Estimating Open Access Mandate Effectiveness: The MELIBEA Score

MELIBEA is a Spanish database that uses a composite formula with eight weighted conditions to estimate the effectiveness of Open Access mandates (registered in ROARMAP). We analyzed 68 mandated institutions for publication years 2011-2013 to determine how well the MELIBEA score and its individual conditions predict what percentage of published articles indexed by Web of Knowledge is deposited in each institution's OA repository, and when. We found a small but significant positive correlation (0.18) between MELIBEA score and deposit percentage. We also found that for three of the eight MELIBEA conditions (deposit timing, internal use, and opt-outs), one value of each was strongly associated with deposit percentage or deposit latency (immediate deposit required, deposit required for performance evaluation, unconditional opt-out allowed for the OA requirement but no opt-out for deposit requirement). When we updated the initial values and weights of the MELIBEA formula for mandate effectiveness to reflect the empirical association we had found, the score's predictive power doubled (.36). There are not yet enough OA mandates to test further mandate conditions that might contribute to mandate effectiveness, but these findings already suggest that it would be useful for future mandates to adopt these three conditions so as to maximize their effectiveness, and thereby the growth of OA.Comment: 27 pages, 13 figures, 3 tables, 40 references, 7761 word

Textual analysis of artificial intelligence manuscripts reveals features associated with peer review outcome

We analyzed a data set of scientific manuscripts that were submitted to various conferences in artificial intelligence. We performed a combination of semantic, lexical, and psycholinguistic analyses of the full text of the manuscripts and compared them with the outcome of the peer review process. We found that accepted manuscripts scored lower than rejected manuscripts on two indicators of readability, and that they also used more scientific and artificial intelligence jargon. We also found that accepted manuscripts were written with words that are less frequent, that are acquired at an older age, and that are more abstract than rejected manuscripts. The analysis of references included in the manuscripts revealed that the subset of accepted submissions were more likely to cite the same publications. This finding was echoed by pairwise comparisons of the word content of the manuscripts (i.e., an indicator of semantic similarity), which were more similar in the subset of accepted manuscripts. Finally, we predicted the peer review outcome of manuscripts with their word content, with words related to machine learning and neural networks positively related to acceptance, whereas words related to logic, symbolic processing, and knowledge-based systems negatively related to acceptance

Psycholinguistic Correlates of Symbol Grounding in Dictionaries

A dictionary can be represented as a directed graph with links from defining to defined words. The minimal feedback vertex sets (MinSets, Ms) of a dictionary graph are the smallest sets of words from which all the rest can be defined. We computed Ms for four English dictionaries. The words in the dictionary components revealed by our graph-theoretic analysis differ in their psycholinguistic correlates. Every MinSet has a C-part that is younger and more frequent and an S-part, that is more concrete. To understand the functional role of these components will require a close study of the words themselves, and how they are combined into definitions. We can already conclude that the closer a word is to the MinSets that can define all other words, the more concrete and frequent the word is likely to be, and the earlier it is likely to have been learned. This is what one would expect if the words in the MinSets were the ones that had been acquired through direct sensorimotor grounding

Contributions à la recherche d'information dans des systèmes distribués, ouverts, intégrant des participants autonomes

Les travaux que nous présentons sont relatifs à la problématique de la recherche d'information dans des systèmes dont les traits caractéristiques sont la distribution à très large échelle, l'ouverture, et l'autonomie des participants. Nous nous sommes plus particulièrement intéressé à des solutions facilitant l'intégration des participants et s'adaptant dynamiquement à leurs attentes. Nos travaux s'articulent au tour de trois axes : la définition d'une architecture distribuée, l'allocation de requêtes, et le traitement de l'hétérogénéité sémantique. Nous avons d'abord proposé une architecture totalement distribuée organisée en communautés thématiques. Cette vision sémantique de l'organisation, combinée à une politique qui consiste à s'appuyer non seulement sur les ressource des participants, mais aussi sur leurs compétences, permet de router les requêtes et les réponses dans le système en évitant de maintenir d'un index général tel que pratiqué par les moteurs de recherche. Un système ainsi distribué pose rapidement le problème de l'allocation des requêtes. En effet, tous les fournisseurs d'information ne disposent pas de ressources leur permettant de traiter le très grand nombre de requêtes émises. Laisser les participants choisir les requêtes qu'ils traitent répond aux attentes des fournisseurs. Cependant, cela entraine que certaines requêtes ne sont pas traitées pour des raisons individuelles, ce qui ne correspond pas au comportement qu'attendent les utilisateurs. Nous avons donc exploré la piste consistant à tenir compte des intentions des participants tout en allouant autoritairement les requêtes si nécessaire. Nous avons d'abord proposé une médiation flexible utilisant des aspects monétaires. Puis, nous avons mené une étude concernant la satisfaction des participants où nous avons dégagé un certain nombre de notions : satisfaction, satisfaction par rapport au système d'allocation, adéquation d'un participant par rapport au système, adéquation du système par rapport à un participant, etc. Nous avons alors proposé une deuxième technique d'allocation, SbQA, directement basée sur la notion de satisfaction. Enfin, de par leur nature, les systèmes distribués ouverts intègrent des participants provenant d'horizons différents ce qui est propice à l'hétérogénéité sémantique. Dans le cadre de la recherche d'information et des vecteurs sémantiques, nous avons proposé une méthode qui utilise non seulement les alignements entre ontologies mais aussi un mécanisme «d'explication» et «d'interprétation» pour améliorer l'interopérabilité sémantique

Echange d'Information grâce à des caractérisations sémantiques

National audienceUsing ontologies allows agents to put meaning behind the terms appearing in the information exchanges. Supporting us on this fact, we propose an entity named focus allowing to represent various kinds of information contents : documents, data bases, services, agents' capabilities, etc. A focus consists of a weighting of the concepts of an ontology in order to indicate which meanings are important for the agent which has set it up. To help the capture of the values in the focus we present a procedure to spread the weightings in the focus. Then we define a measure of relevance of a focus compared to another. The originality of our approach lies in the fact that the focus is an exchangeable entity between the agents and does not require a centralization of the data collections

Variations dans la réponse de la diversité génétique de populations de couleuvres insulaires faisant face à la perte d’habitat

Projet de recherche réalisé avec Bernard Angers comme directeur de maîtrise, Denis Réale en tant que co-directeur et grâce à la collaboration active d'Emmanuel Milot.La région métropolitaine de Montréal est formée de nombreuses îles à la jonction du fleuve Saint-Laurent et de la rivière des Outaouais, isolant ainsi les populations insulaires en fonction de distances respectives ainsi que des courants. Ce système offre un contexte idéal pour évaluer l’effet de la perte d’habitat liée à la pression d'urbanisation dans un paysage métropolitain insulaire ou en situation d’archipel. La présente étude a pour objectif de comparer l’effet de la perte d’habitat sur la diversité génétique de deux serpents très distincts, Storeria dekayi et Thamnophis sirtalis. Des analyses réalisées à l’aide de marqueurs microsatellites révèlent une plus importante structure génétique entre les populations de S. dekayi (FST=0,19) qu’entre celles de T. sirtalis (FST=0,07) dans la région montréalaise. Chez les deux espèces étudiées, la majorité des populations des habitats réduits présente une richesse allélique moyenne comparable à celle observée dans les habitats plus vastes. Néanmoins, certaines populations présentent des réponses différentes, dont des traces de goulots d’étranglement, une perte de richesse allélique ou encore une importante modification des fréquences alléliques. Au niveau régional, les résultats présentent une importante perte de diversité génétique chez les couleuvres se trouvant sur le continent alors que les populations insulaires de la région montréalaise constituent désormais un réservoir de diversité génétique. Les résultats observés auprès des populations insulaires démontrent que les effets de la perte d’habitat peuvent s’avérer très spécifiques à chaque situation et que la détection de traces génétiques d’un tel phénomène peut nécessiter un contexte logistique très particulier. Un nombre croissant de publications reportent une absence de signature génétique suite à la perte d’habitat chez des oiseaux et des mammifères. Il s’agit de la première étude témoignant de ce phénomène chez les reptiles. Une note est fournie en annexe à l’intention des gestionnaires au sujet de la conservation de la couleuvre brune, S. dekayi.The Montreal metropolitan community includes numerous islands located at the confluence of the Saint-Lawrence and Ottawa Rivers. In such a fragmented landscape, dispersal of animals is limited by the distance between islands as well as the currents. This system offers an ideal context for the study of the effects of habitat loss on the genetic diversity of animal populations located on islands or archipelagos. This study seeks to assess the effects of habitat area by comparing the organization of genetic diversity of two highly distinct snake species, Storeria dekayi and Thamnophis sirtalis. Analysis realized with microsatellite markers reveals a much stronger genetic organisation in S. dekayi (FST=0.19) than in T. sirtalis (FST=0.07) in the Montreal area. For both studied species, most populations found in reduced habitats showed similar genetic diversity to what was observed in larger habitats. Nevertheless, some populations showed different responses to the loss of habitat, including traces of genetic bottlenecks, a loss in mean allelic richness or an important alteration of their allelic frequencies. This study also reveals an important loss of genetic diversity in the continental snake populations. At the regional scale, the results reveal an important loss of genetic diversity in the continental snake populations and that the insular populations of the Montreal area now constitute a reservoir of the remnant genetic diversity. Moreover, this study not only demonstrates that the genetic response to habitat loss can be very case-specific, but also that to detect traces of such a phenomenon can require a very particular framework. A growing number of publications based on birds and mammals have reported the absence of a genetic signature following a habitat loss. This is the first study to report this phenomenon in reptiles. A note intended for managers is provided about the conservation of the Dekay’s brown snake, S. dekayi

The Latent Structure of Dictionaries

How many words (and which ones) are sufficient to define all other words? When dictionaries are analyzed as directed graphs with links from defining words to defined words, they reveal a latent structure. Recursively removing all words that are reachable by definition but that do not define any further words reduces the dictionary to a Kernel of about 10%. This is still not the smallest number of words that can define all the rest. About 75% of the Kernel turns out to be its Core, a Strongly Connected Subset of words with a definitional path to and from any pair of its words and no word’s definition depending on a word outside the set. But the Core cannot define all the rest of the dictionary. The 25% of the Kernel surrounding the Core consists of small strongly connected subsets of words: the Satellites. The size of the smallest set of words that can define all the rest (the graph’s Minimum Feedback Vertex Set or MinSet) is about 1% of the dictionary, 15% of the Kernel, and half-Core, half-Satellite. But every dictionary has a huge number of MinSets. The Core words are learned earlier, more frequent, and less concrete than the Satellites, which in turn are learned earlier and more frequent but more concrete than the rest of the Dictionary. In principle, only one MinSet’s words would need to be grounded through the sensorimotor capacity to recognize and categorize their referents. In a dual-code sensorimotor-symbolic model of the mental lexicon, the symbolic code could do all the rest via re-combinatory definition

Query interpretation to help peers understand each others in semantically heterogeneous systems

National audienceIn semantic web applications where query initiators and information providers do not necessarily share the same ontology, semantic interoperability generally relies on ontology matching or schema mappings. Information exchange is then not only enabled by the established correspondences (the ``shared'' parts of the ontologies) but, in some sense, limited to them. Then, how the ``unshared'' parts can also contribute to and improve information exchange ? In this paper, we address this question by considering a system where documents and queries are represented by semantic vectors. We propose a specific query expansion step at the query initiator's side and a query interpretation step at the document provider's. Through these steps, unshared concepts contribute to evaluate the relevance of documents wrt. a given query. Our experiments show an important improvement of retrieval relevance when concepts of documents and queries are not shared. Even if the concepts of the initial query are not shared by the document provider, our method still ensures 90% of the precision and recall obtained when the concepts are shared

Improving Interoperability Using Query Interpretation in Semantic Vector Spaces

International audienceIn semantic web applications where query initiators and information providers do not necessarily share the same ontology, semantic interoperability generally relies on ontology matching or schema mappings. Information exchange is then not only enabled by the established correspondences (the ``shared'' parts of the ontologies) but, in some sense, limited to them. Then, how the ``unshared'' parts can also contribute to and improve information exchange ? In this paper, we address this question by considering a system where documents and queries are represented by semantic vectors. We propose a specific query expansion step at the query initiator's side and a query interpretation step at the document provider's. Through these steps, unshared concepts contribute to evaluate the relevance of documents wrt. a given query. Our experiments show an important improvement of retrieval relevance when concepts of documents and queries are not shared. Even if the concepts of the initial query are not shared by the document provider, our method still ensures 90% of the precision and recall obtained when the concepts are shared

A Framework to Assess Knowledge Graphs Accountability

Knowledge Graphs (KGs), and Linked Open Data in particular, enable the generation and exchange of more and more information on the Web. In order to use and reuse these data properly, the presence of accountability information is essential. Accountability requires specific and accurate information about people's responsibilities and actions. In this article, we define KGAcc, a framework dedicated to the assessment of RDF graphs accountability. It consists of accountability requirements and a measure of accountability for KGs. Then, we evaluate KGs from the LOD cloud and describe the results obtained. Finally, we compare our approach with data quality and FAIR assessment frameworks to highlight the differences.Comment: 8 pages, to be published in: 2023 IEEE International Conference on Web Intelligence and Intelligent Agent Technology (WI-IAT