As awareness computing attracts increasing attention, this special issue has been arranged for researchers, engineers, and scientists to discuss on awareness computing and to exchange ideas, opinions, and the latest results in this emerging new field.

Awareness is the ability to be conscious of, feel, or perceive ? in other words, to have awareness. It implies vigilance in observing and alertness in drawing inferences from experience. The ultimate goal of awareness computing is to create computing systems that are aware.

The eight papers accepted for this issue come mainly from International Symposium on Aware Computing 2010 and cover different aspects of awareness computing in science and engineering. The authors have been kind enough to revise their papers for this publication.

Two papers focus on awareness learning and multimedia-based learning, three examine localization using sensor networks, sound sources, and radiofrequency identification, and three explore a fuzzy-rules mining algorithm, an interactive map search system, and semi-supervised method for pattern recognition.

We thank the reviewers for their time and effort in reviewing papers within a limited time. We are most grateful to Professor Qiangfu Zhao of the University of Aizu, Japan, and to Professors Toshio Fukuda and Kaoru Hirota, Editors-in-Chief, for inviting us to guest-edit this special issue. We also thank the Fuji Technology Press staff for its ongoing assistance.