Special Issue On Granular Computing

Although the notion is a relatively recent one, the notions and principles of Granular Computing (GrC) have appeared in a different guise in many related fields including granularity in Artificial Intelligence, interval computing, cluster analysis, quotient space theory and many others. Recent years have witnessed a renewed and expanding interest in the topic as it begins to play a key role in bioinformatics, e-commerce, machine learning, security, data mining and wireless mobile computing when it comes to the issues of effectiveness, robustness and uncertainty. The Handbook of Granular Computing offers a comprehensive reference source for the granular computing community, edited by and with contributions from leading experts in the field. Includes chapters covering the foundations of granular computing, interval analysis and fuzzy set theory; hybrid methods and models of granular computing; and applications and case studies. Divided into 5 sections: Preliminaries, Fundamentals, Methodology and Algorithms, Development of Hybrid Models and Applications and Case Studies. Presents the flow of ideas in a systematic, well-organized manner, starting with the concepts and motivation and proceeding to detailed design that materializes in specific algorithms, applications and case studies. Provides the reader with a self-contained reference that includes all pre-requisite knowledge, augmented with step-by-step explanations of more advanced concepts. The Handbook of Granular Computing represents a significant and valuable contribution to the literature and will appeal to a broad audience including researchers, students and practitioners in the fields of Computational Intelligence, pattern recognition, fuzzy sets and neural networks, system modelling, operations research and bioinformatics.

Granular Computing is concerned with constructing and processing carried out at the level of information granules. Using information granules, we comprehend the world and interact with it, no matter which intelligent endeavor this may involve. The landscape of granular computing is immensely rich and involves set theory (interval mathematics), fuzzy sets, rough sets, random sets linked together in a highly synergetic environment. This volume is a first comprehensive treatment of this emerging paradigm and embraces its fundamentals, underlying methodological framework, and a sound algorithmic environment. The panoply of applications covered includes system identification, telecommunications, linguistics and music processing. Written by experts in the field, this volume will appeal to all developing intelligent systems, either working at the methodological level or interested in detailed system realization.

This book covers methods based on a combination of granular computing, rough sets, and knowledge discovery in data mining (KDD). The discussion of KDD foundations based on the rough set approach and granular computing feature illustrative applications.

The first edition of the Encyclopedia of Complexity and Systems Science (ECSS, 2009) presented a comprehensive overview of granular computing (GrC) broadly divided into several categories: Granular computing from rough set theory, Granular Computing in Database Theory, Granular Computing in Social Networks, Granular Computing and Fuzzy Set Theory, Grid/Cloud Computing, as well as general issues in granular computing. In 2011, the formal theory of GrC was established, providing an adequate infrastructure to support revolutionary new approaches to computer/data science, including the challenges presented by so-called big data. For this volume of ECSS, Second Edition, many entries have been updated to capture these new developments, together with new chapters on such topics as data clustering, outliers in data mining, qualitative fuzzy sets, and information flow analysis for security applications. Granulations can be seen as a natural and ancient methodology deeply rooted in the human mind. Many daily "things" are routinely granulated into sub "things": The topography of earth is granulated into hills, plateaus, etc., space and time are granulated into infinitesimal granules, and a circle is granulated into polygons of infinitesimal sides. Such granules led to the invention of calculus, topology and non-standard analysis. Formalization of general granulation was difficult but, as shown in this volume, great progress has been made in combing discrete and continuous mathematics under one roof for a broad range of applications in data science.

This book discusses current topics in rough set theory. Since Pawlak’s rough set theory was first proposed to offer a basis for imprecise and uncertain data and reasoning from data, many workers have investigated its foundations and applications. Examining various topical issues, including object-oriented rough set models, recommendation systems, decision tables, and granular computing, the book is a valuable resource for students and researchers in the field.

Information granules are fundamental conceptual entities facilitating perception of complex phenomena and contributing to the enhancement of human centricity in intelligent systems. The formal frameworks of information granules and information granulation comprise fuzzy sets, interval analysis, probability, rough sets, and shadowed sets, to name only a few representatives. Among current developments of Granular Computing, interesting options concern information granules of higher order and of higher type. The higher order information granularity is concerned with an effective formation of information granules over the space being originally constructed by information granules of lower order. This construct is directly associated with the concept of hierarchy of systems composed of successive processing layers characterized by the increasing levels of abstraction. This idea of layered, hierarchical realization of models of complex systems has gained a significant level of visibility in fuzzy modeling with the well-established concept of hierarchical fuzzy models where one strives to achieve a sound tradeoff between accuracy and a level of detail captured by the model and its level of interpretability. Higher type information granules emerge when the information granules themselves cannot be fully characterized in a purely numerical fashion but instead it becomes convenient to exploit their realization in the form of other types of information granules such as type-2 fuzzy sets, interval-valued fuzzy sets, or probabilistic fuzzy sets. Higher order and higher type of information granules constitute the focus of the studies on Granular Computing presented in this study. The book elaborates on sound methodologies of Granular Computing, algorithmic pursuits and an array of diverse applications and case studies in environmental studies, option price forecasting, and power engineering.

The Latin American Neutrosophic Science Association was created in 2018 as a result of the initiative of a group of university professors from Mexico and Ecuador. The Association has developed an intense work in the investigative context, expression of the capacity that neutrosophy has as a tool for understanding and transformation of reality in social benefit. Neutrosophic sets as a generalization fuzzy set (especially intuitionistic fuzzy sets), allows handling a greater number of situations that occur in reality and becomes a facilitator of the approach to the studied object without undermining its complex and multivariate essence. In this special edition, researchers from six Ecuadorian universities show the results of research projects addressing a wide range of topics related to the social environment of these Higher Education Institutions. The contents include law, criminology, public and administrative management, evaluation of pedagogical scenarios, prospective analysis, artificial intelligence, among other topics. They are many different texts with a common denominator, the social sciences, and their relationship with neutrosophy. The progress of these investigations originates a significant change in the ways of validating and reasoning the proposals, the appreciation of neutrality increases the interpretability and the inferential efficacy from the analysis of the results, which enunciates a methodological, perceptive and objective enrichment in the humanistic sciences in Latin American geographical region.