Abstract: The First Symposium on The Theory and Application of Expert Systems in Emergency Management, held at the Department of Commerce, Washington, D.C. (April 24 and 25, 1985) was funded by the Federal Emergency Management Agency and organized by the National Bureau of Standards' Operations Research Division. The purpose of the symposium was to bring together researchers in expert systems, artificial intelligence, and emergency operations in a forum to review the concepts of expert systems and the problems of emergency management, with the objective of determining how expert systems can be used to augment the experience of local, State and Federal emergency managers faced with the difficult tasks of determining the best response to an emergency situation. Speakers addressed the following areas: The theory and uncertainty aspects of expert systems, artificial intelligence's future role in emergency management, technology for building and using expert systems, emergency management decisions and information needs and uses, applications of expert systems in the management of chemical spills and shipboard and coal mine fires, and the role and use of simulation in emergency management expert systems.

From Introduction: "This is the second in a series of reports concerned with research and development requirements and areas of continuing concern in the computer and information sciences and technologies."

From Abstract: "This publication attempts to diminish the incidence of stress corrosion failures by assembling the available practical measures to avoid or minimize the problem and present these measures in a form comprehensible to those persons responsible for the design, fabrication, and maintenance of new structures."

Report issued by the U.S. National Bureau of Standards discussing an analysis of seismic design provisions for buildings with three main objectives. As stated in the introduction, "The first objective was to assist the ATC in the preparation of its report. The second objective of the study was to augment the text of the published Provisions by providing a formal, consistent documentation of the text. The third objective was to provide alternate arrangements of the Provisions that would make them more readily usable by several categories of users" (p. 1). This report includes illustrations.

Report issued by the U.S. National Bureau of Standards discussing results of a survey conducted on automatic mechanized indexing and data processing. As stated in the introduction, "it has concentrated on the major developments in and related demonstrations of automatic indexing potentialities. Examples are also given of indexes compiled by machine and of potentially related research efforts in such areas as natural language text searching, statistical association techniques used for search and retrieval, and proposed systems for concept processing" (p. 1). This report includes an illustration.

From Introduction: "This is the third in a planned series of reports involving selective literature reviews of research and development requirements and areas of continuing R & D concern in the computer and information sciences and technologies."