Editorial

Welcome to the first issue of Autonomous Agents and Multi-Agent Systems –An International Journal. As the first journal in the field, Autonomous Agents and Multi-Agent Systems will be an important forum for disseminating significant new results in the foundations, development, analysis, and applications of agent-based systems. The properties of interacting, autonomous systems have long been studied in a wide variety of academic disciplines. However, the idea of using such conceptual structures as a way of analysing, designing, and building software systems has only recently gained widespread acceptance. This paradigm shift is the result of a number of independent developments and advances in the related disciplines of distributed computing, object-oriented systems, software engineering and artificial intelligence. Despite its comparative youth, the field has quickly gathered momentum, and is currently one of the fastest growing areas of computer science. The reason for this interest is that the agent metaphor provides a natural and elegant means of representing a diverse range of problems, and it affords opportunities to tackle the new classes of applications that arise as the industrial and commercial worlds move towards more modular, distributed, and open systems. At the core of the field of agent-based computing lies the notion of interacting agents. Although there is no universally accepted definition of agency, it is nevertheless generally understood that agents are problem solving systems capable of independent, autonomous action in some environment. Agents must typically take action in the face of partial information and uncertainty both about the environment and about the results that their actions might have. When faced with these difficulties, an agent needs to be able to decide whether its tasks are still appropriate, whether the chosen means of realising them is likely to succeed, or whether a new course of action should be undertaken instead. In many contexts, agents need to interact with one another to complete or enhance their problem solving. These interactions can take many forms, ranging from simple communication to obtain or share information, through to more elaborate interactions such as cooperation, coordination, and negotiation to achieve individual and collective goals. Against this background, Autonomous Agents and Multi-Agent Systems seeks to provide a high-quality, archival forum for publishing results related to all aspects of agent-based systems. It is concerned with advances in both autonomous agents and multi-agent systems, in basic theoretical concepts and in practical applications, and the relationships between agent-based systems and other fields of study. To ensure that the journal reaches and maintains the highest scientific standards, we have assembled a first-rate international panel of associate editors, who between them cover the whole spectrum of contemporary agentbased systems research and development. These editors will be ably supported by an editorial board composed of internationally recognised experts.