Mechanical engineering and design innovations are both academic and practical engineering fields that involve systematic technological materialization through scientific principles and engineering designs. Technological innovation by mechanical engineering includes IT-based intelligent mechanical systems, mechanics, and design innovations. IT-based intelligent mechanical systems, which implant intelligence to machine systems, are interdisciplinary area combining conventional mechanical technology and new information technology. The main goal of IT-based intelligent mechanical systems is to develop fundamental technologies and to apply them to the industry field. Potential topics include, but are not limited to:

• Mathematical modeling and methods
• Computer-based design
• Intelligent manufacturing system
• Virtual manufacturing system
• Core parts and devices for intelligent systems
• Computational engineering science
• Design methodology and optimization
• Machine diagnostics and reliability
• Human-machine interaction/virtual reality and entertainment

The 2nd International Conference on Innovation, Communication and Engineering (ICICE 2013) will be held during (26 October –1 November) in Qingdao, Shandong, China, http://2013.icice.net/. Authors are invited to submit the extended versions of their papers to this special issue.

Before submission authors should carefully read over the journal’s Author Guidelines, which are located at http://www.hindawi.com/journals/mpe/guidelines/. Prospective authors should submit an electronic copy of their complete manuscript through the journal Manuscript Tracking System at http://mts.hindawi.com/submit/journals/mpe/icice/ according to the following timetable: