This book contains the lectures and a selection of the seminars gi ven in the Fifth International Workshop on Instabilities and Nonequilibrium Structures which took place in Santiago, Chile, in December 1993. The Workshop was organized by Facultad de Ciencias Fisicas y Matematicas, Universidad de Chile, Instituto de Fisica of Universidad Cat6lica de Valparaiso and Centro de Fisica No Lineal y Sistemas Complejos de Santiago. This volume is the first of a new series of Kluwer on Nonlinear Phenomena and Complex Systems which will be edited by the Centro de Fisica No Lineal y Sistemas Complejos de Santiago. We thank Dr. David Lamer of Kluwer for his encouragements and support for this project. ix LIST OF SPONSORS OF THE WORKSHOP * Academia Chilena de Ciencias * Facultad de Ciencias Fisicas y Mathematicas de la Univ. de Chile * Instituto de Fisica de la Univ.
Cat6lica de Valparaiso * Centro de FIsica No Lineal y Sistemas Complejos de Santiago (CFNL) * CONICYT (Chile) * Ministere Francais des Affaires Etrangeres * International Centre for Theoretical Physics (Trieste) * UNESCO * Fundaci6n Andes (Chile) * Departamento Tecnico de Investigaci6n y de Relaciones Internationa- cion ales de la Universidad de Chile * IDIEM (Fac. Cs. FIs. y Mat., Univ. de Chile) * CHILGENER S.A.