonlinear Tenuous Structures.- Random Field Phenomena at Magnetic Surfaces and Interfaces.- Spin Glasses and High-Tc Superconductivity.- Magnetic Frustration and Pairing in Doped Lanthanum Cuprate.- Glassy Dynamics in Proteins.- Vulcanization: How Randomly Cross-Linked Macromolecules Form Equilibrium Amorphous Solids.- Superlocalization of Fractons: Direct Observation by Supercomputer.- A Possibility of Spin-Glass Ordering in the Oxide Superconductor (La1?xSrx)2CuO4??.- Percolation Treatment of Frustrated Ising Lattices.- Critical Properties of the Fuzzy Model.- Monte Carlo Simulations on a Controlled-Frustration Model of ±J Ising Systems.- Simulation of Spin Dynamics for FMR in Compounds with Competing Anisotropies.- III Optimization Problems and Neural Network Models.- Optimization Problems at Thermal Equilibrium.- Bayesian Statistics and Statistical Mechanics.- Graph Partitioning and Spin Glasses.- Statistical Neurodynamics - Associative Memory and Self-Organization.- Reconstruction of Images in the Visual Cortex.- Modelling Brain Lesions in Neural Networks.- Neural Network Formation and the Activity of an Aggregate of Dissociated Hydra Cells.- Glauber Dynamics of Neural Network Models.- Stochastic Dynamics of an Analog Neural Network.- Rule Dynamics and the Fuzzy Attractor: New Approach to EEG.- Phase Selection of the Immune Network.- IV Nonlinear Dynamics in Fluids, Chemical and Biological Systems, etc..- Are Earthquakes, Fractals, and 1/f Noise Self-organized Critical Phenomena?.- Marginal Stability, Memory and Nonlinear Dynamics of Charge Density Waves.- Stochastic Aspects of the Sliding Charge-Density-Wave Current Spectra.- Dynamical Critical Phenomena in Sliding Charge-Density-Waves.- Metastability, Adaptability and Memory in Charge Density Waves.- Transition to Turbulence via Spatiotemporal Intermittency.- Onset of Collective Rhythms in Large Populations of Coupled Oscillators.- Nonlinear Dynamics in Chemical Systems.- The Thermodynamic Behavior of Elementary Reversible Cellular Automata.- Mixing Property and Lyapunov Spectra of Hamiltonian Dynamical Systems with Many Degrees of Freedom.- Defect Turbulence in EHD Convection of Liquid Crystal.- Self-Organized Electric Structure in Uni- and Multicellular Biological Systems.- Interaction of Chemical Waves and Hydrodynamic Flow.- Flow Visualization of the Velocity Field of Square Convection Near the Critical Point Using Holographic Interferometry.- Pattern Formation by Nonlinear Reactions and Diffusion in Electrochemical Systems.- Dissipative Structure and an External Noise Effect in an Energy Conversion System.- Nonlinear Binary Fluid Convection at Positive Separation Ratios.- Index of Contributors.