Toward interdisciplinary cooperation in visualization

a considerable advance being made in visualization techniques in recent years. Visualization is an interdisciplinary science related not only to many academic fields, but also to industrial engineering. "FLUCOME" is an international symposium which provides an excellent opportunity for people engaged in a wide range of fields to meet, discuss and exchange ideas of visualization. FLUCOME is an acronym for the International Symposium on Fluid Control, Measurement and Visualization. The symposium first organized in Japan has become a powerful international symposium, unifying the fluid control, measurement and visualization. The covered fields include engineering, physics, medical science, agriculture, aerospace, oceanography, meteorology and sports science. After the first symposium in Chiba (Japan) in 1985, it has been held every three years, in Sheffield (UK), San Francisco (USA), Toulouse (France), Hayama (Japan) and in Sherbrooke (Canada) last year. The 7th FLUCOME will be held in Sorrento, Italy in 2003 and the 8th symposium in China in 2005. This issue is a collection of papers selected and rewritten from those presented at the FLUCOME 2000 in Sherbrooke according to the request of the Editorial Committee. We should like to express our sincere appreciation to the authors, reviewers and the organizing committee members of the symposium for their support given to this excellent issue.