Jack, are you aware of NASA's strategic plan and its education group
objective to "Stimulate broad interest in and understanding of Earth
system science, research technologies, and applications, and will
encourage young scholars to consider careers in science and technology"?
If not, then I highly recommend downloading it. <
http://www.earth.nasa.gov/visions/stratplan/ese_strategic_plan.pdf >
(3.7 Mb) because on pg. 12 I'm sure you'll find its Strategic Priorities
(2002 - 2010), on pg. 25 examples of expected education accomplishments
in 5 years, and on pg. 38 information synthesis and acess to knowledge
in 10 years very interesting.
* Implement an open and distributed information system architecture
that will include Principal Investigator processing in the mix of
science data processing providers, and tie together diverse
creators and users of higher level information products.
* Develop an Earth Science Extension Network to exchange information
products at the State and local level, and facilitate jointly
sponsored applications research to enable broad societal benefit
from Earth science knowledge.
* Collaborate with operational mission agencies and commercial
concerns to demonstrate remote sensing capabilities they want to
incorporate in their decision support systems.
* Develop and test models and data assimilation processes to bring
diverse observations and research to bear on the fundamental Earth
science questions.
* Support the conduct of scientific assessments of consequences of
climate change and global and regional impacts on:
Food and fiber production
Fresh water and other natural resources
Human health and spread of infectious diseases
Planning and development of roads, cities, and other
infrastructure
Also, note on pg. 13: The Sensor Web technology is key for succeeding in
Goal 1: Observe, understand, and model the Earth system to learn how it
is changing, and the consequences for life on Earth.
Since a Sensor Web provides a different type of measurement tool than
that associated with remote measurements made by orbital platforms. By
definition, remote measurements obtained from orbit require a high
degree of knowledge of the physics of the measurement to infer value
from the data collected (interpreting ocean currents or a vegetation
index, for example). In
contrast, a Sensor Web can provide direct, proximity measurements over a
large spatial scale whose value is much more immediate. Moreover, unlike
remote measurements made by orbital or airborne platforms, a Sensor Web
provides a continued, virtual presence in an area. This is particularly
important when investigating phenomena of a transient nature where there
is no
guarantee that an orbiting instrument will be in position to record the
event. Finally, Sensor Webs can provide crucial ground truth and
calibration data for remote measurements. (see pg. 4 <
http://sensorwebs.jpl.nasa.gov/resources/sensorweb-concept.pdf >)
The Sensor Web has been running continuously since May 18th, 2000 <
http://sensorwebs.jpl.nasa.gov/resources/applications.html >. It is
expected that the Sensor Web will become a ubiquitous instrument in the
future, particular in applications that require an
intelligent, virtual presence.
The penultimate goal of a Sensor Web is to extract knowledge from the
data collected and adapt and react accordingly. Although
the computation hardware in a pod can be quite sophisticated, it is the
sharing of information among the pods that gives the Sensor Web a
macrointelligence. Intelligence in the human brain is created because of
a complex, inhomogeneous network of neurons and not because of
individual intelligence from each neuron. Similarly, the Sensor Web is
an instrument where greater functionality is derived from a
parallel-type architecture as sensor measurements (including pod
location) are passed, and collectively interpreted, from pod to pod.
This global sharing of information will lead to pod synergism (the whole
of their activity being greater than the sum of their parts) by
permitting intelligent resource (power, bandwidth, consumables)
management by the web, and allowing for self-modifying behavior based on
environmental factors and internal web diagnostics.
Sensor Webs are often confused with projects that fall under names such
as “distributed sensors” or “sensor networks”. The most unique feature
of the Sensor Web is that information gathered by one pod is shared and
used by other pods (i.e., Collective IQ). Distributed sensors networks
merely gather data and communicate it to an uplink point.
Any pods dropped at random into this depicted web will, with a higher
probability, tend to be associated with a single mother pod and
particular sub-web. Consequently, a scale-free hierarchy emerges which
is quite robust with respect to random pod dropout. Interestingly, there
are indications that nervous systems may be modeled on similar ideas,
again invoking a strong analogy between the Sensor Web and the brain.
Relative to NASA strategic plan, are you interested in contacting the PI
for the following Ontology-Based Information Extraction proposal?
STOTTLER HENKE ASSOC., INC.
1660 S. Amphlett Blvd., Suite 350
San Mateo, CA 94402
Phone: (206) 545-1478
PI: Ronald Braun
Topic#: DARPA 00-012
< http://www.sbirsttr.com/SbirMisc/abs001DARPA.htm >
Title: Ontology-Based Information Extraction from Free-Form Text
Abstract:
We propose an innovative combination of machine learning techniques
coupled with a novel end-to-end system architecture built around a
shared domain ontology to permit ontology-based information extraction
(IE) from free text. Our Ontology-Based IE (OBIE) system will
significantly increase end-to-end recall for the IE task while
maintaining or improving precision. OBIE will accomplish this by
enabling interaction between different levels of the IE processing
pipeline simultaneously through a shared ontology. IE components will be
developed to demonstrate increases in recall permitted by the inclusion
of hierarchical knowledge in their learning algorithms. Active learning
and bootstrapping algorithms will be extended to automatically learn the
ontology of a new domain, to assist in training the IE components, and
to reduce the burden of annotation on the end-user. Performance metrics
in a variety of system configurations will allow a characterization of
performance gains enabled by the proposed architecture. Phase I research
and development of a proof-of-concept limited prototype will demonstrate
the feasibility and utility of OBIE's ontology-based IE capability and
will lay the groundwork for its Phase II implementation.
Kindest regards,
-- John
P.S.
I cc'd Renwick Breck who has developed architectual plans for building
an Earth Science facility based on NASA's strategic plan and education
objectives in Oakland City Center (someday?). He has many years of
wonderful accomplishments in developing and applying "NotePad
International" collaborative technology which was eventually licensed to
NASA. Perhaps we can get together to discuss more about his lastest
efforts?
Jack Park wrote:
> Rod,
>
> I am not sure where to go with this, but I will say the following: at
> http://www.thinkalong.com/nex/Nexist.html, there is a zipped Word doc
> that
> shows screenshots with a bit of verbiage about running an IBIS
> discussion
> with Nexist. Howard Liu and I are preparing Nexist to go into a high
> school classroom in September, specifically to allow students to
> conduct
> moderated discussions, say, about global warming, and so forth. Our
> goal:
> exercise Nexist in a real-world situation for the first time. What we
> plan
> to learn: whatever we can. Jeff Conklin's upcoming Dialog Mapping
> workshop, I think, will help in my planning for the school room
> exercise.
>
> Will that enhance education? Well, I think so, as discussed in my
> paper
> Bringing Knowledge Technologies to the Classroom, a pdf of which is
> also at
> the Nexist site.
>
> Today, I also put the very latest version of Nexist itself at the same
>
> site, and a second download of the required jar files. Now,
> everything you
> need to play with Nexist is readily available. Your only issue will
> be to
> have a late model Java (I built it on jdk1.3) installed, and adjust
> the
> classpath notations in the batch files to suit (sorry, I can't say
> anything
> about Mac or Unix, but I think Grant put some scripts for Linux up at
> http://nexist.sourceforge.com.
>
> Cheers
> Jack
>
>
> At 11:52 AM 6/20/2001 -0700, you wrote:
> >Jack,
> >
> >Please see my letter with feedback you requested, and asking about
> feedback on
> >improving education.....
> >
> >http://www.welchco.com/04/00067/61/01/06/1901.HTM#0001
> >
> >Thanks.
> >
> >Rod
> >
> >
> >
> >Jack Park wrote:
> > >
> > > I have placed my latest Nexist 0.2 classes and source on the web.
> Visit
> > > http://www.thinkalong.com/nex/Nexist.html to download them.
> > >
> > > This turns out to be an interim solution until I coax secure cvs
> to run
> > > properly on Win ME (is that possible?).
> > >
> > > Changes include numerous bug fixes and enhancements to
> functionality (some
> > > just completed, others added). Now, it is possible to generate a
> "drill
> > > down" topic map in which you create a topic in one topic map, and
> use
> > > occurrences of that topic to reference other topic maps.
> > >
> > > I shall be very interested to see what others make of that idea.
> > >
> > > Cheers
> > > Jack
> > >
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This archive was generated by hypermail 2b29 : Wed Jul 18 2001 - 00:40:02 PDT