This Science in Developing Countries award will help to support a regional workshop on random materials and processes in Barbados. The workshop, organized by Professor Eugene Stanley of Boston University and Professor Leo Moseley of the University of the West Indies in Barbados, together with Professor Miguel Octavio of the Instituto Venezolano de Investigaciones Cientificas (IVIC) in Venezuela, will bring together scientists from the Caribbean, Latin America and Europe as well as from the U.S. Random materials and processes is a relatively new interdis- ciplinary field whose goal is to understand a large class of phenomena and structures, which at the microscopic level are random and unpredictable but reveal structure and predic- tability in the large. Indeed, a very large part of our natural environment as well as a substantial fraction of man- made objects, including glasses, polymers and amorphous materials are examples of these materials. Thus the area is one of interest to a broad range of scientists and subject to various approaches: from the purely mathematical to the level of direct engineering applicability. In keeping with the goals of the Science in Developing Countries Program, the workshop has been designed to reach engineers, scientists, and mathematicians interested in recent progress in this multi-disciplinary field.
