Information granules: Towards foundations of granular computing

We introduce basic notions related to granular computing, namely the inform ation granule syntax and semantics as well as the inclusion and closeness ( similarity) relations of granules. Different information sources (units, ag ents) are equipped with two kinds of operations on information granules: op erations transforming tuples of information granules definable by a given a gent into information granules definable by this agent and approximation op erations for computing by agents approximations of information granules del ivered by other agents. More complex granules are constructed by means of t hese operations and approximation operations from some input information gr anules. The construction of information granules is described by expression s called terms. We discuss a problem of synthesis of robust terms, i.e., de scriptions of information granules, satisfying a given specification. This is an important problem for granular computing and its applications for spa tial reasoning or knowledge discovery and data mining. (C) 2001 John Wiley & Sons, Inc.