Connaître les plantes utiles pour l’Agriculture Biologique d’après la littérature : Construction et exploration d’une base de connaissances pour la santé végétale et animale

Organic Farming excludes the use of synthetic chemicals to protect plants in the field or during grain storage and questions the use of antibiotics for livestock breeding or aquaculture. One way to limit major constraints of chemicals (pests and diseases) is to use active plants parts or plants-based products, as it has been described in the literature for plant and animal health. Our current work consists in building a knowledge database from existing literature and implementing exploration methods to support the extraction of knowledge by the potential users (smallholders, advisors, extensionists, researchers, producers, etc.). In early May 2018, the knowledge base gathered data from 227 published documents, dated from 1957 to 2017. Ninety-four percent of the 33,400 uses recorded concerned sub-Saharan African countries

Modelling derivation in defeasible logic programming with perceptron-based neural networks

A solution of problems in multiagent systems involves representing beliefs of agents immersed in dynamic environments. Observation-based Defeasible Logic Programming (ODeLP) is an argument-based logic programming language that is used to represent an agent’s knowledge in the context of a multiagent system. The beliefs of the agent depends on a warrant procedure performed on its knowledge base contents. New perceptions result in changes in the agent’s beliefs. In the context of real time constraints, this belief change procedure should be done efficiently. This paper introduces an algorithm for translating an agent’s knowledge base, expressed as an ODeLP rule base, into a Perceptron-based neural network. Observations in an ODeLP program can then be codified as an input pattern. The input pattern is then fed to the neural network whose propagation results in an output pattern. This output pattern contains information regarding which beliefs can be hold by the agent as well as if there exists contradiction among them. The proposal is attractive as the massivelly parallel processing intrinsic to neural networks make them appropiate for implementing parts of the aforementioned warrant procedure.Eje: V - Workshop de agentes y sistemas inteligentesRed de Universidades con Carreras en Informática (RedUNCI

Reusable Knowledge-based Components for Building Software Applications: A Knowledge Modelling Approach

In computer science, different types of reusable components for building software applications were proposed as a direct consequence of the emergence of new software programming paradigms. The success of these components for building applications depends on factors such as the flexibility in their combination or the facility for their selection in centralised or distributed environments such as internet. In this article, we propose a general type of reusable component, called primitive of representation, inspired by a knowledge-based approach that can promote reusability. The proposal can be understood as a generalisation of existing partial solutions that is applicable to both software and knowledge engineering for the development of hybrid applications that integrate conventional and knowledge based techniques. The article presents the structure and use of the component and describes our recent experience in the development of real-world applications based on this approach

ConEditor+: Capture and Maintenance of Constraints in Engineering Design

The Designers' Workbench is a system, developed to support designers in large organizations, such as Rolls-Royce, by making sure that the design is consistent with the specification for the particular design as well as with the company’s design rule book(s). Currently, to capture the constraint information, a domain expert (design engineer) has to work with a knowledge engineer to identify the constraints, and it is then the task of the knowledge engineer to encode these into the Workbench's knowledge base (KB). This is an error prone and time consuming task. It is highly desirable to relieve the knowledge engineer of this task, and so we have developed a tool, ConEditor+ that enables domain experts themselves to capture and maintain these constraints. The tool allows the user to combine selected entities from the domain ontology with keywords and operators of a constraint language to form a constraint expression. Further, we hypothesize that to apply constraints appropriately, it is necessary to understand the context in which each constraint is applicable. We refer to this as "application conditions". We show that an explicit representation of application conditions, in a machine interpretable format, along with the constraints and the domain ontology can be used to support the verification and maintenance of constraints

Computerization of workflows, guidelines and care pathways: a review of implementation challenges for process-oriented health information systems

There is a need to integrate the various theoretical frameworks and formalisms for modeling clinical guidelines, workflows, and pathways, in order to move beyond providing support for individual clinical decisions and toward the provision of process-oriented, patient-centered, health information systems (HIS). In this review, we analyze the challenges in developing process-oriented HIS that formally model guidelines, workflows, and care pathways. A qualitative meta-synthesis was performed on studies published in English between 1995 and 2010 that addressed the modeling process and reported the exposition of a new methodology, model, system implementation, or system architecture. Thematic analysis, principal component analysis (PCA) and data visualisation techniques were used to identify and cluster the underlying implementation ‘challenge’ themes. One hundred and eight relevant studies were selected for review. Twenty-five underlying ‘challenge’ themes were identified. These were clustered into 10 distinct groups, from which a conceptual model of the implementation process was developed. We found that the development of systems supporting individual clinical decisions is evolving toward the implementation of adaptable care pathways on the semantic web, incorporating formal, clinical, and organizational ontologies, and the use of workflow management systems. These architectures now need to be implemented and evaluated on a wider scale within clinical settings

A knowledge-based approach to VLSI-design in an open CAD-environment

A knowledge-based approach is suggested to assist a designer in the increasingly complex task of generating VLSI-chips from abstract, high-level specifications of the system. The complexity of designing VLSI-circuits has reached a level where computer-based assistance has become indispensable. Not all of the design tasks allow for algorithmic solutions. AI technique can be used, in order to support the designer with computer-aided tools for tasks not suited for algorithmic approaches. The approach described in this paper is based upon the underlying characteristics of VLSI design processes in general, comprising all stages of the design. A universal model is presented, accompanied with a recording method for the acquisition of design knowledge - strategic and task-specific - in terms of the design actions involved and their effects on the design itself. This method is illustrated by a simple design example: the implementation of the logical EXOR-component. Finally suggestions are made for obtaining a universally usable architecture of a knowledge-based system for VLSI-design

Lessons for Co-management: Experiences from the Fisheries Management Science Programme (FMSP)

The aim of this document is to communicate lessons for fisheries co-management that have emerged from a series of projects undertaken by the DFID Fisheries Management Science Programme (FMSP). It focuses on three examples of FMSP projects: ParFish, Adaptive learning and designing data collection systems. This document does not aim to give a comprehensive overview of co-management but seeks to provide a viewpoint based on the experiences of the FMSP projects in question. This document is targeted to fisheries decision makers, managers and facilitators including government, industry and non-governmental organisations

An ontology framework for developing platform-independent knowledge-based engineering systems in the aerospace industry

This paper presents the development of a novel knowledge-based engineering (KBE) framework for implementing platform-independent knowledge-enabled product design systems within the aerospace industry. The aim of the KBE framework is to strengthen the structure, reuse and portability of knowledge consumed within KBE systems in view of supporting the cost-effective and long-term preservation of knowledge within such systems. The proposed KBE framework uses an ontology-based approach for semantic knowledge management and adopts a model-driven architecture style from the software engineering discipline. Its phases are mainly (1) Capture knowledge required for KBE system; (2) Ontology model construct of KBE system; (3) Platform-independent model (PIM) technology selection and implementation and (4) Integration of PIM KBE knowledge with computer-aided design system. A rigorous methodology is employed which is comprised of five qualitative phases namely, requirement analysis for the KBE framework, identifying software and ontological engineering elements, integration of both elements, proof of concept prototype demonstrator and finally experts validation. A case study investigating four primitive three-dimensional geometry shapes is used to quantify the applicability of the KBE framework in the aerospace industry. Additionally, experts within the aerospace and software engineering sector validated the strengths/benefits and limitations of the KBE framework. The major benefits of the developed approach are in the reduction of man-hours required for developing KBE systems within the aerospace industry and the maintainability and abstraction of the knowledge required for developing KBE systems. This approach strengthens knowledge reuse and eliminates platform-specific approaches to developing KBE systems ensuring the preservation of KBE knowledge for the long term