Overview of papers from the U.S./Japan workshop on parallel symbolic computing -- Prioritization in parallel symbolic computing -- A priority control system for OR-parallel Prolog and its performance evaluation -- Extending the Multilisp sponsor model to deal with intertask synchronization side effects -- Distillations of dynamic partitioning experience -- A message passing implementation of lazy task creation -- P-continuation based implementation of PaiLisp interpreter -- Running higher-order unification in PaiLisp -- HyperDEBU: A multiwindow debugger for parallel logic programs -- MulTVision: A tool for visualizing parallel program executions -- Managing side effects on shared data -- Design of a concurrent and distributed language -- TS/Scheme: Distributed data structures in Lisp -- A SIMD environment TUPLE for parallel list processing -- Architecture independence and coordination -- Persistent immutable shared abstractions -- Asynchrony and real-time in distributed systems -- Asynchronous communication model based on linear logic -- Parallel inference system research in the Japanese FGCS project -- Massively parallel symbolic computing -- Sparcle: A multithreaded VLSI processor for parallel computing -- A new architecture design paradigm for parallel computing in scheme -- Customizable policy management in the Sting operating system -- An efficient implementation scheme of concurrent object-oriented languages on stock multicomputers (extended abstract) -- Panel discussion I: Massively parallel architectures and symbolic computation -- Panel Discussion II: Applications for parallel symbolic computation.

Parallel and distributed computing are becoming increasingly important as cost-effective ways to achieve high computational performance. Symbolic computations are notable for their use of irregular data structures and hence parallel symbolic computing has its own distinctive set of technical challenges. The papers in this book are based on presentations made at a workshop at MIT in October 1992. They present results in a wide range of areas including: speculative computation, scheduling techniques, program development tools and environments, programming languages and systems, models of concurrency and distribution, parallel computer architecture, and symbolic applications.