The theory of classical artificial neural networks has been used to solve pattern recognition problems in image processing that is different from traditional pattern recognition approaches. In standard neural network theory, the first step in performing a neural network calculation involves the linear operation of multiplying neural values by their synaptic strengths and adding the results. Thresholding usually follows the linear operation in order to provide for non-linearity of the network. This paper presents the fundamental theory for a morphological neural network which, instead of multiplication and summation, uses the non-linear operation of addition and maximum. Several basic applications which are distinctly different from pattern recognition techniques are given, including a net which performs a sieving algorithm.