Special Issue: CogInfoCom enabled research and applications in engineering

CogInfoCom is a novel interdisciplinary field of research – seen as a result of the merging of cognitive aspects and infocommunicative technologies in recent years. Research on CogInfoCom has enabled researchers and developers in engineering to explore the degree of co-existence of human and artificial intelligence in different fields. Such interdisciplinary research also contributes to the mapping out of innovative engineering applications enabled by CogInfoCom technologies. This special issue presents seven papers on both theoretical and applied research – each with its unique perspective on CogInfoCom applications in engineering. The papers cover a number of industries, i.e., manufacturing, transportation and waste management. As guest editors, we expect that the research documented in the special issue will be able to articulate the diversity of CogInfoCom applications even though the papers included represent only a tiny portion of the many engineering fields that have ties to CogInfoCom. We also hope that the research presented in this special issue will trigger further interest in the deployment of CogInfoCom technologies in other fields. ∗Corresponding author: Wei Deng Solvang, Department of Industrial Engineering, Narvik University College, Lodve Langes Gate 2, 8505 Narvik, Norway. E-mail: [email protected]. We would like to thank the editors of Intelligent Decision Technologies for making this special issue possible. We would also like to thank all contributing authors and reviewers for their work in making this a high-quality special issue. In addition to the financial schemes to which the authors have already expressed their gratitude, we would like to pass our special gratitude to the INTERREG IVA North project “Sustainable Manufacturing and Engineering”. The project funding has enabled cross-border cooperation among three Nordic countries, and this special issue is one of the results of the project. Wei Deng Solvang and Bjørn Solvang ISSN 1872-4981/15/$27.50 c © 2015 – IOS Press and the authors. All rights reserved