These Proceedings are based on the papers presented at the 5th IFIP Conference on Optimization Techniques held in Rome, May 7-11, 1973. The Conference was sponsored by the IFIP Technical Committee on Optimization (TC-7) and by the Consiglio Nazionale delle Ricerche (Italian National Research Council).
The Conference was devoted to recent advances in optimization techniques and their application to modelling, identification and control of large systems. Major emphasis of the Conference was on the most recent application areas, including: Environmental Systems, Socio-economic Systems, Biological Systems.
An interesting feature of the Conference was the participation of specialists both in control theory and in the field of application of systems engineering.
The Proceedings are divided into two volumes. In the first are collected the papers in which the methodological aspects are emphasized; in the second those dealing with various application areas.