Computational group theory is an interdisciplinary field which involves the use of groups to solve problems in computer science and mathematics. At least three communities have strongly influenced this field: (1) the theoretical computer science community through studies of the complexity of computation with groups and their connections with the complexity of combinatorial isomorphism or search problems; (2) the symbolic algebra/computer algebra communities, which have built large integrated software packages and have developed CPU efficient algorithms for group theoretic computations; and (3) the group theory community through continued progress on understanding the structure of groups, most notably the classification of finite simple groups. This project will support the DIMACS (Center for Discrete Mathematics and Computer Science) Workshop on Groups and Computation to be held October 7-10, 1991 at Rutgers University. Research on computational group theory currently appears in diverse forums in both mathematics and computer science. This reflects the role of groups as fundamental mathematical objects with a wide range of applicability. This workshop will bring together researchers in theoretical computer science, computer algebra, and group theory to discuss group-theoretic algorithms for both serial and parallel computer architectures.
