Cultural differences in categorical memory errors persist with age.

Science.gov (United States)

Gutchess, Angela; Boduroglu, Aysecan

2018-01-02

This cross-sectional experiment examined the influence of aging on cross-cultural differences in memory errors. Previous research revealed that Americans committed more categorical memory errors than Turks; we tested whether the cognitive constraints associated with aging impacted the pattern of memory errors across cultures. Furthermore, older adults are vulnerable to memory errors for semantically-related information, and we assessed whether this tendency occurs across cultures. Younger and older adults from the US and Turkey studied word pairs, with some pairs sharing a categorical relationship and some unrelated. Participants then completed a cued recall test, generating the word that was paired with the first. These responses were scored for correct responses or different types of errors, including categorical and semantic. The tendency for Americans to commit more categorical memory errors emerged for both younger and older adults. In addition, older adults across cultures committed more memory errors, and these were for semantically-related information (including both categorical and other types of semantic errors). Heightened vulnerability to memory errors with age extends across cultural groups, and Americans' proneness to commit categorical memory errors occurs across ages. The findings indicate some robustness in the ways that age and culture influence memory errors.

Quality Assurance of UMLS Semantic Type Assignments Using SNOMED CT Hierarchies.

Science.gov (United States)

Gu, H; Chen, Y; He, Z; Halper, M; Chen, L

2016-01-01

The Unified Medical Language System (UMLS) is one of the largest biomedical terminological systems, with over 2.5 million concepts in its Metathesaurus repository. The UMLS's Semantic Network (SN) with its collection of 133 high-level semantic types serves as an abstraction layer on top of the Metathesaurus. In particular, the SN elaborates an aspect of the Metathesaurus's concepts via the assignment of one or more types to each concept. Due to the scope and complexity of the Metathesaurus, errors are all but inevitable in this semantic-type assignment process. To develop a semi-automated methodology to help assure the quality of semantic-type assignments within the UMLS. The methodology uses a cross-validation strategy involving SNOMED CT's hierarchies in combination with UMLS semantic types. Semantically uniform, disjoint concept groups are generated programmatically by partitioning the collection of all concepts in the same SNOMED CT hierarchy according to their respective semantic-type assignments in the UMLS. Domain experts are then called upon to review the concepts in any group having a small number of concepts. It is our hypothesis that a semantic-type assignment combination applicable only to a very small number of concepts in a SNOMED CT hierarchy is an indicator of potential problems. The methodology was applied to the UMLS 2013AA release along with the SNOMED CT from January 2013. An overall error rate of 33% was found for concepts proposed by the quality-assurance methodology. Supporting our hypothesis, that number was four times higher than the error rate found in control samples. The results show that the quality-assurance methodology can aid in effective and efficient identification of UMLS semantic-type assignment errors.

“Pre-semantic” cognition revisited: Critical differences between semantic aphasia and semantic dementia

OpenAIRE

Jefferies, Elizabeth; Rogers, Timothy T.; Hopper, Samantha; Lambon Ralph, Matthew A.

2010-01-01

Patients with semantic dementia show a specific pattern of impairment on both verbal and non-verbal "pre-semantic" tasks, e.g., reading aloud, past tense generation, spelling to dictation, lexical decision, object decision, colour decision and delayed picture copying. All seven tasks are characterised by poorer performance for items that are atypical of the domain and "regularisation errors" (irregular/atypical items are produced as if they were domain-typical). The emergence of this pattern ...

Managing Inadvertent Arterial Catheterization During Central Venous Access Procedures

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Nicholson, Tony; Ettles, Duncan; Robinson, Graham

2004-01-01

Purpose: Approximately 200,000 central venous catheterizations are carried out annually in the National Health Service in the United Kingdom. Inadvertent arterial puncture occurs in up to 3.7%. Significant morbidity and death has been reported. We report on our experience in the endovascular treatment of this iatrogenic complication. Methods: Retrospective analysis was carried out of 9 cases referred for endovascular treatment of inadvertent arterial puncture during central venous catheterization over a 5 year period. Results: It was not possible to obtain accurate figures on the numbers of central venous catheterizations carried out during the time period. Five patients were referred with carotid or subclavian pseudoaneurysms and hemothorax following inadvertent arterial catheter insertion and subsequent removal. These patients all underwent percutaneous balloon tamponade and/or stent-graft insertion. More recently 4 patients were referred with the catheter still in situ and were successfully treated with a percutaneous closure device. Conclusion: If inadvertent arterial catheterization during central venous access procedures is recognized and catheters removed, sequelae can be treated percutaneously. However, once the complication is recognized it is better to leave the catheter in situ and seal the artery percutaneously with a closure device

Semantic dementia without surface dyslexia in Spanish: unimpaired reading with impaired semantics.

Science.gov (United States)

Wilson, Maximiliano A; Martínez-Cuitiño, Macarena

2012-01-01

Surface dyslexia has been attributed to an overreliance on the sub-lexical route for reading. Typically, surface dyslexic patients commit regularisation errors when reading irregular words. Also, semantic dementia has often been associated with surface dyslexia, leading to some explanations of the reading impairment that stress the role of semantics in irregular word reading. Nevertheless, some patients have been reported with unimpaired ability to read irregular words, even though they show severe comprehension impairment. We present the case of M.B., the first Spanish-speaking semantic dementia patient to be reported who shows unimpaired reading of non-words, regular words, and - most strikingly - irregular loan words. M.B. has severely impaired comprehension of the same words he reads correctly (whether regular or irregular). We argue that M.B.'s pattern of performance shows that irregular words can be correctly read even with impaired semantic knowledge corresponding to those words.

For a new look at 'lexical errors': evidence from semantic approximations with verbs in aphasia.

Science.gov (United States)

Duvignau, Karine; Tran, Thi Mai; Manchon, Mélanie

2013-08-01

The ability to understand the similarity between two phenomena is fundamental for humans. Designated by the term analogy in psychology, this ability plays a role in the categorization of phenomena in the world and in the organisation of the linguistic system. The use of analogy in language often results in non-standard utterances, particularly in speakers with aphasia. These non-standard utterances are almost always studied in a nominal context and considered as errors. We propose a study of the verbal lexicon and present findings that measure, by an action-video naming task, the importance of verb-based non-standard utterances made by 17 speakers with aphasia ("la dame déshabille l'orange"/the lady undresses the orange, "elle casse la tomate"/she breaks the tomato). The first results we have obtained allow us to consider these type of utterances from a new perspective: we propose to eliminate the label of "error", suggesting that they may be viewed as semantic approximations based upon a relationship of inter-domain synonymy and are ingrained in the heart of the lexical system.

Semantics and analysis of business process models in BPMN

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Dijkman, R.M.; Dumas, M.; Ouyang, C.

2008-01-01

The Business Process Modelling Notation (BPMN) is a standard for capturing business processes in the early phases of systems development. The mix of constructs found in BPMN makes it possible to create models with semantic errors. Such errors are especially serious, because errors in the early

WEATHER FORECAST DATA SEMANTIC ANALYSIS IN F-LOGIC

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Ana Meštrović

2007-06-01

Full Text Available This paper addresses the semantic analysis problem in a spoken dialog system developed for the domain of weather forecasts. The main goal of semantic analysis is to extract the meaning from the spoken utterances and to transform it into a domain database format. In this work a semantic database for the domain of weather forecasts is represented using the F-logic formalism. Semantic knowledge is captured through semantic categories a semantic dictionary using phrases and output templates. Procedures for semantic analysis of Croatian weather data combine parsing techniques for Croatian language and slot filling approach. Semantic analysis is conducted in three phases. In the first phase the main semantic category for the input utterance is determined. The lattices are used for hierarchical semantic relation representation and main category derivation. In the second phase semantic units are analyzed and knowledge slots in the database are filled. Since some slot values of input data are missing in the third phase, incomplete data is updated with missing values. All rules for semantic analysis are defined in the F-logic and implemented using the FLORA-2 system. The results of semantic analysis evaluation in terms of frame and slot error rates are presented.

Ureteroscopic holmium laser cutting for inadvertently sutured drainage tube (report of five cases).

Science.gov (United States)

Gao, Xu; Lu, Xin; Ren, Shancheng; Xu, Chuanliang; Sun, Yinghao

2008-07-01

The aim of this paper is to report a simple solution for inadvertently sutured drainage tube after urological surgery and discuss the different managements according to different types of this embarrassing complication. From September 2001 to January 2007, five inadvertently sutured drainage tubes were treated with ureteroscopic holmium laser cutting for the suture. All drainage tubes were removed after the operation without other complications. Holmium laser cutting via ureteroscope is a simple solution for the embarrassing problem of inadvertently sutured drainage tube. It can save the patient from undergoing another open surgery.

The timing of spontaneous detection and repair of naming errors in aphasia.

Science.gov (United States)

Schuchard, Julia; Middleton, Erica L; Schwartz, Myrna F

2017-08-01

This study examined the timing of spontaneous self-monitoring in the naming responses of people with aphasia. Twelve people with aphasia completed a 615-item naming test twice, in separate sessions. Naming attempts were scored for accuracy and error type, and verbalizations indicating detection were coded as negation (e.g., "no, not that") or repair attempts (i.e., a changed naming attempt). Focusing on phonological and semantic errors, we measured the timing of the errors and of the utterances that provided evidence of detection. The effects of error type and detection response type on error-to-detection latencies were analyzed using mixed-effects regression modeling. We first asked whether phonological errors and semantic errors differed in the timing of the detection process or repair planning. Results suggested that the two error types primarily differed with respect to repair planning. Specifically, repair attempts for phonological errors were initiated more quickly than repair attempts for semantic errors. We next asked whether this difference between the error types could be attributed to the tendency for phonological errors to have a high degree of phonological similarity with the subsequent repair attempts, thereby speeding the programming of the repairs. Results showed that greater phonological similarity between the error and the repair was associated with faster repair times for both error types, providing evidence of error-to-repair priming in spontaneous self-monitoring. When controlling for phonological overlap, significant effects of error type and repair accuracy on repair times were also found. These effects indicated that correct repairs of phonological errors were initiated particularly quickly, whereas repairs of semantic errors were initiated relatively slowly, regardless of their accuracy. We discuss the implications of these findings for theoretical accounts of self-monitoring and the role of speech error repair in learning. Copyright �

Role of grammatical gender and semantics in German word production

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Vigliocco, G.; Vinson, D.P.; Indefrey, P.; Levelt, W.J.M.; Hellwig, F.

2004-01-01

Semantic substitution errors (e.g., saying "arm" when "leg" is intended) are among the most common types of errors occurring during spontaneous speech. It has been shown that grammatical gender of German target nouns is preserved in the errors ( E. Marx, 1999). In 3 experiments, the authors explored

Prevention of the inadvertent movement and illicit trafficking of radioactive materials

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

2004-05-01

By international agreements, the movement of all radioactive materials within and between States should be subject to high standards of regulatory, administrative, safety and engineering controls to ensure that such movements are conducted in a safe and secure manner. In the case of nuclear materials, there are additional requirements for physical protection and accountability to ensure against threats of nuclear proliferation and to safeguard against any attempts at diversion. The results of the terrorist attacks of September 2001 emphasized the requirement for enhanced control and security of nuclear and radioactive materials. In this regard, measures are being taken to increase the global levels of physical protection and security for nuclear materials. Experience in many parts of the world continues to prove that movements of radioactive materials outside of the regulatory and legal frameworks continue to occur. Such movements may be either deliberate or inadvertent. Deliberate, illegal movements of radioactive materials, including nuclear material, for terrorist, political or illegal profit is generally understood to be illicit trafficking. The more common movements outside of regulatory control are inadvertent in nature. An example of an inadvertent movement might be the transport of steel contaminated by a melted radioactive source that was lost from proper controls. Such a shipment may present health and safety threats to the personnel involved as well as to the general public. States have the responsibility for combating illicit trafficking and inadvertent movements of radioactive materials. The IAEA co-operates with Member States and other international organizations in joint efforts to prevent incidents of illicit trafficking and inadvertent movements and to harmonize policies and measures by the provision of relevant advice through technical assistance and documents. As an example, the IAEA and the World Customs Organization (WCO) maintain a Memorandum

Prevention of the inadvertent movement and illicit trafficking of radioactive materials

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

2004-12-01

By international agreements, the movement of all radioactive materials within and between States should be subject to high standards of regulatory, administrative, safety and engineering controls to ensure that such movements are conducted in a safe and secure manner. In the case of nuclear materials, there are additional requirements for physical protection and accountability to ensure against threats of nuclear proliferation and to safeguard against any attempts at diversion. The results of the terrorist attacks of September 2001 emphasized the requirement for enhanced control and security of nuclear and radioactive materials. In this regard, measures are being taken to increase the global levels of physical protection and security for nuclear materials. Experience in many parts of the world continues to prove that movements of radioactive materials outside of the regulatory and legal frameworks continue to occur. Such movements may be either deliberate or inadvertent. Deliberate, illegal movements of radioactive materials, including nuclear material, for terrorist, political or illegal profit is generally understood to be illicit trafficking. The more common movements outside of regulatory control are inadvertent in nature. An example of an inadvertent movement might be the transport of steel contaminated by a melted radioactive source that was lost from proper controls. Such a shipment may present health and safety threats to the personnel involved as well as to the general public. States have the responsibility for combating illicit trafficking and inadvertent movements of radioactive materials. The IAEA co-operates with Member States and other international organizations in joint efforts to prevent incidents of illicit trafficking and inadvertent movements and to harmonize policies and measures by the provision of relevant advice through technical assistance and documents. As an example, the IAEA and the World Customs Organization (WCO) maintain a Memorandum

Prevention of the inadvertent movement and illicit trafficking of radioactive materials

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

2003-08-01

By international agreements, the movement of all radioactive materials within and between States should be subject to high standards of regulatory, administrative, safety and engineering controls to ensure that such movements are conducted in a safe and secure manner. In the case of nuclear materials, there are additional requirements for physical protection and accountability to ensure against threats of nuclear proliferation and to safeguard against any attempts at diversion. The results of the terrorist attacks of September 2001 emphasized the requirement for enhanced control and security of nuclear and radioactive materials. In this regard, measures are being taken to increase the global levels of physical protection and security for nuclear materials. Experience in many parts of the world continues to prove that movements of radioactive materials outside of the regulatory and legal frameworks continue to occur. Such movements may be either deliberate or inadvertent. Deliberate, illegal movements of radioactive materials, including nuclear material, for terrorist, political or illegal profit is generally understood to be illicit trafficking. The more common movements outside of regulatory control are inadvertent in nature. An example of an inadvertent movement might be the transport of steel contaminated by a melted radioactive source that was lost from proper controls. Such a shipment may present health and safety threats to the personnel involved as well as to the general public. States have the responsibility for combating illicit trafficking and inadvertent movements of radioactive materials. The IAEA co-operates with Member States and other international organizations in joint efforts to prevent incidents of illicit trafficking and inadvertent movements and to harmonize policies and measures by the provision of relevant advice through technical assistance and documents. As an example, the IAEA and the World Customs Organization (WCO) maintain a Memorandum

Prevention of the inadvertent movement and illicit trafficking of radioactive materials

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

2003-05-01

By international agreements, the movement of all radioactive materials within and between States should be subject to high standards of regulatory, administrative, safety and engineering controls to ensure that such movements are conducted in a safe and secure manner. In the case of nuclear materials, there are additional requirements for physical protection and accountability to ensure against threats of nuclear proliferation and to safeguard against any attempts at diversion. The results of the terrorist attacks of September 2001 emphasized the requirement for enhanced control and security of nuclear and radioactive materials. In this regard, measures are being taken to increase the global levels of physical protection and security for nuclear materials. Experience in many parts of the world continues to prove that movements of radioactive materials outside of the regulatory and legal frameworks continue to occur. Such movements may be either deliberate or inadvertent. Deliberate, illegal movements of radioactive materials, including nuclear material, for terrorist, political or illegal profit is generally understood to be illicit trafficking. The more common movements outside of regulatory control are inadvertent in nature. An example of an inadvertent movement might be the transport of steel contaminated by a melted radioactive source that was lost from proper controls. Such a shipment may present health and safety threats to the personnel involved as well as to the general public. States have the responsibility for combating illicit trafficking and inadvertent movements of radioactive materials. The IAEA co-operates with Member States and other international organizations in joint efforts to prevent incidents of illicit trafficking and inadvertent movements and to harmonize policies and measures by the provision of relevant advice through technical assistance and documents. As an example, the IAEA and the World Customs Organization (WCO) maintain a Memorandum

Prevention of the inadvertent movement and illicit trafficking of radioactive materials

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

2002-09-01

By international agreements, the movement of all radioactive materials within and between States should be subject to high standards of regulatory, administrative, safety and engineering controls to ensure that such movements are conducted in a safe and secure manner. In the case of nuclear materials, there are additional requirements for physical protection and accountability to ensure against threats of nuclear proliferation and to safeguard against any attempts at diversion. The results of the terrorist attacks of September 2001 emphasized the requirement for enhanced control and security of nuclear and radioactive materials. In this regard, measures are being taken to increase the global levels of physical protection and security for nuclear materials. Experience in many parts of the world continues to prove that movements of radioactive materials outside of the regulatory and legal frameworks continue to occur. Such movements may be either deliberate or inadvertent. Deliberate, illegal movements of radioactive materials, including nuclear material, for terrorist, political or illegal profit is generally understood to be illicit trafficking. The more common movements outside of regulatory control are inadvertent in nature. An example of an inadvertent movement might be the transport of steel contaminated by a melted radioactive source that was lost from proper controls. Such a shipment may present health and safety threats to the personnel involved as well as to the general public. States have the responsibility for combating illicit trafficking and inadvertent movements of radioactive materials. The IAEA co-operates with Member States and other international organizations in joint efforts to prevent incidents of illicit trafficking and inadvertent movements and to harmonize policies and measures by the provision of relevant advice through technical assistance and documents. As an example, the IAEA and the World Customs Organization (WCO) maintain a Memorandum

Role of Grammatical Gender and Semantics in German Word Production

Science.gov (United States)

Vigliocco, Gabriella; Vinson, David P.; Indefrey, Peter; Levelt, Willem J. M.; Hellwig, Frauke

2004-01-01

Semantic substitution errors (e.g., saying "arm" when "leg" is intended) are among the most common types of errors occurring during spontaneous speech. It has been shown that grammatical gender of German target nouns is preserved in the errors (E. Mane, 1999). In 3 experiments, the authors explored different accounts of the grammatical gender…

Usage of semantic representations in recognition memory.

Science.gov (United States)

Nishiyama, Ryoji; Hirano, Tetsuji; Ukita, Jun

2017-11-01

Meanings of words facilitate false acceptance as well as correct rejection of lures in recognition memory tests, depending on the experimental context. This suggests that semantic representations are both directly and indirectly (i.e., mediated by perceptual representations) used in remembering. Studies using memory conjunction errors (MCEs) paradigms, in which the lures consist of component parts of studied words, have reported semantic facilitation of rejection of the lures. However, attending to components of the lures could potentially cause this. Therefore, we investigated whether semantic overlap of lures facilitates MCEs using Japanese Kanji words in which a whole-word image is more concerned in reading. Experiments demonstrated semantic facilitation of MCEs in a delayed recognition test (Experiment 1), and in immediate recognition tests in which participants were prevented from using phonological or orthographic representations (Experiment 2), and the salient effect on individuals with high semantic memory capacities (Experiment 3). Additionally, analysis of the receiver operating characteristic suggested that this effect is attributed to familiarity-based memory judgement and phantom recollection. These findings indicate that semantic representations can be directly used in remembering, even when perceptual representations of studied words are available.

Effectiveness of Semantic Therapy for Word-Finding Difficulties in Pupils with Persistent Language Impairments: A Randomized Control Trial

Science.gov (United States)

Ebbels, Susan H.; Nicoll, Hilary; Clark, Becky; Eachus, Beth; Gallagher, Aoife L.; Horniman, Karen; Jennings, Mary; McEvoy, Kate; Nimmo, Liz; Turner, Gail

2012-01-01

Background: Word-finding difficulties (WFDs) in children have been hypothesized to be caused at least partly by poor semantic knowledge. Therefore, improving semantic knowledge should decrease word-finding errors. Previous studies of semantic therapy for WFDs are inconclusive. Aims: To investigate the effectiveness of semantic therapy for…

A Simple Semantics and Static Analysis for Stack Inspection

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Anindya Banerjee

2013-09-01

Full Text Available The Java virtual machine and the .NET common language runtime feature an access control mechanism specified operationally in terms of run-time stack inspection. We give a denotational semantics in "eager" form, and show that it is equivalent to the "lazy" semantics using stack inspection. We give a static analysis of safety, i.e., the absence of security errors, that is simpler than previous proposals. We identify several program transformations that can be used to remove run-time checks. We give complete, detailed proofs for safety of the analysis and for the transformations, exploiting compositionality of the eager semantics.

Probability of inadvertent operation of electrical components in harsh environments

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Knoll, A.

1989-01-01

Harsh environment, which means humidity and high temperature, may and will affect unsealed electrical components by causing leakage ground currents in ungrounded direct current systems. The concern in a nuclear power plant is that such harsh environment conditions could cause inadvertent operation of normally deenergized components, which may have a safety-related isolation function. Harsh environment is a common cause failure, and one way to approach the problem is to assume that all the unsealed electrical components will simultaneously and inadvertently energize as a result of the environmental common cause failure. This assumption is unrealistically conservative. Test results indicated that insulating resistences of any terminal block in harsh environments have a random distribution in the range of 1 to 270 kΩ, with a mean value ∼59 kΩ. The objective of this paper is to evaluate a realistic conditional failure probability for inadvertent operation of electrical components in harsh environments. This value will be used thereafter in probabilistic safety evaluations of harsh environment events and will replace both the overconservative common cause probability of 1 and the random failure probability used for mild environments

Inadvertent Intruder Analysis For The Portsmouth On-Site Waste Disposal Facility (OSWDF)

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Smith, Frank G. [Savannah River Site (SRS), Aiken, SC (United States). Savannah River National Lab. (SRNL); Phifer, Mark A. [Savannah River Site (SRS), Aiken, SC (United States). Savannah River National Lab. (SRNL)

2014-01-22

The inadvertent intruder analysis considers the radiological impacts to hypothetical persons who are assumed to inadvertently intrude on the Portsmouth OSWDF site after institutional control ceases 100 years after site closure. For the purposes of this analysis, we assume that the waste disposal in the OSWDF occurs at time zero, the site is under institutional control for the next 100 years, and inadvertent intrusion can occur over the following 1,000 year time period. Disposal of low-level radioactive waste in the OSWDF must meet a requirement to assess impacts on such individuals, and demonstrate that the effective dose equivalent to an intruder would not likely exceed 100 mrem per year for scenarios involving continuous exposure (i.e. chronic) or 500 mrem for scenarios involving a single acute exposure. The focus in development of exposure scenarios for inadvertent intruders was on selecting reasonable events that may occur, giving consideration to regional customs and construction practices. An important assumption in all scenarios is that an intruder has no prior knowledge of the existence of a waste disposal facility at the site. Results of the analysis show that a hypothetical inadvertent intruder at the OSWDF who, in the worst case scenario, resides on the site and consumes vegetables from a garden established on the site using contaminated soil (chronic agriculture scenario) would receive a maximum chronic dose of approximately 7.0 mrem/yr during the 1000 year period of assessment. This dose falls well below the DOE chronic dose limit of 100 mrem/yr. Results of the analysis also showed that a hypothetical inadvertent intruder at the OSWDF who, in the worst case scenario, excavates a basement in the soil that reaches the waste (acute basement construction scenario) would receive a maximum acute dose of approximately 0.25 mrem/yr during the 1000 year period of assessment. This dose falls well below the DOE acute dose limit of 500 mrem/yr. Disposal inventory

Analysis of inadvertent containment spray actuation for NPP Krsko

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Grgic, D.; Spalj, S.; Fancev, T.

2000-01-01

Refueling Water Storage Tank (RWST) supplies borated water to the Chemical and Volume Control System, Emergency Core Cooling System and Containment Spray System. In the analyses of the containment external pressure the spray temperature is assumed to be equal to the RWST lower temperature limit. This value ensures that the design negative containment pressure will not be exceeded in the event of inadvertent actuation of the Containment Spray. For NPP Kriko the negative containment pressure has to be kept below 0.1 kp/cm2 to avoid the loss of containment integrity. This paper pursuents the analysis of Inadvertent Containment Spray Actuation in order to check the influence of change in RWST water temperature on containment negative pressure. GOTHIC computer code was used for calculation of containment thermal hydraulic behavior during this accident. (author)

Preventing Inadvertent Placement of Foley Catheter into Prostatic ...

African Journals Online (AJOL)

Percutaneous suprapubic trocar cystostomy (SPC) is often needed to drain the bladder when urethral catheterization either fails or is not advisable.[1] It is ... vertical or slightly tilting its tip toward umbilicus during foley placement, prevents the inadvertent migration of catheter into prostatic urethra and further complications.

Implementation of coordinated global serotype 2 oral poliovirus vaccine cessation: risks of inadvertent trivalent oral poliovirus vaccine use.

Science.gov (United States)

Duintjer Tebbens, Radboud J; Hampton, Lee M; Thompson, Kimberly M

2016-06-01

The endgame for polio eradication includes coordinated global cessation of oral poliovirus vaccine (OPV), starting with the cessation of vaccine containing OPV serotype 2 (OPV2) by switching all trivalent OPV (tOPV) to bivalent OPV (bOPV). The logistics associated with this global switch represent a significant undertaking, with some possibility of inadvertent tOPV use after the switch. We used a previously developed poliovirus transmission and OPV evolution model to explore the relationships between the extent of inadvertent tOPV use, the time after the switch of the inadvertent tOPV use and corresponding population immunity to serotype 2 poliovirus transmission, and the ability of the inadvertently introduced viruses to cause a serotype 2 circulating vaccine-derived poliovirus (cVDPV2) outbreak in a hypothetical population. We then estimated the minimum time until inadvertent tOPV use in a supplemental immunization activity (SIA) or in routine immunization (RI) can lead to a cVDPV2 outbreak in realistic populations with properties like those of northern India, northern Pakistan and Afghanistan, northern Nigeria, and Ukraine. At low levels of inadvertent tOPV use, the minimum time after the switch for the inadvertent use to cause a cVDPV2 outbreak decreases sharply with increasing proportions of children inadvertently receiving tOPV. The minimum times until inadvertent tOPV use in an SIA or in RI can lead to a cVDPV2 outbreak varies widely among populations, with higher basic reproduction numbers, lower tOPV-induced population immunity to serotype 2 poliovirus transmission prior to the switch, and a lower proportion of transmission occurring via the oropharyngeal route all resulting in shorter times. In populations with the lowest expected immunity to serotype 2 poliovirus transmission after the switch, inadvertent tOPV use in an SIA leads to a cVDPV2 outbreak if it occurs as soon as 9 months after the switch with 0.5 % of children aged 0-4 years inadvertently

Odor identification: perceptual and semantic dimensions.

Science.gov (United States)

Cain, W S; de Wijk, R; Lulejian, C; Schiet, F; See, L C

1998-06-01

Five studies explored identification of odors as an aspect of semantic memory. All dealt in one way or another with the accessibility of acquired olfactory information. The first study examined stability and showed that, consistent with personal reports, people can fail to identify an odor one day yet succeed another. Failure turned more commonly to success than vice versa, and once success occurred it tended to recur. Confidence ratings implied that subjects generally knew the quality of their answers. Even incorrect names, though, often carried considerable information which sometimes reflected a semantic and sometimes a perceptual source of errors. The second study showed that profiling odors via the American Society of Testing and Materials list of attributes, an exercise in depth of processing, effected no increment in the identifiability/accessibility beyond an unelaborated second attempt at retrieval. The third study showed that subjects had only a weak ability to predict the relative recognizability of odors they had failed to identify. Whereas the strength of the feeling that they would 'know' an answer if offered choices did not associate significantly with performance for odors, it did for trivia questions. The fourth study demonstrated an association between ability to discriminate among one set of odors and to identify another, but this emerged only after subjects had received feedback about identity, which essentially changed the task to one of recognition and effectively stabilized access. The fifth study illustrated that feedback improves performance dramatically only for odors involved with it, but that mere retrieval leads to some improvement. The studies suggest a research agenda that could include supplemental use of confidence judgments both retrospectively and prospectively in the same subjects to indicate the amount of accessible semantic information; use of second and third guesses to examine subjects' simultaneously held hypotheses about

Cyclodialysis cleft with late hypotony maculopathy after inadvertent cannula detachment during cataract surgery.

Science.gov (United States)

Kahawita, Shyalle; Cugati, Sudha; Casson, Robert

2015-05-01

We present the case of a 69-year-old woman who presented with hypotony several years after an inadvertent cannula detachment presumably formed a cyclodialysis cleft during phacoemulsification cataract extraction and posterior chamber intraocular lens implantation in her right eye. To our knowledge, this is the first report of late hypotony maculopathy as a result of inadvertent cannula release. Crown Copyright © 2015. Published by Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Closure Using a Surgical Closure Device of Inadvertent Subclavian Artery Punctures During Central Venous Catheter Placement

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Berlet, Matthew H.; Steffen, Diana; Shaughness, George; Hanner, James

2001-01-01

Severe complications can and do occur when central venous catheters are inadvertently placed into subclavian arteries. Two cases are discussed that describe how these inadvertent arterial punctures can be closed using the Perclose device (Abbott Laboratories, Redwood City, CA, USA)

Hemispheric Asymmetries in the Activation and Monitoring of Memory Errors

Science.gov (United States)

Giammattei, Jeannette; Arndt, Jason

2012-01-01

Previous research on the lateralization of memory errors suggests that the right hemisphere's tendency to produce more memory errors than the left hemisphere reflects hemispheric differences in semantic activation. However, all prior research that has examined the lateralization of memory errors has used self-paced recognition judgments. Because…

Mitigating Inadvertent Insider Threats with Incentives

Science.gov (United States)

Liu, Debin; Wang, Xiaofeng; Camp, L. Jean

Inadvertent insiders are trusted insiders who do not have malicious intent (as with malicious insiders) but do not responsibly managing security. The result is often enabling a malicious outsider to use the privileges of the inattentive insider to implement an insider attack. This risk is as old as conversion of a weak user password into root access, but the term inadvertent insider is recently coined to identify the link between the behavior and the vulnerability. In this paper, we propose to mitigate this threat using a novel risk budget mechanism that offers incentives to an insider to behave according to the risk posture set by the organization. We propose assigning an insider a risk budget, which is a specific allocation of risk points, allowing employees to take a finite number of risk-seeking choice. In this way, the employee can complete her tasks without subverting the security system, as with absolute prohibitions. In the end, the organization penalizes the insider if she fails to accomplish her task within the budget while rewards her in the presence of a surplus. Most importantly. the risk budget requires that the user make conscious visible choices to take electronic risks. We describe the theory behind the system, including specific work on the insider threats. We evaluated this approach using human-subject experiments, which demonstrate the effectiveness of our risk budget mechanism. We also present a game theoretic analysis of the mechanism.

Prevalence and reporting of recruitment, randomisation and treatment errors in clinical trials: A systematic review.

Science.gov (United States)

Yelland, Lisa N; Kahan, Brennan C; Dent, Elsa; Lee, Katherine J; Voysey, Merryn; Forbes, Andrew B; Cook, Jonathan A

2018-06-01

Background/aims In clinical trials, it is not unusual for errors to occur during the process of recruiting, randomising and providing treatment to participants. For example, an ineligible participant may inadvertently be randomised, a participant may be randomised in the incorrect stratum, a participant may be randomised multiple times when only a single randomisation is permitted or the incorrect treatment may inadvertently be issued to a participant at randomisation. Such errors have the potential to introduce bias into treatment effect estimates and affect the validity of the trial, yet there is little motivation for researchers to report these errors and it is unclear how often they occur. The aim of this study is to assess the prevalence of recruitment, randomisation and treatment errors and review current approaches for reporting these errors in trials published in leading medical journals. Methods We conducted a systematic review of individually randomised, phase III, randomised controlled trials published in New England Journal of Medicine, Lancet, Journal of the American Medical Association, Annals of Internal Medicine and British Medical Journal from January to March 2015. The number and type of recruitment, randomisation and treatment errors that were reported and how they were handled were recorded. The corresponding authors were contacted for a random sample of trials included in the review and asked to provide details on unreported errors that occurred during their trial. Results We identified 241 potentially eligible articles, of which 82 met the inclusion criteria and were included in the review. These trials involved a median of 24 centres and 650 participants, and 87% involved two treatment arms. Recruitment, randomisation or treatment errors were reported in 32 in 82 trials (39%) that had a median of eight errors. The most commonly reported error was ineligible participants inadvertently being randomised. No mention of recruitment, randomisation

Comparing implicit and explicit semantic access of direct and indirect word pairs in schizophrenia to evaluate models of semantic memory.

Science.gov (United States)

Neill, Erica; Rossell, Susan Lee

2013-02-28

Semantic memory deficits in schizophrenia (SZ) are profound, yet there is no research comparing implicit and explicit semantic processing in the same participant sample. In the current study, both implicit and explicit priming are investigated using direct (LION-TIGER) and indirect (LION-STRIPES; where tiger is not displayed) stimuli comparing SZ to healthy controls. Based on a substantive review (Rossell and Stefanovic, 2007) and meta-analysis (Pomarol-Clotet et al., 2008), it was predicted that SZ would be associated with increased indirect priming implicitly. Further, it was predicted that SZ would be associated with abnormal indirect priming explicitly, replicating earlier work (Assaf et al., 2006). No specific hypotheses were made for implicit direct priming due to the heterogeneity of the literature. It was hypothesised that explicit direct priming would be intact based on the structured nature of this task. The pattern of results suggests (1) intact reaction time (RT) and error performance implicitly in the face of abnormal direct priming and (2) impaired RT and error performance explicitly. This pattern confirms general findings regarding implicit/explicit memory impairments in SZ whilst highlighting the unique pattern of performance specific to semantic priming. Finally, priming performance is discussed in relation to thought disorder and length of illness. Copyright © 2012 Elsevier Ireland Ltd. All rights reserved.

Spatial-Temporal Junction Extraction and Semantic Interpretation

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Simonsen, Kasper Broegaard; Thorsted Nielsen, Mads; Pilz, Florian

2009-01-01

This article describes a novel junction descriptor that encodes junctions’ semantic information in terms incoming lines’ orientations, both in 2D and 3D. A Kalman filter process is used to reduce the effect of local noise on the descriptor's error and to track the features. The improvement gained...

No one way ticket from orthography to semantics in recognition memory: N400 and P200 effects of associations.

Science.gov (United States)

Stuellein, Nicole; Radach, Ralph R; Jacobs, Arthur M; Hofmann, Markus J

2016-05-15

Computational models of word recognition already successfully used associative spreading from orthographic to semantic levels to account for false memories. But can they also account for semantic effects on event-related potentials in a recognition memory task? To address this question, target words in the present study had either many or few semantic associates in the stimulus set. We found larger P200 amplitudes and smaller N400 amplitudes for old words in comparison to new words. Words with many semantic associates led to larger P200 amplitudes and a smaller N400 in comparison to words with a smaller number of semantic associations. We also obtained inverted response time and accuracy effects for old and new words: faster response times and fewer errors were found for old words that had many semantic associates, whereas new words with a large number of semantic associates produced slower response times and more errors. Both behavioral and electrophysiological results indicate that semantic associations between words can facilitate top-down driven lexical access and semantic integration in recognition memory. Our results support neurophysiologically plausible predictions of the Associative Read-Out Model, which suggests top-down connections from semantic to orthographic layers. Copyright © 2016 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

The use of source memory to identify one's own episodic confusion errors.

Science.gov (United States)

Smith, S M; Tindell, D R; Pierce, B H; Gilliland, T R; Gerkens, D R

2001-03-01

In 4 category cued recall experiments, participants falsely recalled nonlist common members, a semantic confusion error. Errors were more likely if critical nonlist words were presented on an incidental task, causing source memory failures called episodic confusion errors. Participants could better identify the source of falsely recalled words if they had deeply processed the words on the incidental task. For deep but not shallow processing, participants could reliably include or exclude incidentally shown category members in recall. The illusion that critical items actually appeared on categorized lists was diminished but not eradicated when participants identified episodic confusion errors post hoc among their own recalled responses; participants often believed that critical items had been on both the incidental task and the study list. Improved source monitoring can potentially mitigate episodic (but not semantic) confusion errors.

Learning from your mistakes: The functional value of spontaneous error monitoring in aphasia

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Erica L. Middleton

2014-04-01

Ex. 4.\t(T = umbrella “umbelella, umbrella”: Phonological error; DetCorr We used mixed effects logistic regression to assess whether the log odds of changing from error to correct was predicted by monitoring status of the error (DetCorr vs. NoDet; DetNoCorr vs. NoDet; whether the monitoring benefit interacted with direction of change (forward, backward; and whether effects varied by error type. Figure 1 (top shows that the proportion accuracy change was higher for DetCorr, relative to NoDet, consistent with a monitoring benefit. The difference in log odds was significant for semantic errors in both directions (forward: coeff. = -1.73; z= -7.78; p < .001; backward: coeff = -0.92; z= -3.60; p < .001, and for phonological errors in both directions (forward: coeff. = -0.74; z= -2.73; p=.006; backward : coeff. = -.76; z = -2.73; p = .006. The difference between DetNoCorr and NoDet was not significant in any condition. Figure 1 (bottom shows that for Semantic errors, there was a directional asymmetry favoring the Forward condition (interaction: coeff. = .79; z = 2.32; p = .02. Phonological errors, in contrast, produced comparable effects in Forward and Backward direction. The results demonstrated a benefit for errors that were detected and corrected. This monitoring benefit was present in both the forward and backward direction, supporting the Strength hypothesis. Of greatest interest, the monitoring benefit for Semantic errors was greater in the forward than backward direction, indicating a role for learning.

Inadvertent presence of genetically modified elements in maize food ...

African Journals Online (AJOL)

Kenya has a biosafety law and has tested genetically modified (GM) maize under confinement and containment, but has neither released nor commercialized any GM crop. This study assessed various maize food products from the Kenyan farms and markets for the inadvertent presence of GMOs. It assessed the possibility ...

Beverage can stay-tabs: still a source for inadvertently ingested foreign bodies in children

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Donnelly, Lane F. [Cincinnati Children' s Hospital Medical Center, Department of Radiology, MLC 5031, Cincinnati, OH (United States); University of Cincinnati, College of Medicine, Departments of Radiology and Pediatrics, Cincinnati, OH (United States)

2010-09-15

In the 1970s in part to avoid inadvertent ingestion, the beverage-can industry changed can construction from pull-tabs to the stay-tabs (remain attached to can after opening) used today. Our purpose is to identify the number of inadvertent ingestions of beverage-can stay-tabs by children recognized at our institution. The medical information system of a children's hospital was searched with key terms to identify cases in which a witnessed or self-reported inadvertent ingestion of a beverage-can stay-tab resulted in a radiograph to rule out presence of a foreign body. Demographics, identification of stay-tab on radiographs, associated abnormalities, and patient management were reviewed. Nineteen cases of stay-tab ingestion were identified over 16 years. Mean age of ingesters was 8.5 years with the majority being teenagers and 15 (79%) >5 years of age. The stay-tab could be seen radiographically only in 4 (21%) cases - all with the stay-tab identified in the stomach. The identification of 19 children who inadvertently ingested beverage-can stay-tabs at a single children's hospital suggests that such ingestions still occur. Radiologists should be aware that stay-tabs are radiographically visible in the minority (21%) of cases. (orig.)

Beverage can stay-tabs: still a source for inadvertently ingested foreign bodies in children

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Donnelly, Lane F.

2010-01-01

In the 1970s in part to avoid inadvertent ingestion, the beverage-can industry changed can construction from pull-tabs to the stay-tabs (remain attached to can after opening) used today. Our purpose is to identify the number of inadvertent ingestions of beverage-can stay-tabs by children recognized at our institution. The medical information system of a children's hospital was searched with key terms to identify cases in which a witnessed or self-reported inadvertent ingestion of a beverage-can stay-tab resulted in a radiograph to rule out presence of a foreign body. Demographics, identification of stay-tab on radiographs, associated abnormalities, and patient management were reviewed. Nineteen cases of stay-tab ingestion were identified over 16 years. Mean age of ingesters was 8.5 years with the majority being teenagers and 15 (79%) >5 years of age. The stay-tab could be seen radiographically only in 4 (21%) cases - all with the stay-tab identified in the stomach. The identification of 19 children who inadvertently ingested beverage-can stay-tabs at a single children's hospital suggests that such ingestions still occur. Radiologists should be aware that stay-tabs are radiographically visible in the minority (21%) of cases. (orig.)

Semantic representations in the temporal pole predict false memories.

Science.gov (United States)

Chadwick, Martin J; Anjum, Raeesa S; Kumaran, Dharshan; Schacter, Daniel L; Spiers, Hugo J; Hassabis, Demis

2016-09-06

Recent advances in neuroscience have given us unprecedented insight into the neural mechanisms of false memory, showing that artificial memories can be inserted into the memory cells of the hippocampus in a way that is indistinguishable from true memories. However, this alone is not enough to explain how false memories can arise naturally in the course of our daily lives. Cognitive psychology has demonstrated that many instances of false memory, both in the laboratory and the real world, can be attributed to semantic interference. Whereas previous studies have found that a diverse set of regions show some involvement in semantic false memory, none have revealed the nature of the semantic representations underpinning the phenomenon. Here we use fMRI with representational similarity analysis to search for a neural code consistent with semantic false memory. We find clear evidence that false memories emerge from a similarity-based neural code in the temporal pole, a region that has been called the "semantic hub" of the brain. We further show that each individual has a partially unique semantic code within the temporal pole, and this unique code can predict idiosyncratic patterns of memory errors. Finally, we show that the same neural code can also predict variation in true-memory performance, consistent with an adaptive perspective on false memory. Taken together, our findings reveal the underlying structure of neural representations of semantic knowledge, and how this semantic structure can both enhance and distort our memories.

Semantic representations in the temporal pole predict false memories

Science.gov (United States)

Chadwick, Martin J.; Anjum, Raeesa S.; Kumaran, Dharshan; Schacter, Daniel L.; Spiers, Hugo J.; Hassabis, Demis

2016-01-01

Recent advances in neuroscience have given us unprecedented insight into the neural mechanisms of false memory, showing that artificial memories can be inserted into the memory cells of the hippocampus in a way that is indistinguishable from true memories. However, this alone is not enough to explain how false memories can arise naturally in the course of our daily lives. Cognitive psychology has demonstrated that many instances of false memory, both in the laboratory and the real world, can be attributed to semantic interference. Whereas previous studies have found that a diverse set of regions show some involvement in semantic false memory, none have revealed the nature of the semantic representations underpinning the phenomenon. Here we use fMRI with representational similarity analysis to search for a neural code consistent with semantic false memory. We find clear evidence that false memories emerge from a similarity-based neural code in the temporal pole, a region that has been called the “semantic hub” of the brain. We further show that each individual has a partially unique semantic code within the temporal pole, and this unique code can predict idiosyncratic patterns of memory errors. Finally, we show that the same neural code can also predict variation in true-memory performance, consistent with an adaptive perspective on false memory. Taken together, our findings reveal the underlying structure of neural representations of semantic knowledge, and how this semantic structure can both enhance and distort our memories. PMID:27551087

Semantic Blogging : Spreading the Semantic Web Meme

OpenAIRE

Cayzer, Steve

2004-01-01

This paper is about semantic blogging, an application of the semantic web to blogging. The semantic web promises to make the web more useful by endowing metadata with machine processable semantics. Blogging is a lightweight web publishing paradigm which provides a very low barrier to entry, useful syndication and aggregation behaviour, a simple to understand structure and decentralized construction of a rich information network. Semantic blogging builds upon the success and clear network valu...

Unification of behavioural, computational and neural accounts of word production errors in post-stroke aphasia

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Marija Tochadse

Full Text Available Neuropsychological assessment, brain imaging and computational modelling have augmented our understanding of the multifaceted functional deficits in people with language disorders after stroke. Despite the volume of research using each technique, no studies have attempted to assimilate all three approaches in order to generate a unified behavioural-computational-neural model of post-stroke aphasia.The present study included data from 53 participants with chronic post-stroke aphasia and merged: aphasiological profiles based on a detailed neuropsychological assessment battery which was analysed with principal component and correlational analyses; measures of the impairment taken from Dell's computational model of word production; and the neural correlates of both behavioural and computational accounts analysed by voxel-based correlational methodology.As a result, all three strands coincide with the separation of semantic and phonological stages of aphasic naming, revealing the prominence of these dimensions for the explanation of aphasic performance. Over and above three previously described principal components (phonological ability, semantic ability, executive-demand, we observed auditory working memory as a novel factor. While the phonological Dell parameter was uniquely related to phonological errors/factor, the semantic parameter was less clear-cut, being related to both semantic errors and omissions, and loading heavily with semantic ability and auditory working memory factors. The close relationship between the semantic Dell parameter and omission errors recurred in their high lesion-correlate overlap in the anterior middle temporal gyrus. In addition, the simultaneous overlap of the lesion correlate of omission errors with more dorsal temporal regions, associated with the phonological parameter, highlights the multiple drivers that underpin this error type. The novel auditory working memory factor was located along left superior

Response to events involving the inadvertent movement or illicit trafficking of radioactive materials

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

2002-09-01

By international agreements, the movement of all radioactive materials within and between States should be subject to high standards of regulatory, administrative, safety and engineering controls to ensure that such movements are conducted in a safe and secure manner. In the case of nuclear materials, there are additional requirements for physical protection and accountability to ensure against threats of nuclear proliferation and to safeguard against any attempts at diversion. The results of the terrorist attacks of September 2001 emphasized the requirement for enhanced control and security of nuclear and radioactive materials. In this regard, measures are being taken to increase the global levels of physical protection and security for nuclear materials. Experience in many parts of the world continues to prove that movements of radioactive materials outside of the regulatory and legal frameworks continue to occur. Such movements may be either deliberate or inadvertent. Deliberate, illegal movements of radioactive materials, including nuclear material, for terrorist, political or illegal profit is generally understood to be illicit trafficking. The more common movements outside of regulatory control are inadvertent in nature. An example of an inadvertent movement might be the transport of steel contaminated by a melted radioactive source that was lost from proper controls. Such a shipment may present health and safety threats to the personnel involved as well as to the general public. States have the responsibility for combating illicit trafficking and inadvertent movements of radioactive materials. The IAEA co-operates with Member States and other international organizations in joint efforts to prevent incidents of illicit trafficking and inadvertent movements and to harmonize policies and measures by the provision of relevant advice through technical assistance and documents. As an example, the IAEA and the World Customs Organization (WCO) maintain a Memorandum

Response to events involving the inadvertent movement or illicit trafficking of radioactive materials

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

2004-08-01

By international agreements, the movement of all radioactive materials within and between States should be subject to high standards of regulatory, administrative, safety and engineering controls to ensure that such movements are conducted in a safe and secure manner. In the case of nuclear materials, there are additional requirements for physical protection and accountability to ensure against threats of nuclear proliferation and to safeguard against any attempts at diversion. The results of the terrorist attacks of September 2001 emphasized the requirement for enhanced control and security of nuclear and radioactive materials. In this regard, measures are being taken to increase the global levels of physical protection and security for nuclear materials. Experience in many parts of the world continues to prove that movements of radioactive materials outside of the regulatory and legal frameworks continue to occur. Such movements may be either deliberate or inadvertent. Deliberate, illegal movements of radioactive materials, including nuclear material, for terrorist, political or illegal profit is generally understood to be illicit trafficking. The more common movements outside of regulatory control are inadvertent in nature. An example of an inadvertent movement might be the transport of steel contaminated by a melted radioactive source that was lost from proper controls. Such a shipment may present health and safety threats to the personnel involved as well as to the general public. States have the responsibility for combating illicit trafficking and inadvertent movements of radioactive materials. The IAEA co-operates with Member States and other international organizations in joint efforts to prevent incidents of illicit trafficking and inadvertent movements and to harmonize policies and measures by the provision of relevant advice through technical assistance and documents. As an example, the IAEA and the World Customs Organization (WCO) maintain a Memorandum

Response to events involving the inadvertent movement or illicit trafficking of radioactive materials

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

2002-08-01

By international agreements, the movement of all radioactive materials within and between States should be subject to high standards of regulatory, administrative, safety and engineering controls to ensure that such movements are conducted in a safe and secure manner. In the case of nuclear materials, there are additional requirements for physical protection and accountability to ensure against threats of nuclear proliferation and to safeguard against any attempts at diversion. The results of the terrorist attacks of September 2001 emphasized the requirement for enhanced control and security of nuclear and radioactive materials. In this regard, measures are being taken to increase the global levels of physical protection and security for nuclear materials. Experience in many parts of the world continues to prove that movements of radioactive materials outside of the regulatory and legal frameworks continue to occur. Such movements may be either deliberate or inadvertent. Deliberate, illegal movements of radioactive materials, including nuclear material, for terrorist, political or illegal profit is generally understood to be illicit trafficking. The more common movements outside of regulatory control are inadvertent in nature. An example of an inadvertent movement might be the transport of steel contaminated by a melted radioactive source that was lost from proper controls. Such a shipment may present health and safety threats to the personnel involved as well as to the general public. States have the responsibility for combating illicit trafficking and inadvertent movements of radioactive materials. The IAEA co-operates with Member States and other international organizations in joint efforts to prevent incidents of illicit trafficking and inadvertent movements and to harmonize policies and measures by the provision of relevant advice through technical assistance and documents. As an example, the IAEA and the World Customs Organization (WCO) maintain a Memorandum

Response to events involving the inadvertent movement or illicit trafficking of radioactive materials

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

2003-08-01

By international agreements, the movement of all radioactive materials within and between States should be subject to high standards of regulatory, administrative, safety and engineering controls to ensure that such movements are conducted in a safe and secure manner. In the case of nuclear materials, there are additional requirements for physical protection and accountability to ensure against threats of nuclear proliferation and to safeguard against any attempts at diversion. The results of the terrorist attacks of September 2001 emphasized the requirement for enhanced control and security of nuclear and radioactive materials. In this regard, measures are being taken to increase the global levels of physical protection and security for nuclear materials. Experience in many parts of the world continues to prove that movements of radioactive materials outside of the regulatory and legal frameworks continue to occur. Such movements may be either deliberate or inadvertent. Deliberate, illegal movements of radioactive materials, including nuclear material, for terrorist, political or illegal profit is generally understood to be illicit trafficking. The more common movements outside of regulatory control are inadvertent in nature. An example of an inadvertent movement might be the transport of steel contaminated by a melted radioactive source that was lost from proper controls. Such a shipment may present health and safety threats to the personnel involved as well as to the general public. States have the responsibility for combating illicit trafficking and inadvertent movements of radioactive materials. The IAEA co-operates with Member States and other international organizations in joint efforts to prevent incidents of illicit trafficking and inadvertent movements and to harmonize policies and measures by the provision of relevant advice through technical assistance and documents. As an example, the IAEA and the World Customs Organization (WCO) maintain a Memorandum

Biomedical semantics in the Semantic Web.

Science.gov (United States)

Splendiani, Andrea; Burger, Albert; Paschke, Adrian; Romano, Paolo; Marshall, M Scott

2011-03-07

The Semantic Web offers an ideal platform for representing and linking biomedical information, which is a prerequisite for the development and application of analytical tools to address problems in data-intensive areas such as systems biology and translational medicine. As for any new paradigm, the adoption of the Semantic Web offers opportunities and poses questions and challenges to the life sciences scientific community: which technologies in the Semantic Web stack will be more beneficial for the life sciences? Is biomedical information too complex to benefit from simple interlinked representations? What are the implications of adopting a new paradigm for knowledge representation? What are the incentives for the adoption of the Semantic Web, and who are the facilitators? Is there going to be a Semantic Web revolution in the life sciences?We report here a few reflections on these questions, following discussions at the SWAT4LS (Semantic Web Applications and Tools for Life Sciences) workshop series, of which this Journal of Biomedical Semantics special issue presents selected papers from the 2009 edition, held in Amsterdam on November 20th.

Inadvertent intrathecal injection of labetalol in a patient undergoing post-partum tubal ligation.

Science.gov (United States)

Balestrieri, P J; Hamza, M S; Ting, P H; Blank, R S; Grubb, C T

2005-10-01

After receiving a continuous spinal anesthetic for labor following an inadvertent dural puncture with a 17-gauge epidural needle, a morbidly obese parturient underwent post-partum tubal ligation 12 h after vaginal delivery. The patient received a total of 2 mL of 0.75% hyperbaric bupivacaine for the surgery. In response to moderate hypertension the patient received intravenous labetalol hydrochloride 20 mg. She subsequently was inadvertently administered approximately 15 mg of labetalol through the spinal catheter. The spinal catheter was removed immediately after the procedure. She suffered no apparent adverse neurologic effects.

Lexical Errors and Accuracy in Foreign Language Writing. Second Language Acquisition

Science.gov (United States)

del Pilar Agustin Llach, Maria

2011-01-01

Lexical errors are a determinant in gaining insight into vocabulary acquisition, vocabulary use and writing quality assessment. Lexical errors are very frequent in the written production of young EFL learners, but they decrease as learners gain proficiency. Misspellings are the most common category, but formal errors give way to semantic-based…

Preserved musical semantic memory in semantic dementia.

Science.gov (United States)

Weinstein, Jessica; Koenig, Phyllis; Gunawardena, Delani; McMillan, Corey; Bonner, Michael; Grossman, Murray

2011-02-01

To understand the scope of semantic impairment in semantic dementia. Case study. Academic medical center. A man with semantic dementia, as demonstrated by clinical, neuropsychological, and imaging studies. Music performance and magnetic resonance imaging results. Despite profoundly impaired semantic memory for words and objects due to left temporal lobe atrophy, this semiprofessional musician was creative and expressive in demonstrating preserved musical knowledge. Long-term representations of words and objects in semantic memory may be dissociated from meaningful knowledge in other domains, such as music.

Energy Consumption Forecasting Using Semantic-Based Genetic Programming with Local Search Optimizer

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Mauro Castelli

2015-01-01

Full Text Available Energy consumption forecasting (ECF is an important policy issue in today’s economies. An accurate ECF has great benefits for electric utilities and both negative and positive errors lead to increased operating costs. The paper proposes a semantic based genetic programming framework to address the ECF problem. In particular, we propose a system that finds (quasi-perfect solutions with high probability and that generates models able to produce near optimal predictions also on unseen data. The framework blends a recently developed version of genetic programming that integrates semantic genetic operators with a local search method. The main idea in combining semantic genetic programming and a local searcher is to couple the exploration ability of the former with the exploitation ability of the latter. Experimental results confirm the suitability of the proposed method in predicting the energy consumption. In particular, the system produces a lower error with respect to the existing state-of-the art techniques used on the same dataset. More importantly, this case study has shown that including a local searcher in the geometric semantic genetic programming system can speed up the search process and can result in fitter models that are able to produce an accurate forecasting also on unseen data.

Errors, error detection, error correction and hippocampal-region damage: data and theories.

Science.gov (United States)

MacKay, Donald G; Johnson, Laura W

2013-11-01

This review and perspective article outlines 15 observational constraints on theories of errors, error detection, and error correction, and their relation to hippocampal-region (HR) damage. The core observations come from 10 studies with H.M., an amnesic with cerebellar and HR damage but virtually no neocortical damage. Three studies examined the detection of errors planted in visual scenes (e.g., a bird flying in a fish bowl in a school classroom) and sentences (e.g., I helped themselves to the birthday cake). In all three experiments, H.M. detected reliably fewer errors than carefully matched memory-normal controls. Other studies examined the detection and correction of self-produced errors, with controls for comprehension of the instructions, impaired visual acuity, temporal factors, motoric slowing, forgetting, excessive memory load, lack of motivation, and deficits in visual scanning or attention. In these studies, H.M. corrected reliably fewer errors than memory-normal and cerebellar controls, and his uncorrected errors in speech, object naming, and reading aloud exhibited two consistent features: omission and anomaly. For example, in sentence production tasks, H.M. omitted one or more words in uncorrected encoding errors that rendered his sentences anomalous (incoherent, incomplete, or ungrammatical) reliably more often than controls. Besides explaining these core findings, the theoretical principles discussed here explain H.M.'s retrograde amnesia for once familiar episodic and semantic information; his anterograde amnesia for novel information; his deficits in visual cognition, sentence comprehension, sentence production, sentence reading, and object naming; and effects of aging on his ability to read isolated low frequency words aloud. These theoretical principles also explain a wide range of other data on error detection and correction and generate new predictions for future test. Copyright © 2013 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Semantic Advertising

OpenAIRE

Zamanzadeh, Ben; Ashish, Naveen; Ramakrishnan, Cartic; Zimmerman, John

2013-01-01

We present the concept of Semantic Advertising which we see as the future of online advertising. Semantic Advertising is online advertising powered by semantic technology which essentially enables us to represent and reason with concepts and the meaning of things. This paper aims to 1) Define semantic advertising, 2) Place it in the context of broader and more widely used concepts such as the Semantic Web and Semantic Search, 3) Provide a survey of work in related areas such as context matchi...

Syntactic and semantic errors in radiology reports associated with speech recognition software.

Science.gov (United States)

Ringler, Michael D; Goss, Brian C; Bartholmai, Brian J

2017-03-01

Speech recognition software can increase the frequency of errors in radiology reports, which may affect patient care. We retrieved 213,977 speech recognition software-generated reports from 147 different radiologists and proofread them for errors. Errors were classified as "material" if they were believed to alter interpretation of the report. "Immaterial" errors were subclassified as intrusion/omission or spelling errors. The proportion of errors and error type were compared among individual radiologists, imaging subspecialty, and time periods. In all, 20,759 reports (9.7%) contained errors, of which 3992 (1.9%) were material errors. Among immaterial errors, spelling errors were more common than intrusion/omission errors ( p reports, reports reinterpreting results of outside examinations, and procedural studies (all p < .001). Error rate decreased over time ( p < .001), which suggests that a quality control program with regular feedback may reduce errors.

Modulation of alpha oscillations is required for the suppression of semantic interference.

Science.gov (United States)

Melnik, Natalia; Mapelli, Igor; Özkurt, Tolga Esat

2017-10-01

Recent findings on alpha band oscillations suggest their important role in memory consolidation and suppression of external distractors such as environmental noise. However, less attention was given to the phenomenon of internal distracting information being solely inherent to the stimuli content. Human memory may be prone to internal distractions caused by semantic relatedness between the meaning of words (e.g., atom, neutron, nucleus, etc.) to be encoded, i.e., semantic interference. Our study investigates the brain oscillatory dynamics behind the semantic interference phenomenon, whose possible outcome is known as false memories. In this direction, Deese-Roediger-McDermott word lists were appropriated for a modified Sternberg paradigm in auditory modality. Participants received semantically related and unrelated word lists via headphones while EEG data were acquired. Semantic interference triggered the false memory rates to be higher than those of other types of memory errors. Analysis demonstrated that the upper part of alpha band (∼10-12Hz) power decreases on parieto-occipital channels in the retention interval, prior to the probe item for semantically related condition. Our study elucidates the oscillatory mechanisms behind semantic interference by relying on alpha functional inhibition theory. Copyright © 2017 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Late-Onset Inadvertent Bleb Formation following Pars Plana M3 Molteno Implant Tube Obstruction

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Anmar M. Abdul-Rahman

2017-01-01

Full Text Available Purpose: To report a case of inadvertent bleb formation presenting 18 months after pars plana M3 Molteno implant tube obstruction in a patient with mixed mechanism glaucoma. Materials and Methods: An 84-year-old Caucasian male with mixed mechanism glaucoma underwent slit-lamp examination, gonioscopy, colour anterior segment photography and anterior segment optical coherence tomography (AS-OCT. Results: An inadvertent bleb developed 18 months after pars plana implant tube re-positioning with a 6/0 Vicryl tie ligature. The bleb was located in the area anterior to the implant plate; it was characterised by a thin, transparent, avascular and multi-cystic wall, with a visible stoma at the posterior edge of the bleb. The bleb was functioning as demonstrated by an intraocular pressure of 6 mm Hg at presentation and a punctate fluorescein uptake pattern of the bleb wall. The bleb over the plate of the Molteno implant was non-functioning, likely secondary to tube obstruction by vitreous in the early postoperative period. AS-OCT showed a tract from the anterior chamber commencing at an entry wound through a corneal tunnel to the posterior stoma at the base of the inadvertent bleb. Conclusions: We hypothesise that the pathophysiologic factors resulting in an inadvertent bleb are a result of a combination of apoptosis, late-onset wound dehiscence and internal gaping of a centrally placed corneal wound. In addition, aqueous hydrodynamic factors may play a role.

Potential impact of DOE's performance objective for protection of inadvertent intruders on low-level waste disposals at Oak Ridge National Laboratory

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Kocher, D.C.

1993-01-01

Performance objectives for disposal of low-level radioactive waste at Department of Energy (DOE) sites include limits on radiation dose to inadvertent intruders. This paper investigates the potential impact of DOE's performance objective for protection of inadvertent intruders on the acceptability of low-level waste disposals at Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL). The analysis is based on waste volumes and radionuclide inventories for recent disposals and estimated doses to an inadvertent intruder for assumed exposure scenarios. The analysis indicates that more than 99% of the total volume of waste in recent disposals meets the performance objective for inadvertent intruders, and the volume of waste found to be unacceptable for disposal is only about 16 m 3 . Therefore, DOE's performance objective for protection of inadvertent intruders probably will not have unreasonably adverse impacts on acceptable waste disposals at ORNL

Naming without knowing and appearance without associations: evidence for constructive processes in semantic memory?

Science.gov (United States)

Laws, K R; Evans, J J; Hodges, J R; McCarthy, R A

1995-01-01

This study describes a patient (SE) with temporal lobe injury resulting from Herpes Simplex Encephalitis, who displayed a previously unreported impairment in which his knowledge of associative and functional attributes of animals was disproportionately impaired by comparison with his knowledge of their sensory attributes (including their visual properties and characteristic sounds). His knowledge of man-made objects was preserved. A striking aspect of the present case was that the patient remained able to name many animals from their pictures, despite making gross errors in generating associative information about these same animals. This suggests that a semantic representation incorporating stored sensory knowledge may be sufficient for naming (at least for biological categories) and associative information may be unnecessary. Semantic knowledge may normally incorporate more information than is necessary for identification. SE's errors were found to be confabulatory and reconstructive in nature and it is argued that this aspect of his performance challenges passive conceptions of semantic memory couched in terms of a catalogue of stored representations. It is proposed that the patient's disorder affects a dynamic, constructive, and inferential component of his knowledge base, and that this component is sensitive to semantic category.

Expanding the Extent of a UMLS Semantic Type via Group Neighborhood Auditing

Science.gov (United States)

Chen, Yan; Gu, Huanying; Perl, Yehoshua; Halper, Michael; Xu, Junchuan

2009-01-01

Objective Each Unified Medical Language System (UMLS) concept is assigned one or more semantic types (ST). A dynamic methodology for aiding an auditor in finding concepts that are missing the assignment of a given ST, S is presented. Design The first part of the methodology exploits the previously introduced Refined Semantic Network and accompanying refined semantic types (RST) to help narrow the search space for offending concepts. The auditing is focused in a neighborhood surrounding the extent of an RST, T (of S) called an envelope, consisting of parents and children of concepts in the extent. The audit moves outward as long as missing assignments are discovered. In the second part, concepts not reached previously are processed and reassigned T as needed during the processing of S's other RSTs. The set of such concepts is expanded in a similar way to that in the first part. Measurements The number of errors discovered is reported. To measure the methodology's efficiency, “error hit rates” (i.e., errors found in concepts examined) are computed. Results The methodology was applied to three STs: Experimental Model of Disease (EMD), Environmental Effect of Humans, and Governmental or Regulatory Activity. The EMD experienced the most drastic change. For its RST “EMD ∩ Neoplastic Process” (RST “EMD”) with only 33 (31) original concepts, 915 (134) concepts were found by the first (second) part to be missing the EMD assignment. Changes to the other two STs were smaller. Conclusion The results show that the proposed auditing methodology can help to effectively and efficiently identify concepts lacking the assignment of a particular semantic type. PMID:19567802

Semantator: annotating clinical narratives with semantic web ontologies.

Science.gov (United States)

Song, Dezhao; Chute, Christopher G; Tao, Cui

2012-01-01

To facilitate clinical research, clinical data needs to be stored in a machine processable and understandable way. Manual annotating clinical data is time consuming. Automatic approaches (e.g., Natural Language Processing systems) have been adopted to convert such data into structured formats; however, the quality of such automatically extracted data may not always be satisfying. In this paper, we propose Semantator, a semi-automatic tool for document annotation with Semantic Web ontologies. With a loaded free text document and an ontology, Semantator supports the creation/deletion of ontology instances for any document fragment, linking/disconnecting instances with the properties in the ontology, and also enables automatic annotation by connecting to the NCBO annotator and cTAKES. By representing annotations in Semantic Web standards, Semantator supports reasoning based upon the underlying semantics of the owl:disjointWith and owl:equivalentClass predicates. We present discussions based on user experiences of using Semantator.

Analyzing temozolomide medication errors: potentially fatal.

Science.gov (United States)

Letarte, Nathalie; Gabay, Michael P; Bressler, Linda R; Long, Katie E; Stachnik, Joan M; Villano, J Lee

2014-10-01

The EORTC-NCIC regimen for glioblastoma requires different dosing of temozolomide (TMZ) during radiation and maintenance therapy. This complexity is exacerbated by the availability of multiple TMZ capsule strengths. TMZ is an alkylating agent and the major toxicity of this class is dose-related myelosuppression. Inadvertent overdose can be fatal. The websites of the Institute for Safe Medication Practices (ISMP), and the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) MedWatch database were reviewed. We searched the MedWatch database for adverse events associated with TMZ and obtained all reports including hematologic toxicity submitted from 1st November 1997 to 30th May 2012. The ISMP describes errors with TMZ resulting from the positioning of information on the label of the commercial product. The strength and quantity of capsules on the label were in close proximity to each other, and this has been changed by the manufacturer. MedWatch identified 45 medication errors. Patient errors were the most common, accounting for 21 or 47% of errors, followed by dispensing errors, which accounted for 13 or 29%. Seven reports or 16% were errors in the prescribing of TMZ. Reported outcomes ranged from reversible hematological adverse events (13%), to hospitalization for other adverse events (13%) or death (18%). Four error reports lacked detail and could not be categorized. Although the FDA issued a warning in 2003 regarding fatal medication errors and the product label warns of overdosing, errors in TMZ dosing occur for various reasons and involve both healthcare professionals and patients. Overdosing errors can be fatal.

Anatomic, Clinical, and Neuropsychological Correlates of Spelling Errors in Primary Progressive Aphasia

Science.gov (United States)

Shim, HyungSub; Hurley, Robert S.; Rogalski, Emily; Mesulam, M.-Marsel

2012-01-01

This study evaluates spelling errors in the three subtypes of primary progressive aphasia (PPA): agrammatic (PPA-G), logopenic (PPA-L), and semantic (PPA-S). Forty-one PPA patients and 36 age-matched healthy controls were administered a test of spelling. The total number of errors and types of errors in spelling to dictation of regular words,…

Semantic content-based recommendations using semantic graphs.

Science.gov (United States)

Guo, Weisen; Kraines, Steven B

2010-01-01

Recommender systems (RSs) can be useful for suggesting items that might be of interest to specific users. Most existing content-based recommendation (CBR) systems are designed to recommend items based on text content, and the items in these systems are usually described with keywords. However, similarity evaluations based on keywords suffer from the ambiguity of natural languages. We present a semantic CBR method that uses Semantic Web technologies to recommend items that are more similar semantically with the items that the user prefers. We use semantic graphs to represent the items and we calculate the similarity scores for each pair of semantic graphs using an inverse graph frequency algorithm. The items having higher similarity scores to the items that are known to be preferred by the user are recommended.

Development of safety analysis and constraint detection techniques for process interaction errors

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Fan, Chin-Feng, E-mail: csfanc@saturn.yzu.edu.tw [Computer Science and Engineering Dept., Yuan-Ze University, Taiwan (China); Tsai, Shang-Lin; Tseng, Wan-Hui [Computer Science and Engineering Dept., Yuan-Ze University, Taiwan (China)

2011-02-15

Among the new failure modes introduced by computer into safety systems, the process interaction error is the most unpredictable and complicated failure mode, which may cause disastrous consequences. This paper presents safety analysis and constraint detection techniques for process interaction errors among hardware, software, and human processes. Among interaction errors, the most dreadful ones are those that involve run-time misinterpretation from a logic process. We call them the 'semantic interaction errors'. Such abnormal interaction is not adequately emphasized in current research. In our static analysis, we provide a fault tree template focusing on semantic interaction errors by checking conflicting pre-conditions and post-conditions among interacting processes. Thus, far-fetched, but highly risky, interaction scenarios involve interpretation errors can be identified. For run-time monitoring, a range of constraint types is proposed for checking abnormal signs at run time. We extend current constraints to a broader relational level and a global level, considering process/device dependencies and physical conservation rules in order to detect process interaction errors. The proposed techniques can reduce abnormal interactions; they can also be used to assist in safety-case construction.

Development of safety analysis and constraint detection techniques for process interaction errors

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Fan, Chin-Feng; Tsai, Shang-Lin; Tseng, Wan-Hui

2011-01-01

Among the new failure modes introduced by computer into safety systems, the process interaction error is the most unpredictable and complicated failure mode, which may cause disastrous consequences. This paper presents safety analysis and constraint detection techniques for process interaction errors among hardware, software, and human processes. Among interaction errors, the most dreadful ones are those that involve run-time misinterpretation from a logic process. We call them the 'semantic interaction errors'. Such abnormal interaction is not adequately emphasized in current research. In our static analysis, we provide a fault tree template focusing on semantic interaction errors by checking conflicting pre-conditions and post-conditions among interacting processes. Thus, far-fetched, but highly risky, interaction scenarios involve interpretation errors can be identified. For run-time monitoring, a range of constraint types is proposed for checking abnormal signs at run time. We extend current constraints to a broader relational level and a global level, considering process/device dependencies and physical conservation rules in order to detect process interaction errors. The proposed techniques can reduce abnormal interactions; they can also be used to assist in safety-case construction.

Intentional and inadvertent non-adherence in adult coeliac disease. A cross-sectional survey.

Science.gov (United States)

Hall, Nicola J; Rubin, Gregory P; Charnock, Anne

2013-09-01

Adherence to a gluten-free diet is the mainstay of treatment for coeliac disease. Non-adherence is common as the diet is restrictive and can be difficult to follow. This study aimed to determine the rates of intentional and inadvertent non-adherence in adult coeliac disease and to examine the factors associated with both. A self-completion questionnaire was mailed to adult coeliac patients identified from the computer records of 31 family practices within the North East of England. We received 287 responses after one reminder. Intentional gluten consumption was reported by 115 (40%) of respondents. 155 (54%) had made at least one known mistaken lapse over the same period and 82 (29%) reported neither intentional nor mistaken gluten consumption. Using logistic regression analysis, low self-efficacy, perceptions of tolerance to gluten and intention were found to be independently predictive of intentional gluten consumption. A statistical model predicted 71.8% of cases reporting intentional lapses. Intentional non-adherence to the GFD was found to be common but not as frequent as inadvertent lapses. Distinguishing the factors influencing both intentional and inadvertent non-adherence is useful in understanding dietary self-management in coeliac disease. Copyright © 2013 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Boundary error analysis and categorization in the TRECVID news story segmentation task

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Arlandis, J.; Over, P.; Kraaij, W.

2005-01-01

In this paper, an error analysis based on boundary error popularity (frequency) including semantic boundary categorization is applied in the context of the news story segmentation task from TRECVTD1. Clusters of systems were defined based on the input resources they used including video, audio and

Geospatial semantic web

CERN Document Server

Zhang, Chuanrong; Li, Weidong

2015-01-01

This book covers key issues related to Geospatial Semantic Web, including geospatial web services for spatial data interoperability; geospatial ontology for semantic interoperability; ontology creation, sharing, and integration; querying knowledge and information from heterogeneous data source; interfaces for Geospatial Semantic Web, VGI (Volunteered Geographic Information) and Geospatial Semantic Web; challenges of Geospatial Semantic Web; and development of Geospatial Semantic Web applications. This book also describes state-of-the-art technologies that attempt to solve these problems such as WFS, WMS, RDF, OWL, and GeoSPARQL, and demonstrates how to use the Geospatial Semantic Web technologies to solve practical real-world problems such as spatial data interoperability.

Frontal lobe damage impairs process and content in semantic memory: evidence from category-specific effects in progressive non-fluent aphasia.

Science.gov (United States)

Reilly, Jamie; Rodriguez, Amy D; Peelle, Jonathan E; Grossman, Murray

2011-06-01

Portions of left inferior frontal cortex have been linked to semantic memory both in terms of the content of conceptual representation (e.g., motor aspects in an embodied semantics framework) and the cognitive processes used to access these representations (e.g., response selection). Progressive non-fluent aphasia (PNFA) is a neurodegenerative condition characterized by progressive atrophy of left inferior frontal cortex. PNFA can, therefore, provide a lesion model for examining the impact of frontal lobe damage on semantic processing and content. In the current study we examined picture naming in a cohort of PNFA patients across a variety of semantic categories. An embodied approach to semantic memory holds that sensorimotor features such as self-initiated action may assume differential importance for the representation of manufactured artifacts (e.g., naming hand tools). Embodiment theories might therefore predict that patients with frontal damage would be differentially impaired on manufactured artifacts relative to natural kinds, and this prediction was borne out. We also examined patterns of naming errors across a wide range of semantic categories and found that naming error distributions were heterogeneous. Although PNFA patients performed worse overall on naming manufactured artifacts, there was no reliable relationship between anomia and manipulability across semantic categories. These results add to a growing body of research arguing against a purely sensorimotor account of semantic memory, suggesting instead a more nuanced balance of process and content in how the brain represents conceptual knowledge. Copyright © 2010 Elsevier Srl. All rights reserved.

Semantic Multimedia

NARCIS (Netherlands)

S. Staab; A. Scherp; R. Arndt; R. Troncy (Raphael); M. Grzegorzek; C. Saathoff; S. Schenk; L. Hardman (Lynda)

2008-01-01

htmlabstractMultimedia constitutes an interesting field of application for Semantic Web and Semantic Web reasoning, as the access and management of multimedia content and context depends strongly on the semantic descriptions of both. At the same time, multimedia resources constitute complex objects,

Newly-acquired words are more phonologically robust in verbal short-term memory when they have associated semantic representations.

Science.gov (United States)

Savill, Nicola; Ellis, Andrew W; Jefferies, Elizabeth

2017-04-01

Verbal short-term memory (STM) is a crucial cognitive function central to language learning, comprehension and reasoning, yet the processes that underlie this capacity are not fully understood. In particular, although STM primarily draws on a phonological code, interactions between long-term phonological and semantic representations might help to stabilise the phonological trace for words ("semantic binding hypothesis"). This idea was first proposed to explain the frequent phoneme recombination errors made by patients with semantic dementia when recalling words that are no longer fully understood. However, converging evidence in support of semantic binding is scant: it is unusual for studies of healthy participants to examine serial recall at the phoneme level and also it is difficult to separate the contribution of phonological-lexical knowledge from effects of word meaning. We used a new method to disentangle these influences in healthy individuals by training new 'words' with or without associated semantic information. We examined phonological coherence in immediate serial recall (ISR), both immediately and the day after training. Trained items were more likely to be recalled than novel nonwords, confirming the importance of phonological-lexical knowledge, and items with semantic associations were also produced more accurately than those with no meaning, at both time points. For semantically-trained items, there were fewer phoneme ordering and identity errors, and consequently more complete target items were produced in both correct and incorrect list positions. These data show that lexical-semantic knowledge improves the robustness of verbal STM at the sub-item level, even when the effect of phonological familiarity is taken into account. Copyright © 2016 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

[Investigating phonological planning processes in speech production through a speech-error induction technique].

Science.gov (United States)

Nakayama, Masataka; Saito, Satoru

2015-08-01

The present study investigated principles of phonological planning, a common serial ordering mechanism for speech production and phonological short-term memory. Nakayama and Saito (2014) have investigated the principles by using a speech-error induction technique, in which participants were exposed to an auditory distracIor word immediately before an utterance of a target word. They demonstrated within-word adjacent mora exchanges and serial position effects on error rates. These findings support, respectively, the temporal distance and the edge principles at a within-word level. As this previous study induced errors using word distractors created by exchanging adjacent morae in the target words, it is possible that the speech errors are expressions of lexical intrusions reflecting interactive activation of phonological and lexical/semantic representations. To eliminate this possibility, the present study used nonword distractors that had no lexical or semantic representations. This approach successfully replicated the error patterns identified in the abovementioned study, further confirming that the temporal distance and edge principles are organizing precepts in phonological planning.

Anabolic agents: recent strategies for their detection and protection from inadvertent doping

Science.gov (United States)

Geyer, Hans; Schänzer, Wilhelm; Thevis, Mario

2014-01-01

According to the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) Prohibited List, anabolic agents consist of exogenous anabolic androgenic steroids (AAS), endogenous AAS and other anabolic agents such as clenbuterol and selective androgen receptor modulators (SARMs). Currently employed strategies for their improved detection include the prolongation of the detection windows for exogenous AAS, non-targeted and indirect analytical approaches for the detection of modified steroids (designer steroids), the athlete’s biological passport and isotope ratio mass spectrometry for the detection of the misuse of endogenous AAS, as well as preventive doping research for the detection of SARMs. The recent use of these strategies led to 4–80-fold increases of adverse analytical findings for exogenous AAS, to the detection of the misuse of new designer steroids, to adverse analytical findings of different endogenous AAS and to the first adverse analytical findings of SARMs. The strategies of the antidoping research are not only focused on the development of methods to catch the cheating athlete but also to protect the clean athlete from inadvertent doping. Within the past few years several sources of inadvertent doping with anabolic agents have been identified. Among these are nutritional supplements adulterated with AAS, meat products contaminated with clenbuterol, mycotoxin (zearalenone) contamination leading to zeranol findings, and natural products containing endogenous AAS. The protection strategy consists of further investigations in case of reasonable suspicion of inadvertent doping, publication of the results, education of athletes and development of methods to differentiate between intentional and unintentional doping. PMID:24632537

Attention and Facilitation: Converging Information Versus Inadvertent Reading in Stroop Task Performance

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Roelofs, A.P.A.

2010-01-01

Disagreement exists about whether color-word Stroop facilitation is caused by converging information (e.g.. Cohen et al.. 1990: Roelofs, 2003) or inadvertent reading (MacLeod & MacDonald, 2000). Four experiments tested between these hypotheses by examining Stroop effects oil response time (RT) both

Varieties of semantic 'access' deficit in Wernicke's aphasia and semantic aphasia.

Science.gov (United States)

Thompson, Hannah E; Robson, Holly; Lambon Ralph, Matthew A; Jefferies, Elizabeth

2015-12-01

Comprehension deficits are common in stroke aphasia, including in cases with (i) semantic aphasia, characterized by poor executive control of semantic processing across verbal and non-verbal modalities; and (ii) Wernicke's aphasia, associated with poor auditory-verbal comprehension and repetition, plus fluent speech with jargon. However, the varieties of these comprehension problems, and their underlying causes, are not well understood. Both patient groups exhibit some type of semantic 'access' deficit, as opposed to the 'storage' deficits observed in semantic dementia. Nevertheless, existing descriptions suggest that these patients might have different varieties of 'access' impairment-related to difficulty resolving competition (in semantic aphasia) versus initial activation of concepts from sensory inputs (in Wernicke's aphasia). We used a case series design to compare patients with Wernicke's aphasia and those with semantic aphasia on Warrington's paradigmatic assessment of semantic 'access' deficits. In these verbal and non-verbal matching tasks, a small set of semantically-related items are repeatedly presented over several cycles so that the target on one trial becomes a distractor on another (building up interference and eliciting semantic 'blocking' effects). Patients with Wernicke's aphasia and semantic aphasia were distinguished according to lesion location in the temporal cortex, but in each group, some individuals had additional prefrontal damage. Both of these aspects of lesion variability-one that mapped onto classical 'syndromes' and one that did not-predicted aspects of the semantic 'access' deficit. Both semantic aphasia and Wernicke's aphasia cases showed multimodal semantic impairment, although as expected, the Wernicke's aphasia group showed greater deficits on auditory-verbal than picture judgements. Distribution of damage in the temporal lobe was crucial for predicting the initially 'beneficial' effects of stimulus repetition: cases with

Generative Semantics.

Science.gov (United States)

King, Margaret

The first section of this paper deals with the attempts within the framework of transformational grammar to make semantics a systematic part of linguistic description, and outlines the characteristics of the generative semantics position. The second section takes a critical look at generative semantics in its later manifestations, and makes a case…

Semantic similarity between old and new items produces false alarms in recognition memory.

Science.gov (United States)

Montefinese, Maria; Zannino, Gian Daniele; Ambrosini, Ettore

2015-09-01

In everyday life, human beings can report memories of past events that did not occur or that occurred differently from the way they remember them because memory is an imperfect process of reconstruction and is prone to distortion and errors. In this recognition study using word stimuli, we investigated whether a specific operationalization of semantic similarity among concepts can modulate false memories while controlling for the possible effect of associative strength and word co-occurrence in an old-new recognition task. The semantic similarity value of each new concept was calculated as the mean cosine similarity between pairs of vectors representing that new concept and each old concept belonging to the same semantic category. Results showed that, compared with (new) low-similarity concepts, (new) high-similarity concepts had significantly higher probability of being falsely recognized as old, even after partialling out the effect of confounding variables, including associative relatedness and lexical co-occurrence. This finding supports the feature-based view of semantic memory, suggesting that meaning overlap and sharing of semantic features (which are greater when more similar semantic concepts are being processed) have an influence on recognition performance, resulting in more false alarms for new high-similarity concepts. We propose that the associative strength and word co-occurrence among concepts are not sufficient to explain illusory memories but is important to take into account also the effects of feature-based semantic relations, and, in particular, the semantic similarity among concepts.

Relationship Structures and Semantic Type Assignments of the UMLS Enriched Semantic Network

Science.gov (United States)

Zhang, Li; Halper, Michael; Perl, Yehoshua; Geller, James; Cimino, James J.

2005-01-01

Objective: The Enriched Semantic Network (ESN) was introduced as an extension of the Unified Medical Language System (UMLS) Semantic Network (SN). Its multiple subsumption configuration and concomitant multiple inheritance make the ESN's relationship structures and semantic type assignments different from those of the SN. A technique for deriving the relationship structures of the ESN's semantic types and an automated technique for deriving the ESN's semantic type assignments from those of the SN are presented. Design: The technique to derive the ESN's relationship structures finds all newly inherited relationships in the ESN. All such relationships are audited for semantic validity, and the blocking mechanism is used to block invalid relationships. The mapping technique to derive the ESN's semantic type assignments uses current SN semantic type assignments and preserves nonredundant categorizations, while preventing new redundant categorizations. Results: Among the 426 newly inherited relationships, 326 are deemed valid. Seven blockings are applied to avoid inheritance of the 100 invalid relationships. Sixteen semantic types have different relationship structures in the ESN as compared to those in the SN. The mapping of semantic type assignments from the SN to the ESN avoids the generation of 26,950 redundant categorizations. The resulting ESN contains 138 semantic types, 149 IS-A links, 7,303 relationships, and 1,013,876 semantic type assignments. Conclusion: The ESN's multiple inheritance provides more complete relationship structures than in the SN. The ESN's semantic type assignments avoid the existing redundant categorizations appearing in the SN and prevent new ones that might arise due to multiple parents. Compared to the SN, the ESN provides a more accurate unifying semantic abstraction of the UMLS Metathesaurus. PMID:16049233

Potential impact of DOE's performance objective for protection of inadvertent intruders on low-level waste disposals at Oak Ridge National Laboratory

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Kocher, D.C.

1992-01-01

The Department of Energy's Order 5820.2A, Chapter III, specifies performance objectives for disposal of low-level radioactive waste which include limits on effective dose equivalent for inadvertent intruders. This paper investigates the potential impact of the performance objective for protection of inadvertent intruders on the acceptability of waste disposals in Solid Waste Storage Area (SWSA) 6 at Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL). The analysis is based on radionuclide inventories and waste volumes for recent disposals in SWSA 6 and calculated doses to an inadvertent intruder per unit concentration of radionuclides in disposed waste for assumed exposure scenarios

Methods of Run-Time Error Detection in Distributed Process Control Software

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Drejer, N.

In this thesis, methods of run-time error detection in application software for distributed process control is designed. The error detection is based upon a monitoring approach in which application software is monitored by system software during the entire execution. The thesis includes definition...... and constraint evaluation is designed for the modt interesting error types. These include: a) semantical errors in data communicated between application tasks; b) errors in the execution of application tasks; and c) errors in the timing of distributed events emitted by the application software. The design...... of error detection methods includes a high level software specification. this has the purpose of illustrating that the designed can be used in practice....

Attention and Facilitation: Converging Information versus Inadvertent Reading in Stroop Task Performance

Science.gov (United States)

Roelofs, Ardi

2010-01-01

Disagreement exists about whether color-word Stroop facilitation is caused by converging information (e.g., Cohen et al., 1990; Roelofs, 2003) or inadvertent reading (MacLeod & MacDonald, 2000). Four experiments tested between these hypotheses by examining Stroop effects on response time (RT) both within and between languages. Words cannot be…

Semantic Desktop

Science.gov (United States)

Sauermann, Leo; Kiesel, Malte; Schumacher, Kinga; Bernardi, Ansgar

In diesem Beitrag wird gezeigt, wie der Arbeitsplatz der Zukunft aussehen könnte und wo das Semantic Web neue Möglichkeiten eröffnet. Dazu werden Ansätze aus dem Bereich Semantic Web, Knowledge Representation, Desktop-Anwendungen und Visualisierung vorgestellt, die es uns ermöglichen, die bestehenden Daten eines Benutzers neu zu interpretieren und zu verwenden. Dabei bringt die Kombination von Semantic Web und Desktop Computern besondere Vorteile - ein Paradigma, das unter dem Titel Semantic Desktop bekannt ist. Die beschriebenen Möglichkeiten der Applikationsintegration sind aber nicht auf den Desktop beschränkt, sondern können genauso in Web-Anwendungen Verwendung finden.

Semantic heterogeneity: comparing new semantic web approaches with those of digital libraries

OpenAIRE

Krause, Jürgen

2008-01-01

To demonstrate that newer developments in the semantic web community, particularly those based on ontologies (simple knowledge organization system and others) mitigate common arguments from the digital library (DL) community against participation in the Semantic web. The approach is a semantic web discussion focusing on the weak structure of the Web and the lack of consideration given to the semantic content during indexing. The points criticised by the semantic web and ontology approaches ar...

Semantic and visual determinants of face recognition in a prosopagnosic patient.

Science.gov (United States)

Dixon, M J; Bub, D N; Arguin, M

1998-05-01

Prosopagnosia is the neuropathological inability to recognize familiar people by their faces. It can occur in isolation or can coincide with recognition deficits for other nonface objects. Often, patients whose prosopagnosia is accompanied by object recognition difficulties have more trouble identifying certain categories of objects relative to others. In previous research, we demonstrated that objects that shared multiple visual features and were semantically close posed severe recognition difficulties for a patient with temporal lobe damage. We now demonstrate that this patient's face recognition is constrained by these same parameters. The prosopagnosic patient ELM had difficulties pairing faces to names when the faces shared visual features and the names were semantically related (e.g., Tonya Harding, Nancy Kerrigan, and Josee Chouinard -three ice skaters). He made tenfold fewer errors when the exact same faces were associated with semantically unrelated people (e.g., singer Celine Dion, actress Betty Grable, and First Lady Hillary Clinton). We conclude that prosopagnosia and co-occurring category-specific recognition problems both stem from difficulties disambiguating the stored representations of objects that share multiple visual features and refer to semantically close identities or concepts.

Semantic framework for mapping object-oriented model to semantic web languages.

Science.gov (United States)

Ježek, Petr; Mouček, Roman

2015-01-01

The article deals with and discusses two main approaches in building semantic structures for electrophysiological metadata. It is the use of conventional data structures, repositories, and programming languages on one hand and the use of formal representations of ontologies, known from knowledge representation, such as description logics or semantic web languages on the other hand. Although knowledge engineering offers languages supporting richer semantic means of expression and technological advanced approaches, conventional data structures and repositories are still popular among developers, administrators and users because of their simplicity, overall intelligibility, and lower demands on technical equipment. The choice of conventional data resources and repositories, however, raises the question of how and where to add semantics that cannot be naturally expressed using them. As one of the possible solutions, this semantics can be added into the structures of the programming language that accesses and processes the underlying data. To support this idea we introduced a software prototype that enables its users to add semantically richer expressions into a Java object-oriented code. This approach does not burden users with additional demands on programming environment since reflective Java annotations were used as an entry for these expressions. Moreover, additional semantics need not to be written by the programmer directly to the code, but it can be collected from non-programmers using a graphic user interface. The mapping that allows the transformation of the semantically enriched Java code into the Semantic Web language OWL was proposed and implemented in a library named the Semantic Framework. This approach was validated by the integration of the Semantic Framework in the EEG/ERP Portal and by the subsequent registration of the EEG/ERP Portal in the Neuroscience Information Framework.

EVALUATION OF SEMANTIC SIMILARITY FOR SENTENCES IN NATURAL LANGUAGE BY MATHEMATICAL STATISTICS METHODS

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

A. E. Pismak

2016-03-01

Full Text Available Subject of Research. The paper is focused on Wiktionary articles structural organization in the aspect of its usage as the base for semantic network. Wiktionary community references, article templates and articles markup features are analyzed. The problem of numerical estimation for semantic similarity of structural elements in Wiktionary articles is considered. Analysis of existing software for semantic similarity estimation of such elements is carried out; algorithms of their functioning are studied; their advantages and disadvantages are shown. Methods. Mathematical statistics methods were used to analyze Wiktionary articles markup features. The method of semantic similarity computing based on statistics data for compared structural elements was proposed.Main Results. We have concluded that there is no possibility for direct use of Wiktionary articles as the source for semantic network. We have proposed to find hidden similarity between article elements, and for that purpose we have developed the algorithm for calculation of confidence coefficients proving that each pair of sentences is semantically near. The research of quantitative and qualitative characteristics for the developed algorithm has shown its major performance advantage over the other existing solutions in the presence of insignificantly higher error rate. Practical Relevance. The resulting algorithm may be useful in developing tools for automatic Wiktionary articles parsing. The developed method could be used in computing of semantic similarity for short text fragments in natural language in case of algorithm performance requirements are higher than its accuracy specifications.

Inadvertent recovery in communication deficits following the upper limb mirror therapy in stroke: A case report.

Science.gov (United States)

Arya, Kamal Narayan; Pandian, Shanta

2014-10-01

Broca's aphasia is the most challenging communication deficit in stroke. Left inferior frontal gyrus (IFG), a key region of the mirror-neuron system, gets lesioned in Broca's aphasia. Mirror therapy (MT), a form of action-observation, may trigger the mirror neurons. The aim of this study was to report a case of poststroke subject with Broca's aphasia, who exhibited an inadvertent and significant improvement in speech after MT for the paretic upper limb. The 20-month old stroke patient underwent MT through goal-directed tasks. He received a total absence of spontaneous speech, writing, and naming. After 45 sessions of task-based MT for the upper limb, he showed tremendous recovery in expressive communication. He had fluent and comprehensive communication; however, with a low pitch and minor pronunciation errors. He showed a substantial change (from 18/100 to 79/100) on the Communicative Effective Index, particularly, on items such as expressing emotions, one-to-one conversation, naming, and spontaneous conversation. Copyright © 2014 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Programming the semantic web

CERN Document Server

Segaran, Toby; Taylor, Jamie

2009-01-01

With this book, the promise of the Semantic Web -- in which machines can find, share, and combine data on the Web -- is not just a technical possibility, but a practical reality Programming the Semantic Web demonstrates several ways to implement semantic web applications, using current and emerging standards and technologies. You'll learn how to incorporate existing data sources into semantically aware applications and publish rich semantic data. Each chapter walks you through a single piece of semantic technology and explains how you can use it to solve real problems. Whether you're writing

Semantic metrics

OpenAIRE

Hu, Bo; Kalfoglou, Yannis; Dupplaw, David; Alani, Harith; Lewis, Paul; Shadbolt, Nigel

2006-01-01

In the context of the Semantic Web, many ontology-related operations, e.g. ontology ranking, segmentation, alignment, articulation, reuse, evaluation, can be boiled down to one fundamental operation: computing the similarity and/or dissimilarity among ontological entities, and in some cases among ontologies themselves. In this paper, we review standard metrics for computing distance measures and we propose a series of semantic metrics. We give a formal account of semantic metrics drawn from a...

Inquisitive semantics and pragmatics

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Groenendijk, J.; Roelofsen, F.; Larrazabal, J.M.; Zubeldia, L.

2009-01-01

This paper starts with an informal introduction to inquisitive semantics. After that, we present a formal definition of the semantics, and introduce the basic semantic notions of inquisitiveness and informativeness, in terms of wich we define the semantic categories of questions, assertions, and

Personal semantics: at the crossroads of semantic and episodic memory.

Science.gov (United States)

Renoult, Louis; Davidson, Patrick S R; Palombo, Daniela J; Moscovitch, Morris; Levine, Brian

2012-11-01

Declarative memory is usually described as consisting of two systems: semantic and episodic memory. Between these two poles, however, may lie a third entity: personal semantics (PS). PS concerns knowledge of one's past. Although typically assumed to be an aspect of semantic memory, it is essentially absent from existing models of knowledge. Furthermore, like episodic memory (EM), PS is idiosyncratically personal (i.e., not culturally-shared). We show that, depending on how it is operationalized, the neural correlates of PS can look more similar to semantic memory, more similar to EM, or dissimilar to both. We consider three different perspectives to better integrate PS into existing models of declarative memory and suggest experimental strategies for disentangling PS from semantic and episodic memory. Copyright © 2012 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Inadvertent raising of levels in the FFTF primary sodium pumps. Final unusual occurrence report, HEDL 79-34 (FFTF-58)

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Kuechle, J.D.

1981-01-01

The final unusual occurrence report describes the inadvertent raising of the sodium level in the FFTF primary sodium pumps during system testing. This event is now judged to have caused permanent deformation of the primary pump shaft on loop 1 during a period when pump rotation was stopped and sodium level in the pump tank was inadvertently increased. The shaft was subsequently removed, straightened, and returned to service in the spare FFTF pump

SSWAP: A Simple Semantic Web Architecture and Protocol for semantic web services.

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Gessler, Damian D G; Schiltz, Gary S; May, Greg D; Avraham, Shulamit; Town, Christopher D; Grant, David; Nelson, Rex T

2009-09-23

SSWAP (Simple Semantic Web Architecture and Protocol; pronounced "swap") is an architecture, protocol, and platform for using reasoning to semantically integrate heterogeneous disparate data and services on the web. SSWAP was developed as a hybrid semantic web services technology to overcome limitations found in both pure web service technologies and pure semantic web technologies. There are currently over 2400 resources published in SSWAP. Approximately two dozen are custom-written services for QTL (Quantitative Trait Loci) and mapping data for legumes and grasses (grains). The remaining are wrappers to Nucleic Acids Research Database and Web Server entries. As an architecture, SSWAP establishes how clients (users of data, services, and ontologies), providers (suppliers of data, services, and ontologies), and discovery servers (semantic search engines) interact to allow for the description, querying, discovery, invocation, and response of semantic web services. As a protocol, SSWAP provides the vocabulary and semantics to allow clients, providers, and discovery servers to engage in semantic web services. The protocol is based on the W3C-sanctioned first-order description logic language OWL DL. As an open source platform, a discovery server running at http://sswap.info (as in to "swap info") uses the description logic reasoner Pellet to integrate semantic resources. The platform hosts an interactive guide to the protocol at http://sswap.info/protocol.jsp, developer tools at http://sswap.info/developer.jsp, and a portal to third-party ontologies at http://sswapmeet.sswap.info (a "swap meet"). SSWAP addresses the three basic requirements of a semantic web services architecture (i.e., a common syntax, shared semantic, and semantic discovery) while addressing three technology limitations common in distributed service systems: i.e., i) the fatal mutability of traditional interfaces, ii) the rigidity and fragility of static subsumption hierarchies, and iii) the

Alignment of the UMLS semantic network with BioTop: methodology and assessment.

Science.gov (United States)

Schulz, Stefan; Beisswanger, Elena; van den Hoek, László; Bodenreider, Olivier; van Mulligen, Erik M

2009-06-15

For many years, the Unified Medical Language System (UMLS) semantic network (SN) has been used as an upper-level semantic framework for the categorization of terms from terminological resources in biomedicine. BioTop has recently been developed as an upper-level ontology for the biomedical domain. In contrast to the SN, it is founded upon strict ontological principles, using OWL DL as a formal representation language, which has become standard in the semantic Web. In order to make logic-based reasoning available for the resources annotated or categorized with the SN, a mapping ontology was developed aligning the SN with BioTop. The theoretical foundations and the practical realization of the alignment are being described, with a focus on the design decisions taken, the problems encountered and the adaptations of BioTop that became necessary. For evaluation purposes, UMLS concept pairs obtained from MEDLINE abstracts by a named entity recognition system were tested for possible semantic relationships. Furthermore, all semantic-type combinations that occur in the UMLS Metathesaurus were checked for satisfiability. The effort-intensive alignment process required major design changes and enhancements of BioTop and brought up several design errors that could be fixed. A comparison between a human curator and the ontology yielded only a low agreement. Ontology reasoning was also used to successfully identify 133 inconsistent semantic-type combinations. BioTop, the OWL DL representation of the UMLS SN, and the mapping ontology are available at http://www.purl.org/biotop/.

Effects of human errors on the determination of surveillance test interval

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Chung, Dae Wook; Koo, Bon Hyun

1990-01-01

This paper incorporates the effects of human error relevant to the periodic test on the unavailability of the safety system as well as the component unavailability. Two types of possible human error during the test are considered. One is the possibility that a good safety system is inadvertently left in a bad state after the test (Type A human error) and the other is the possibility that bad safety system is undetected upon the test (Type B human error). An event tree model is developed for the steady-state unavailability of safety system to determine the effects of human errors on the component unavailability and the test interval. We perform the reliability analysis of safety injection system (SIS) by applying aforementioned two types of human error to safety injection pumps. Results of various sensitivity analyses show that; 1) the appropriate test interval decreases and steady-state unavailability increases as the probabilities of both types of human errors increase, and they are far more sensitive to Type A human error than Type B and 2) the SIS unavailability increases slightly as the probability of Type B human error increases, and significantly as the probability of Type A human error increases. Therefore, to avoid underestimation, the effects of human error should be incorporated in the system reliability analysis which aims at the relaxations of the surveillance test intervals, and Type A human error has more important effect on the unavailability and surveillance test interval

Effects of perceptual similarity but not semantic association on false recognition in aging

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Kayleigh Burnside

2017-12-01

Full Text Available This study investigated semantic and perceptual influences on false recognition in older and young adults in a variant on the Deese-Roediger-McDermott paradigm. In two experiments, participants encoded intermixed sets of semantically associated words, and sets of unrelated words. Each set was presented in a shared distinctive font. Older adults were no more likely to falsely recognize semantically associated lure words compared to unrelated lures also presented in studied fonts. However, they showed an increase in false recognition of lures which were related to studied items only by a shared font. This increased false recognition was associated with recollective experience. The data show that older adults do not always rely more on prior knowledge in episodic memory tasks. They converge with other findings suggesting that older adults may also be more prone to perceptually-driven errors.

SemanticOrganizer: A Customizable Semantic Repository for Distributed NASA Project Teams

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Keller, Richard M.; Berrios, Daniel C.; Carvalho, Robert E.; Hall, David R.; Rich, Stephen J.; Sturken, Ian B.; Swanson, Keith J.; Wolfe, Shawn R.

2004-01-01

SemanticOrganizer is a collaborative knowledge management system designed to support distributed NASA projects, including diverse teams of scientists, engineers, and accident investigators. The system provides a customizable, semantically structured information repository that stores work products relevant to multiple projects of differing types. SemanticOrganizer is one of the earliest and largest semantic web applications deployed at NASA to date, and has been used in diverse contexts ranging from the investigation of Space Shuttle Columbia's accident to the search for life on other planets. Although the underlying repository employs a single unified ontology, access control and ontology customization mechanisms make the repository contents appear different for each project team. This paper describes SemanticOrganizer, its customization facilities, and a sampling of its applications. The paper also summarizes some key lessons learned from building and fielding a successful semantic web application across a wide-ranging set of domains with diverse users.

Varieties of semantic ‘access’ deficit in Wernicke’s aphasia and semantic aphasia

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Robson, Holly; Lambon Ralph, Matthew A.; Jefferies, Elizabeth

2015-01-01

Comprehension deficits are common in stroke aphasia, including in cases with (i) semantic aphasia, characterized by poor executive control of semantic processing across verbal and non-verbal modalities; and (ii) Wernicke’s aphasia, associated with poor auditory–verbal comprehension and repetition, plus fluent speech with jargon. However, the varieties of these comprehension problems, and their underlying causes, are not well understood. Both patient groups exhibit some type of semantic ‘access’ deficit, as opposed to the ‘storage’ deficits observed in semantic dementia. Nevertheless, existing descriptions suggest that these patients might have different varieties of ‘access’ impairment—related to difficulty resolving competition (in semantic aphasia) versus initial activation of concepts from sensory inputs (in Wernicke’s aphasia). We used a case series design to compare patients with Wernicke’s aphasia and those with semantic aphasia on Warrington’s paradigmatic assessment of semantic ‘access’ deficits. In these verbal and non-verbal matching tasks, a small set of semantically-related items are repeatedly presented over several cycles so that the target on one trial becomes a distractor on another (building up interference and eliciting semantic ‘blocking’ effects). Patients with Wernicke’s aphasia and semantic aphasia were distinguished according to lesion location in the temporal cortex, but in each group, some individuals had additional prefrontal damage. Both of these aspects of lesion variability—one that mapped onto classical ‘syndromes’ and one that did not—predicted aspects of the semantic ‘access’ deficit. Both semantic aphasia and Wernicke’s aphasia cases showed multimodal semantic impairment, although as expected, the Wernicke’s aphasia group showed greater deficits on auditory-verbal than picture judgements. Distribution of damage in the temporal lobe was crucial for predicting the initially �

E-Prescribing Errors in Community Pharmacies: Exploring Consequences and Contributing Factors

Science.gov (United States)

Stone, Jamie A.; Chui, Michelle A.

2014-01-01

Objective To explore types of e-prescribing errors in community pharmacies and their potential consequences, as well as the factors that contribute to e-prescribing errors. Methods Data collection involved performing 45 total hours of direct observations in five pharmacies. Follow-up interviews were conducted with 20 study participants. Transcripts from observations and interviews were subjected to content analysis using NVivo 10. Results Pharmacy staff detected 75 e-prescription errors during the 45 hour observation in pharmacies. The most common e-prescribing errors were wrong drug quantity, wrong dosing directions, wrong duration of therapy, and wrong dosage formulation. Participants estimated that 5 in 100 e-prescriptions have errors. Drug classes that were implicated in e-prescribing errors were antiinfectives, inhalers, ophthalmic, and topical agents. The potential consequences of e-prescribing errors included increased likelihood of the patient receiving incorrect drug therapy, poor disease management for patients, additional work for pharmacy personnel, increased cost for pharmacies and patients, and frustrations for patients and pharmacy staff. Factors that contribute to errors included: technology incompatibility between pharmacy and clinic systems, technology design issues such as use of auto-populate features and dropdown menus, and inadvertently entering incorrect information. Conclusion Study findings suggest that a wide range of e-prescribing errors are encountered in community pharmacies. Pharmacists and technicians perceive that causes of e-prescribing errors are multidisciplinary and multifactorial, that is to say e-prescribing errors can originate from technology used in prescriber offices and pharmacies. PMID:24657055

Getting connected: Both associative and semantic links structure semantic memory for newly learned persons.

Science.gov (United States)

Wiese, Holger; Schweinberger, Stefan R

2015-01-01

The present study examined whether semantic memory for newly learned people is structured by visual co-occurrence, shared semantics, or both. Participants were trained with pairs of simultaneously presented (i.e., co-occurring) preexperimentally unfamiliar faces, which either did or did not share additionally provided semantic information (occupation, place of living, etc.). Semantic information could also be shared between faces that did not co-occur. A subsequent priming experiment revealed faster responses for both co-occurrence/no shared semantics and no co-occurrence/shared semantics conditions, than for an unrelated condition. Strikingly, priming was strongest in the co-occurrence/shared semantics condition, suggesting additive effects of these factors. Additional analysis of event-related brain potentials yielded priming in the N400 component only for combined effects of visual co-occurrence and shared semantics, with more positive amplitudes in this than in the unrelated condition. Overall, these findings suggest that both semantic relatedness and visual co-occurrence are important when novel information is integrated into person-related semantic memory.

Word-embeddings Italian semantic spaces: A semantic model for psycholinguistic research

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Marelli Marco

2017-01-01

Full Text Available Distributional semantics has been for long a source of successful models in psycholinguistics, permitting to obtain semantic estimates for a large number of words in an automatic and fast way. However, resources in this respect remain scarce or limitedly accessible for languages different from English. The present paper describes WEISS (Word-Embeddings Italian Semantic Space, a distributional semantic model based on Italian. WEISS includes models of semantic representations that are trained adopting state-of-the-art word-embeddings methods, applying neural networks to induce distributed representations for lexical meanings. The resource is evaluated against two test sets, demonstrating that WEISS obtains a better performance with respect to a baseline encoding word associations. Moreover, an extensive qualitative analysis of the WEISS output provides examples of the model potentialities in capturing several semantic phenomena. Two variants of WEISS are released and made easily accessible via web through the SNAUT graphic interface.

Semantically Interoperable XML Data.

Science.gov (United States)

Vergara-Niedermayr, Cristobal; Wang, Fusheng; Pan, Tony; Kurc, Tahsin; Saltz, Joel

2013-09-01

XML is ubiquitously used as an information exchange platform for web-based applications in healthcare, life sciences, and many other domains. Proliferating XML data are now managed through latest native XML database technologies. XML data sources conforming to common XML schemas could be shared and integrated with syntactic interoperability. Semantic interoperability can be achieved through semantic annotations of data models using common data elements linked to concepts from ontologies. In this paper, we present a framework and software system to support the development of semantic interoperable XML based data sources that can be shared through a Grid infrastructure. We also present our work on supporting semantic validated XML data through semantic annotations for XML Schema, semantic validation and semantic authoring of XML data. We demonstrate the use of the system for a biomedical database of medical image annotations and markups.

Semantically Interoperable XML Data

Science.gov (United States)

Vergara-Niedermayr, Cristobal; Wang, Fusheng; Pan, Tony; Kurc, Tahsin; Saltz, Joel

2013-01-01

XML is ubiquitously used as an information exchange platform for web-based applications in healthcare, life sciences, and many other domains. Proliferating XML data are now managed through latest native XML database technologies. XML data sources conforming to common XML schemas could be shared and integrated with syntactic interoperability. Semantic interoperability can be achieved through semantic annotations of data models using common data elements linked to concepts from ontologies. In this paper, we present a framework and software system to support the development of semantic interoperable XML based data sources that can be shared through a Grid infrastructure. We also present our work on supporting semantic validated XML data through semantic annotations for XML Schema, semantic validation and semantic authoring of XML data. We demonstrate the use of the system for a biomedical database of medical image annotations and markups. PMID:25298789

Semantics of Kinship Terms in Tamil from the Semantic Typology Point of View

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Анна Александровна Смирнитская

2016-12-01

Full Text Available In this article the author examines the lexical-semantic group “kinship terms” in Tamil, applying the attainments of modern semantic typology and the theory of semantic derivation. The kinship terms describing nuclear and extended family are explored. The “semantic shift” relation between two different meanings is established if such relation is realized by synchronous polysemy in one lexeme, semantic derivation, diachronic semantic change, cognates or some other means. The starting point of the study is the typological data from the DatSemShift catalogue of semantic shifts in languages of the world developed by a group of researchers under the guidance of Anna A. Zalizniak in the Institute of Linguistics, RAS. We verify the presence of semantic shifts described in the Database in Tamil. Also, we propose new semantic shifts specific only for this language. We confirm the presence of semantic relation of the studied type among the meanings with English “labels”: father - parents, girl - daughter, to deliver (a child - parents, - child, old woman - wife, owner - wife and others. The data also allows the assumption that the same relation exists between the meanings: old - grandfather, earth - mother, son - courage, unripe - son and others. The meanings of this field are the sources of semantic movements to abstract notions, lexicon of posession, forms of address and others; in addition many inner semantic relations inside this field are revealed. The meanings covering the nuclear part of the kinship system participate in universal semantic shifts described in the DatSemShift catalogue, while the meanings from collateral branches of this bifurcative kinship system (uncle, aunt turn out to be incomparable with kinship terms from indo-european lineal systems. Their meanings can be included in the DatSemShift catalogue only with an indication of system specifics. The information about semantic shifts can be useful for

Semantic Role Labeling

CERN Document Server

Palmer, Martha; Xue, Nianwen

2011-01-01

This book is aimed at providing an overview of several aspects of semantic role labeling. Chapter 1 begins with linguistic background on the definition of semantic roles and the controversies surrounding them. Chapter 2 describes how the theories have led to structured lexicons such as FrameNet, VerbNet and the PropBank Frame Files that in turn provide the basis for large scale semantic annotation of corpora. This data has facilitated the development of automatic semantic role labeling systems based on supervised machine learning techniques. Chapter 3 presents the general principles of applyin

Representations for Semantic Learning Webs: Semantic Web Technology in Learning Support

Science.gov (United States)

Dzbor, M.; Stutt, A.; Motta, E.; Collins, T.

2007-01-01

Recent work on applying semantic technologies to learning has concentrated on providing novel means of accessing and making use of learning objects. However, this is unnecessarily limiting: semantic technologies will make it possible to develop a range of educational Semantic Web services, such as interpretation, structure-visualization, support…

UML 2 Semantics and Applications

CERN Document Server

Lano, Kevin

2009-01-01

A coherent and integrated account of the leading UML 2 semantics work and the practical applications of UML semantics development With contributions from leading experts in the field, the book begins with an introduction to UML and goes on to offer in-depth and up-to-date coverage of: The role of semantics Considerations and rationale for a UML system model Definition of the UML system model UML descriptive semantics Axiomatic semantics of UML class diagrams The object constraint language Axiomatic semantics of state machines A coalgebraic semantic framework for reasoning about interaction des

Assessing explicit error reporting in the narrative electronic medical record using keyword searching.

Science.gov (United States)

Cao, Hui; Stetson, Peter; Hripcsak, George

2003-01-01

Many types of medical errors occur in and outside of hospitals, some of which have very serious consequences and increase cost. Identifying errors is a critical step for managing and preventing them. In this study, we assessed the explicit reporting of medical errors in the electronic record. We used five search terms "mistake," "error," "incorrect," "inadvertent," and "iatrogenic" to survey several sets of narrative reports including discharge summaries, sign-out notes, and outpatient notes from 1991 to 2000. We manually reviewed all the positive cases and identified them based on the reporting of physicians. We identified 222 explicitly reported medical errors. The positive predictive value varied with different keywords. In general, the positive predictive value for each keyword was low, ranging from 3.4 to 24.4%. Therapeutic-related errors were the most common reported errors and these reported therapeutic-related errors were mainly medication errors. Keyword searches combined with manual review indicated some medical errors that were reported in medical records. It had a low sensitivity and a moderate positive predictive value, which varied by search term. Physicians were most likely to record errors in the Hospital Course and History of Present Illness sections of discharge summaries. The reported errors in medical records covered a broad range and were related to several types of care providers as well as non-health care professionals.

Errorful and errorless learning: The impact of cue-target constraint in learning from errors.

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Bridger, Emma K; Mecklinger, Axel

2014-08-01

The benefits of testing on learning are well described, and attention has recently turned to what happens when errors are elicited during learning: Is testing nonetheless beneficial, or can errors hinder learning? Whilst recent findings have indicated that tests boost learning even if errors are made on every trial, other reports, emphasizing the benefits of errorless learning, have indicated that errors lead to poorer later memory performance. The possibility that this discrepancy is a function of the materials that must be learned-in particular, the relationship between the cues and targets-was addressed here. Cued recall after either a study-only errorless condition or an errorful learning condition was contrasted across cue-target associations, for which the extent to which the target was constrained by the cue was either high or low. Experiment 1 showed that whereas errorful learning led to greater recall for low-constraint stimuli, it led to a significant decrease in recall for high-constraint stimuli. This interaction is thought to reflect the extent to which retrieval is constrained by the cue-target association, as well as by the presence of preexisting semantic associations. The advantage of errorful retrieval for low-constraint stimuli was replicated in Experiment 2, and the interaction with stimulus type was replicated in Experiment 3, even when guesses were randomly designated as being either correct or incorrect. This pattern provides support for inferences derived from reports in which participants made errors on all learning trials, whilst highlighting the impact of material characteristics on the benefits and disadvantages that accrue from errorful learning in episodic memory.

Methods of Run-Time Error Detection in Distributed Process Control Software

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Drejer, N.

of generic run-time error types, design of methods of observing application software behaviorduring execution and design of methods of evaluating run time constraints. In the definition of error types it is attempted to cover all relevant aspects of the application softwaree behavior. Methods of observation......In this thesis, methods of run-time error detection in application software for distributed process control is designed. The error detection is based upon a monitoring approach in which application software is monitored by system software during the entire execution. The thesis includes definition...... and constraint evaluation is designed for the modt interesting error types. These include: a) semantical errors in data communicated between application tasks; b) errors in the execution of application tasks; and c) errors in the timing of distributed events emitted by the application software. The design...

The structure of semantic person memory: evidence from semantic priming in person recognition.

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Wiese, Holger

2011-11-01

This paper reviews research on the structure of semantic person memory as examined with semantic priming. In this experimental paradigm, a familiarity decision on a target face or written name is usually faster when it is preceded by a related as compared to an unrelated prime. This effect has been shown to be relatively short lived and susceptible to interfering items. Moreover, semantic priming can cross stimulus domains, such that a written name can prime a target face and vice versa. However, it remains controversial whether representations of people are stored in associative networks based on co-occurrence, or in more abstract semantic categories. In line with prominent cognitive models of face recognition, which explain semantic priming by shared semantic information between prime and target, recent research demonstrated that priming could be obtained from purely categorically related, non-associated prime/target pairs. Although strategic processes, such as expectancy and retrospective matching likely contribute, there is also evidence for a non-strategic contribution to priming, presumably related to spreading activation. Finally, a semantic priming effect has been demonstrated in the N400 event-related potential (ERP) component, which may reflect facilitated access to semantic information. It is concluded that categorical relatedness is one organizing principle of semantic person memory. ©2011 The British Psychological Society.

Meinongian Semantics and Artificial Intelligence

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William J. Rapaport

2013-12-01

Full Text Available This essay describes computational semantic networks for a philosophical audience and surveys several approaches to semantic-network semantics. In particular, propositional semantic networks (exemplified by SNePS are discussed; it is argued that only a fully intensional, Meinongian semantics is appropriate for them; and several Meinongian systems are presented.

A Semantic Web-based System for Mining Genetic Mutations in Cancer Clinical Trials.

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Priya, Sambhawa; Jiang, Guoqian; Dasari, Surendra; Zimmermann, Michael T; Wang, Chen; Heflin, Jeff; Chute, Christopher G

2015-01-01

Textual eligibility criteria in clinical trial protocols contain important information about potential clinically relevant pharmacogenomic events. Manual curation for harvesting this evidence is intractable as it is error prone and time consuming. In this paper, we develop and evaluate a Semantic Web-based system that captures and manages mutation evidences and related contextual information from cancer clinical trials. The system has 2 main components: an NLP-based annotator and a Semantic Web ontology-based annotation manager. We evaluated the performance of the annotator in terms of precision and recall. We demonstrated the usefulness of the system by conducting case studies in retrieving relevant clinical trials using a collection of mutations identified from TCGA Leukemia patients and Atlas of Genetics and Cytogenetics in Oncology and Haematology. In conclusion, our system using Semantic Web technologies provides an effective framework for extraction, annotation, standardization and management of genetic mutations in cancer clinical trials.

A Case of Transfusion Error in a Trauma Patient With Subsequent Root Cause Analysis Leading to Institutional Change.

Science.gov (United States)

Clifford, Sean Patrick; Mick, Paul Brian; Derhake, Brian Matthew

2016-01-01

A 28-year-old man presented emergently to the operating room following a gun-shot injury to his right groin. Our hospital's Massive Transfusion Protocol was initiated as the patient entered the operating room actively hemorrhaging and severely hypotensive. During the aggressive resuscitation efforts, the patient was inadvertently transfused 2 units of packed red blood cells intended for another patient due to a series of errors. Fortunately, the incorrect product was compatible, and the patient recovered from his near-fatal injuries. Root cause analysis was used to review the transfusion error and develop an action plan to help prevent future occurrences.

Geospatial Semantics and the Semantic Web

CERN Document Server

Ashish, Naveen

2011-01-01

The availability of geographic and geospatial information and services, especially on the open Web has become abundant in the last several years with the proliferation of online maps, geo-coding services, geospatial Web services and geospatially enabled applications. The need for geospatial reasoning has significantly increased in many everyday applications including personal digital assistants, Web search applications, local aware mobile services, specialized systems for emergency response, medical triaging, intelligence analysis and more. Geospatial Semantics and the Semantic Web: Foundation

Evaluation of SPACE code for simulation of inadvertent opening of spray valve in Shin Kori unit 1

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Kim, Seyun; Youn, Bumsoo

2013-01-01

SPACE code is expected to be applied to the safety analysis for LOCA (Loss of Coolant Accident) and Non-LOCA scenarios. SPACE code solves two-fluid, three-field governing equations and programmed with C++ computer language using object-oriented concepts. To evaluate the analysis capability for the transient phenomena in the actual nuclear power plant, an inadvertent opening of spray valve in startup test phase of Shin Kori unit 1 was simulated with SPACE code. To evaluate the analysis capability for the transient phenomena in the actual nuclear power plant, an inadvertent opening of spray valve in startup test phase of Shin Kori unit 1 was simulated with SPACE code

The uptake of radionuclides from inadvertent consumption of soil by grazing animals

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Green, N.; Dodd, N.J.

1988-01-01

Investigations of the transfer to man of artificially-produced radionuclides through food chains have shown that the inadvertent consumption of soil by grazing animals can give variations in estimates of transfer coefficients, especially for radionuclides that are poorly absorbed by plant roots. Even small masses of soil adhering to herbage or directly ingested can make a significant contribution to the intake inventory in terms of activity. Although the activity concentrations of soil-contaminated herbage are elevated, the radionuclides associated with the soil may not necessarily be in a form which is easily absorbed by the animal. Attempts must be made, therefore, to quantify soil intake and the subsequent radionuclide uptake by this mechanism. A field investigation of the uptake of radionuclides by farm animals grazing near the Sellafield nuclear reprocessing plant has been pursued. The aims of the study were to estimate the transfer to muscle and other tissues. This paper describes the methods used to estimate both the soil intake and the consequent availability of radionuclides associated with the soil. The measurements were used to evaluate the contribution to tissue content of inadvertent consumption of soil by cows and sheep. 10 refs.; 2 tabs

「言い誤り」(speech errors)の傾向に関する考察(IV)

OpenAIRE

伊藤, 克敏; Ito, Katsutoshi

2007-01-01

This is the fourth in a series (1988, 1992, 1999) of my research on the tendencies of speech errors committed by adults. Collected speech errors were analyzed on phonological, morphological, syntactic and semantic levels. Similarities and differences between adult and child speech errors were discussed. It was pointed out that the typology of speech errors can be established by comparative study of adult speech errors, developing child language, aphasic speech and speech of senile dementia.

Unit of measurement used and parent medication dosing errors.

Science.gov (United States)

Yin, H Shonna; Dreyer, Benard P; Ugboaja, Donna C; Sanchez, Dayana C; Paul, Ian M; Moreira, Hannah A; Rodriguez, Luis; Mendelsohn, Alan L

2014-08-01

Adopting the milliliter as the preferred unit of measurement has been suggested as a strategy to improve the clarity of medication instructions; teaspoon and tablespoon units may inadvertently endorse nonstandard kitchen spoon use. We examined the association between unit used and parent medication errors and whether nonstandard instruments mediate this relationship. Cross-sectional analysis of baseline data from a larger study of provider communication and medication errors. English- or Spanish-speaking parents (n = 287) whose children were prescribed liquid medications in 2 emergency departments were enrolled. Medication error defined as: error in knowledge of prescribed dose, error in observed dose measurement (compared to intended or prescribed dose); >20% deviation threshold for error. Multiple logistic regression performed adjusting for parent age, language, country, race/ethnicity, socioeconomic status, education, health literacy (Short Test of Functional Health Literacy in Adults); child age, chronic disease; site. Medication errors were common: 39.4% of parents made an error in measurement of the intended dose, 41.1% made an error in the prescribed dose. Furthermore, 16.7% used a nonstandard instrument. Compared with parents who used milliliter-only, parents who used teaspoon or tablespoon units had twice the odds of making an error with the intended (42.5% vs 27.6%, P = .02; adjusted odds ratio=2.3; 95% confidence interval, 1.2-4.4) and prescribed (45.1% vs 31.4%, P = .04; adjusted odds ratio=1.9; 95% confidence interval, 1.03-3.5) dose; associations greater for parents with low health literacy and non-English speakers. Nonstandard instrument use partially mediated teaspoon and tablespoon-associated measurement errors. Findings support a milliliter-only standard to reduce medication errors. Copyright © 2014 by the American Academy of Pediatrics.

Verbal and non-verbal semantic impairment: From fluent primary progressive aphasia to semantic dementia

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Mirna Lie Hosogi Senaha

Full Text Available Abstract Selective disturbances of semantic memory have attracted the interest of many investigators and the question of the existence of single or multiple semantic systems remains a very controversial theme in the literature. Objectives: To discuss the question of multiple semantic systems based on a longitudinal study of a patient who presented semantic dementia from fluent primary progressive aphasia. Methods: A 66 year-old woman with selective impairment of semantic memory was examined on two occasions, undergoing neuropsychological and language evaluations, the results of which were compared to those of three paired control individuals. Results: In the first evaluation, physical examination was normal and the score on the Mini-Mental State Examination was 26. Language evaluation revealed fluent speech, anomia, disturbance in word comprehension, preservation of the syntactic and phonological aspects of the language, besides surface dyslexia and dysgraphia. Autobiographical and episodic memories were relatively preserved. In semantic memory tests, the following dissociation was found: disturbance of verbal semantic memory with preservation of non-verbal semantic memory. Magnetic resonance of the brain revealed marked atrophy of the left anterior temporal lobe. After 14 months, the difficulties in verbal semantic memory had become more severe and the semantic disturbance, limited initially to the linguistic sphere, had worsened to involve non-verbal domains. Conclusions: Given the dissociation found in the first examination, we believe there is sufficient clinical evidence to refute the existence of a unitary semantic system.

Montague semantics

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Janssen, T.M.V.

2012-01-01

Montague semantics is a theory of natural language semantics and of its relation with syntax. It was originally developed by the logician Richard Montague (1930-1971) and subsequently modified and extended by linguists, philosophers, and logicians. The most important features of the theory are its

From Data to Semantic Information

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Luciano Floridi

2003-06-01

Full Text Available Abstract: There is no consensus yet on the definition of semantic information. This paper contributes to the current debate by criticising and revising the Standard Definition of semantic Information (SDI as meaningful data, in favour of the Dretske-Grice approach: meaningful and well-formed data constitute semantic information only if they also qualify as contingently truthful. After a brief introduction, SDI is criticised for providing necessary but insufficient conditions for the definition of semantic information. SDI is incorrect because truth-values do not supervene on semantic information, and misinformation (that is, false semantic information is not a type of semantic information, but pseudo-information, that is not semantic information at all. This is shown by arguing that none of the reasons for interpreting misinformation as a type of semantic information is convincing, whilst there are compelling reasons to treat it as pseudo-information. As a consequence, SDI is revised to include a necessary truth-condition. The last section summarises the main results of the paper and indicates the important implications of the revised definition for the analysis of the deflationary theories of truth, the standard definition of knowledge and the classic, quantitative theory of semantic information.

Foundations of semantic web technologies

CERN Document Server

Hitzler, Pascal; Rudolph, Sebastian

2009-01-01

The Quest for Semantics Building Models Calculating with Knowledge Exchanging Information Semanic Web Technologies RESOURCE DESCRIPTION LANGUAGE (RDF)Simple Ontologies in RDF and RDF SchemaIntroduction to RDF Syntax for RDF Advanced Features Simple Ontologies in RDF Schema Encoding of Special Data Structures An ExampleRDF Formal Semantics Why Semantics? Model-Theoretic Semantics for RDF(S) Syntactic Reasoning with Deduction Rules The Semantic Limits of RDF(S)WEB ONTOLOGY LANGUAGE (OWL) Ontologies in OWL OWL Syntax and Intuitive Semantics OWL Species The Forthcoming OWL 2 StandardOWL Formal Sem

Rational integration of noisy evidence and prior semantic expectations in sentence interpretation.

Science.gov (United States)

Gibson, Edward; Bergen, Leon; Piantadosi, Steven T

2013-05-14

Sentence processing theories typically assume that the input to our language processing mechanisms is an error-free sequence of words. However, this assumption is an oversimplification because noise is present in typical language use (for instance, due to a noisy environment, producer errors, or perceiver errors). A complete theory of human sentence comprehension therefore needs to explain how humans understand language given imperfect input. Indeed, like many cognitive systems, language processing mechanisms may even be "well designed"--in this case for the task of recovering intended meaning from noisy utterances. In particular, comprehension mechanisms may be sensitive to the types of information that an idealized statistical comprehender would be sensitive to. Here, we evaluate four predictions about such a rational (Bayesian) noisy-channel language comprehender in a sentence comprehension task: (i) semantic cues should pull sentence interpretation towards plausible meanings, especially if the wording of the more plausible meaning is close to the observed utterance in terms of the number of edits; (ii) this process should asymmetrically treat insertions and deletions due to the Bayesian "size principle"; such nonliteral interpretation of sentences should (iii) increase with the perceived noise rate of the communicative situation and (iv) decrease if semantically anomalous meanings are more likely to be communicated. These predictions are borne out, strongly suggesting that human language relies on rational statistical inference over a noisy channel.

Basic semantics of product sounds

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Özcan Vieira, E.; Van Egmond, R.

2012-01-01

Product experience is a result of sensory and semantic experiences with product properties. In this paper, we focus on the semantic attributes of product sounds and explore the basic components for product sound related semantics using a semantic differential paradigmand factor analysis. With two

Retrieval from semantic memory.

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Noordman-Vonk, Wietske

1977-01-01

The present study has been concerned with the retrieval of semantic information. Retrieving semantic information is a fundamental process in almost any kind of cognitive behavior. The introduction presented the main experimental paradigms and results found in the literature on semantic memory as

Towards Universal Semantic Tagging

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Abzianidze, Lasha; Bos, Johan

2017-01-01

The paper proposes the task of universal semantic tagging---tagging word tokens with language-neutral, semantically informative tags. We argue that the task, with its independent nature, contributes to better semantic analysis for wide-coverage multilingual text. We present the initial version of

Process-oriented semantic web search

CERN Document Server

Tran, DT

2011-01-01

The book is composed of two main parts. The first part is a general study of Semantic Web Search. The second part specifically focuses on the use of semantics throughout the search process, compiling a big picture of Process-oriented Semantic Web Search from different pieces of work that target specific aspects of the process.In particular, this book provides a rigorous account of the concepts and technologies proposed for searching resources and semantic data on the Semantic Web. To collate the various approaches and to better understand what the notion of Semantic Web Search entails, this bo

Semantic SenseLab: Implementing the vision of the Semantic Web in neuroscience.

Science.gov (United States)

Samwald, Matthias; Chen, Huajun; Ruttenberg, Alan; Lim, Ernest; Marenco, Luis; Miller, Perry; Shepherd, Gordon; Cheung, Kei-Hoi

2010-01-01

Integrative neuroscience research needs a scalable informatics framework that enables semantic integration of diverse types of neuroscience data. This paper describes the use of the Web Ontology Language (OWL) and other Semantic Web technologies for the representation and integration of molecular-level data provided by several of SenseLab suite of neuroscience databases. Based on the original database structure, we semi-automatically translated the databases into OWL ontologies with manual addition of semantic enrichment. The SenseLab ontologies are extensively linked to other biomedical Semantic Web resources, including the Subcellular Anatomy Ontology, Brain Architecture Management System, the Gene Ontology, BIRNLex and UniProt. The SenseLab ontologies have also been mapped to the Basic Formal Ontology and Relation Ontology, which helps ease interoperability with many other existing and future biomedical ontologies for the Semantic Web. In addition, approaches to representing contradictory research statements are described. The SenseLab ontologies are designed for use on the Semantic Web that enables their integration into a growing collection of biomedical information resources. We demonstrate that our approach can yield significant potential benefits and that the Semantic Web is rapidly becoming mature enough to realize its anticipated promises. The ontologies are available online at http://neuroweb.med.yale.edu/senselab/. 2009 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

The paca that roared: Immediate cumulative semantic interference among newly acquired words.

Science.gov (United States)

Oppenheim, Gary M

2018-08-01

With 40,000 words in the average vocabulary, how can speakers find the specific words that they want so quickly and easily? Cumulative semantic interference in language production provides a clue: when naming a large series of pictures, with a few mammals sprinkled about, naming each subsequent mammal becomes slower and more error-prone. Such interference mirrors predictions from an incremental learning algorithm applied to meaning-driven retrieval from an established vocabulary, suggesting retrieval benefits from a constant, implicit, re-optimization process (Oppenheim et al., 2010). But how quickly would a new mammal (e.g. paca) engage in this re-optimization? In this experiment, 18 participants studied 3 novel and 3 familiar exemplars from each of six semantic categories, and immediately performed a timed picture-naming task. Consistent with the learning model's predictions, naming latencies revealed immediate cumulative semantic interference in all directions: from new words to new words, from new words to old words, from old words to new words, and from old words to old words. Repeating the procedure several days later produced similar-magnitude effects, demonstrating that newly acquired words can be immediately semantically integrated, at least to the extent necessary to produce typical cumulative semantic interference. These findings extend the Dark Side model's scope to include novel word production, and are considered in terms of mechanisms for lexical selection. Copyright © 2018 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

Considering the role of semantic memory in episodic future thinking: evidence from semantic dementia.

Science.gov (United States)

Irish, Muireann; Addis, Donna Rose; Hodges, John R; Piguet, Olivier

2012-07-01

Semantic dementia is a progressive neurodegenerative condition characterized by the profound and amodal loss of semantic memory in the context of relatively preserved episodic memory. In contrast, patients with Alzheimer's disease typically display impairments in episodic memory, but with semantic deficits of a much lesser magnitude than in semantic dementia. Our understanding of episodic memory retrieval in these cohorts has greatly increased over the last decade, however, we know relatively little regarding the ability of these patients to imagine and describe possible future events, and whether episodic future thinking is mediated by divergent neural substrates contingent on dementia subtype. Here, we explored episodic future thinking in patients with semantic dementia (n=11) and Alzheimer's disease (n=11), in comparison with healthy control participants (n=10). Participants completed a battery of tests designed to probe episodic and semantic thinking across past and future conditions, as well as standardized tests of episodic and semantic memory. Further, all participants underwent magnetic resonance imaging. Despite their relatively intact episodic retrieval for recent past events, the semantic dementia cohort showed significant impairments for episodic future thinking. In contrast, the group with Alzheimer's disease showed parallel deficits across past and future episodic conditions. Voxel-based morphometry analyses confirmed that atrophy in the left inferior temporal gyrus and bilateral temporal poles, regions strongly implicated in semantic memory, correlated significantly with deficits in episodic future thinking in semantic dementia. Conversely, episodic future thinking performance in Alzheimer's disease correlated with atrophy in regions associated with episodic memory, namely the posterior cingulate, parahippocampal gyrus and frontal pole. These distinct neuroanatomical substrates contingent on dementia group were further qualified by correlational

High Performance Descriptive Semantic Analysis of Semantic Graph Databases

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Joslyn, Cliff A.; Adolf, Robert D.; al-Saffar, Sinan; Feo, John T.; Haglin, David J.; Mackey, Greg E.; Mizell, David W.

2011-06-02

As semantic graph database technology grows to address components ranging from extant large triple stores to SPARQL endpoints over SQL-structured relational databases, it will become increasingly important to be able to understand their inherent semantic structure, whether codified in explicit ontologies or not. Our group is researching novel methods for what we call descriptive semantic analysis of RDF triplestores, to serve purposes of analysis, interpretation, visualization, and optimization. But data size and computational complexity makes it increasingly necessary to bring high performance computational resources to bear on this task. Our research group built a novel high performance hybrid system comprising computational capability for semantic graph database processing utilizing the large multi-threaded architecture of the Cray XMT platform, conventional servers, and large data stores. In this paper we describe that architecture and our methods, and present the results of our analyses of basic properties, connected components, namespace interaction, and typed paths such for the Billion Triple Challenge 2010 dataset.

A Defense of Semantic Minimalism

Science.gov (United States)

Kim, Su

2012-01-01

Semantic Minimalism is a position about the semantic content of declarative sentences, i.e., the content that is determined entirely by syntax. It is defined by the following two points: "Point 1": The semantic content is a complete/truth-conditional proposition. "Point 2": The semantic content is useful to a theory of…

A Case of Transfusion Error in a Trauma Patient With Subsequent Root Cause Analysis Leading to Institutional Change

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Sean Patrick Clifford MD

2016-05-01

Full Text Available A 28-year-old man presented emergently to the operating room following a gun-shot injury to his right groin. Our hospital’s Massive Transfusion Protocol was initiated as the patient entered the operating room actively hemorrhaging and severely hypotensive. During the aggressive resuscitation efforts, the patient was inadvertently transfused 2 units of packed red blood cells intended for another patient due to a series of errors. Fortunately, the incorrect product was compatible, and the patient recovered from his near-fatal injuries. Root cause analysis was used to review the transfusion error and develop an action plan to help prevent future occurrences.

Explaining Chinese Learners’ Errors in the Phonological Representations of Latinate Derivatives in English: A Psycholinguistic Perspective

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Siok H. Lee

2002-06-01

Full Text Available Abstract Investigations of ESL pronunciation have focused on segments, syllable structure and prosody. This study examines the phonological representations of English Latinate derivatives of 32 Cantonese speakers and 32 native speakers (NS from the perspectives of morphophonemics and word association. The subjects (Grade 12 performed tests on listening, pronunciation and semantic rating of word pairs. The results confirmed the hypothesis that in the absence of analogous morphological and morphophonemic features in the L1, base-word pronunciation was the dominant error type for both learners and the NS subjects. As both groups showed comparable rates of recognition of the semantic association between morphologically related words, this recognition seems to account for the dominant error type of both ESL and NS groups.

Recommendations to avoid gross errors of dose in radiotherapeutic treatments

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Souza, Cleber Nogueira de; Monti, Carlos Roberto; Sibata, Claudio Hissao

2001-01-01

Human mistakes are an important source of errors in radiotherapy and may occur at every step of the radiotherapy planning and treatment. To reduce this level of uncertainties, several specialized organizations have recommended a comprehensive quality assurance program. In Brazil, the requirement for these programs has been strongly stressed, and most radiotherapy services have pursued this goal regarding radiation units and dosimetry equipment, as well as the verification of the calculations of the patient's dose and the revision of the plan charts. As a contribution to the improvement of quality control, we present some recommendations to avoid failure of treatment due to error in the delivered dose, such as redundant check of the manual or computer calculations, weekly check of the total dose for each patient, and prevention of inadvertent access to any safety system of the equipment by any staff member that is only supposed to operate the machine. Moreover, the use of a computerized treatment record and verification system should be considered in order to eliminate errors due to incorrect selection of the treatment parameters, in a daily basis. We report four radioactive incidents with patient injuries occurred throughout the world and some gross errors of dose. (author)

Subliminal semantic priming in speech.

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Jérôme Daltrozzo

Full Text Available Numerous studies have reported subliminal repetition and semantic priming in the visual modality. We transferred this paradigm to the auditory modality. Prime awareness was manipulated by a reduction of sound intensity level. Uncategorized prime words (according to a post-test were followed by semantically related, unrelated, or repeated target words (presented without intensity reduction and participants performed a lexical decision task (LDT. Participants with slower reaction times in the LDT showed semantic priming (faster reaction times for semantically related compared to unrelated targets and negative repetition priming (slower reaction times for repeated compared to semantically related targets. This is the first report of semantic priming in the auditory modality without conscious categorization of the prime.

Open semantic analysis: The case of word level semantics in Danish

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Nielsen, Finn Årup; Hansen, Lars Kai

2017-01-01

The present research is motivated by the need for accessible and efficient tools for automated semantic analysis in Danish. We are interested in tools that are completely open, so they can be used by a critical public, in public administration, non-governmental organizations and businesses. We...... describe data-driven models for Danish semantic relatedness, word intrusion and sentiment prediction. Open Danish corpora were assembled and unsupervised learning implemented for explicit semantic analysis and with Gensim’s Word2vec model. We evaluate the performance of the two models on three different...... annotated word datasets. We test the semantic representations’ alignment with single word sentiment using supervised learning. We find that logistic regression and large random forests perform well with Word2vec features....

Applied Semantic Web Technologies

CERN Document Server

Sugumaran, Vijayan

2011-01-01

The rapid advancement of semantic web technologies, along with the fact that they are at various levels of maturity, has left many practitioners confused about the current state of these technologies. Focusing on the most mature technologies, Applied Semantic Web Technologies integrates theory with case studies to illustrate the history, current state, and future direction of the semantic web. It maintains an emphasis on real-world applications and examines the technical and practical issues related to the use of semantic technologies in intelligent information management. The book starts with

TH-B-BRC-01: How to Identify and Resolve Potential Clinical Errors

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Das, I. [NYU Langone Medical Center, New York, NY (United States)

2016-06-15

Radiation treatment consists of a chain of events influenced by the quality of machine operation, beam data commissioning, machine calibration, patient specific data, simulation, treatment planning, imaging and treatment delivery. There is always a chance that the clinical medical physicist may make or fail to detect an error in one of the events that may impact on the patient’s treatment. In the clinical scenario, errors may be systematic and, without peer review, may have a low detectability because they are not part of routine QA procedures. During treatment, there might be errors on machine that needs attention. External reviews of some of the treatment delivery components by independent reviewers, like IROC, can detect errors, but may not be timely. The goal of this session is to help junior clinical physicists identify potential errors as well as the approach of quality assurance to perform a root cause analysis to find and eliminate an error and to continually monitor for errors. A compilation of potential errors will be presented by examples of the thought process required to spot the error and determine the root cause. Examples may include unusual machine operation, erratic electrometer reading, consistent lower electron output, variation in photon output, body parts inadvertently left in beam, unusual treatment plan, poor normalization, hot spots etc. Awareness of the possibility and detection of error in any link of the treatment process chain will help improve the safe and accurate delivery of radiation to patients. Four experts will discuss how to identify errors in four areas of clinical treatment. D. Followill, NIH grant CA 180803.

TH-B-BRC-01: How to Identify and Resolve Potential Clinical Errors

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Das, I.

2016-01-01

Radiation treatment consists of a chain of events influenced by the quality of machine operation, beam data commissioning, machine calibration, patient specific data, simulation, treatment planning, imaging and treatment delivery. There is always a chance that the clinical medical physicist may make or fail to detect an error in one of the events that may impact on the patient’s treatment. In the clinical scenario, errors may be systematic and, without peer review, may have a low detectability because they are not part of routine QA procedures. During treatment, there might be errors on machine that needs attention. External reviews of some of the treatment delivery components by independent reviewers, like IROC, can detect errors, but may not be timely. The goal of this session is to help junior clinical physicists identify potential errors as well as the approach of quality assurance to perform a root cause analysis to find and eliminate an error and to continually monitor for errors. A compilation of potential errors will be presented by examples of the thought process required to spot the error and determine the root cause. Examples may include unusual machine operation, erratic electrometer reading, consistent lower electron output, variation in photon output, body parts inadvertently left in beam, unusual treatment plan, poor normalization, hot spots etc. Awareness of the possibility and detection of error in any link of the treatment process chain will help improve the safe and accurate delivery of radiation to patients. Four experts will discuss how to identify errors in four areas of clinical treatment. D. Followill, NIH grant CA 180803

Inadvertent Splenectomy During Resection for Colorectal Cancer Does Not Increase Long-term Mortality in a Propensity Score Model: A Nationwide Cohort Study.

Science.gov (United States)

Lolle, Ida; Pommergaard, Hans-Christian; Schefte, David F; Bulut, Orhan; Krarup, Peter-Martin; Rosenstock, Steffen J

2016-12-01

Previous studies suggest that long-term mortality is increased in patients who undergo splenectomy during surgery for colorectal cancer. The reason for this association remains unclear. The purpose of this study was to investigate the association between inadvertent splenectomy attributed to iatrogenic lesion to the spleen during colorectal cancer resections and long-term mortality in a national cohort of unselected patients. This was a retrospective, nationwide cohort study. Data were collected from the database of the Danish Colorectal Cancer Group and merged with data from the National Patient Registry and the National Pathology Databank. Danish patients with colorectal cancer undergoing curatively intended resection between 2001 and 2011 were included in the study. The primary outcome was long-term mortality for patients surviving 30 days after surgery. Secondary outcomes were 30-day mortality and risk factors for inadvertent splenectomy. Multivariable and propensity-score matched Cox regression analyses were used to adjust for potential confounding. In total, 23,727 patients were included, of which 277 (1.2%) underwent inadvertent splenectomy. There was no association between inadvertent splenectomy and long-term mortality (adjusted HR = 1.15 (95% CI, 0.95-1.40); p = 0.16) in the propensity score-matched model, whereas 30-day mortality was significantly increased (adjusted HR = 2.31 (95% CI, 1.71-3.11); p splenectomy was most often seen during left hemicolectomy (left hemicolectomy vs right hemicolectomy: OR = 24.76 (95% CI, 15.30-40.06); p splenectomy during resection for colorectal cancer does not seem to increase long-term mortality. The previously reported reduced overall survival after inadvertent splenectomy may be explained by excess mortality in the immediate postoperative period.

Adventures in semantic publishing: exemplar semantic enhancements of a research article.

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

David Shotton

2009-04-01

Full Text Available Scientific innovation depends on finding, integrating, and re-using the products of previous research. Here we explore how recent developments in Web technology, particularly those related to the publication of data and metadata, might assist that process by providing semantic enhancements to journal articles within the mainstream process of scholarly journal publishing. We exemplify this by describing semantic enhancements we have made to a recent biomedical research article taken from PLoS Neglected Tropical Diseases, providing enrichment to its content and increased access to datasets within it. These semantic enhancements include provision of live DOIs and hyperlinks; semantic markup of textual terms, with links to relevant third-party information resources; interactive figures; a re-orderable reference list; a document summary containing a study summary, a tag cloud, and a citation analysis; and two novel types of semantic enrichment: the first, a Supporting Claims Tooltip to permit "Citations in Context", and the second, Tag Trees that bring together semantically related terms. In addition, we have published downloadable spreadsheets containing data from within tables and figures, have enriched these with provenance information, and have demonstrated various types of data fusion (mashups with results from other research articles and with Google Maps. We have also published machine-readable RDF metadata both about the article and about the references it cites, for which we developed a Citation Typing Ontology, CiTO (http://purl.org/net/cito/. The enhanced article, which is available at http://dx.doi.org/10.1371/journal.pntd.0000228.x001, presents a compelling existence proof of the possibilities of semantic publication. We hope the showcase of examples and ideas it contains, described in this paper, will excite the imaginations of researchers and publishers, stimulating them to explore the possibilities of semantic publishing for their own

Pascal Semantics by a Combination of Denotational Semantics and High-level Petri Nets

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Jensen, Kurt; Schmidt, Erik Meineche

1986-01-01

This paper describes the formal semantics of a subset of PASCAL, by means of a semantic model based on a combination of denotational semantics and high-level Petri nets. It is our intention that the paper can be used as part of the written material for an introductory course in computer science....

Semantic Data Matching: Principles and Performance

Science.gov (United States)

Deaton, Russell; Doan, Thao; Schweiger, Tom

Automated and real-time management of customer relationships requires robust and intelligent data matching across widespread and diverse data sources. Simple string matching algorithms, such as dynamic programming, can handle typographical errors in the data, but are less able to match records that require contextual and experiential knowledge. Latent Semantic Indexing (LSI) (Berry et al. ; Deerwester et al. is a machine intelligence technique that can match data based upon higher order structure, and is able to handle difficult problems, such as words that have different meanings but the same spelling, are synonymous, or have multiple meanings. Essentially, the technique matches records based upon context, or mathematically quantifying when terms occur in the same record.

Reactive Kripke semantics

CERN Document Server

Gabbay, Dov M

2013-01-01

This text offers an extension to the traditional Kripke semantics for non-classical logics by adding the notion of reactivity. Reactive Kripke models change their accessibility relation as we progress in the evaluation process of formulas in the model. This feature makes the reactive Kripke semantics strictly stronger and more applicable than the traditional one. Here we investigate the properties and axiomatisations of this new and most effective semantics, and we offer a wide landscape of applications of the idea of reactivity. Applied topics include reactive automata, reactive grammars, rea

Semantics, contrastive linguistics and parallel corpora

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Violetta Koseska

2014-09-01

Full Text Available Semantics, contrastive linguistics and parallel corpora In view of the ambiguity of the term “semantics”, the author shows the differences between the traditional lexical semantics and the contemporary semantics in the light of various semantic schools. She examines semantics differently in connection with contrastive studies where the description must necessary go from the meaning towards the linguistic form, whereas in traditional contrastive studies the description proceeded from the form towards the meaning. This requirement regarding theoretical contrastive studies necessitates construction of a semantic interlanguage, rather than only singling out universal semantic categories expressed with various language means. Such studies can be strongly supported by parallel corpora. However, in order to make them useful for linguists in manual and computer translations, as well as in the development of dictionaries, including online ones, we need not only formal, often automatic, annotation of texts, but also semantic annotation - which is unfortunately manual. In the article we focus on semantic annotation concerning time, aspect and quantification of names and predicates in the whole semantic structure of the sentence on the example of the “Polish-Bulgarian-Russian parallel corpus”.

Machine Translation as a Model for Overcoming Some Common Errors in English-into-Arabic Translation among EFL University Freshmen

Science.gov (United States)

El-Banna, Adel I.; Naeem, Marwa A.

2016-01-01

This research work aimed at making use of Machine Translation to help students avoid some syntactic, semantic and pragmatic common errors in translation from English into Arabic. Participants were a hundred and five freshmen who studied the "Translation Common Errors Remedial Program" prepared by the researchers. A testing kit that…

Semantic web for dummies

CERN Document Server

Pollock, Jeffrey T

2009-01-01

Semantic Web technology is already changing how we interact with data on the Web. By connecting random information on the Internet in new ways, Web 3.0, as it is sometimes called, represents an exciting online evolution. Whether you're a consumer doing research online, a business owner who wants to offer your customers the most useful Web site, or an IT manager eager to understand Semantic Web solutions, Semantic Web For Dummies is the place to start! It will help you:Know how the typical Internet user will recognize the effects of the Semantic WebExplore all the benefits the data Web offers t

The contribution of executive control to semantic cognition: Convergent evidence from semantic aphasia and executive dysfunction.

Science.gov (United States)

Thompson, Hannah E; Almaghyuli, Azizah; Noonan, Krist A; Barak, Ohr; Lambon Ralph, Matthew A; Jefferies, Elizabeth

2018-01-03

Semantic cognition, as described by the controlled semantic cognition (CSC) framework (Rogers et al., , Neuropsychologia, 76, 220), involves two key components: activation of coherent, generalizable concepts within a heteromodal 'hub' in combination with modality-specific features (spokes), and a constraining mechanism that manipulates and gates this knowledge to generate time- and task-appropriate behaviour. Executive-semantic goal representations, largely supported by executive regions such as frontal and parietal cortex, are thought to allow the generation of non-dominant aspects of knowledge when these are appropriate for the task or context. Semantic aphasia (SA) patients have executive-semantic deficits, and these are correlated with general executive impairment. If the CSC proposal is correct, patients with executive impairment should not only exhibit impaired semantic cognition, but should also show characteristics that align with those observed in SA. This possibility remains largely untested, as patients selected on the basis that they show executive impairment (i.e., with 'dysexecutive syndrome') have not been extensively tested on tasks tapping semantic control and have not been previously compared with SA cases. We explored conceptual processing in 12 patients showing symptoms consistent with dysexecutive syndrome (DYS) and 24 SA patients, using a range of multimodal semantic assessments which manipulated control demands. Patients with executive impairments, despite not being selected to show semantic impairments, nevertheless showed parallel patterns to SA cases. They showed strong effects of distractor strength, cues and miscues, and probe-target distance, plus minimal effects of word frequency on comprehension (unlike semantic dementia patients with degradation of conceptual knowledge). This supports a component process account of semantic cognition in which retrieval is shaped by control processes, and confirms that deficits in SA patients reflect

Putting semantics into the semantic web: how well can it capture biology?

Science.gov (United States)

Kazic, Toni

2006-01-01

Could the Semantic Web work for computations of biological interest in the way it's intended to work for movie reviews and commercial transactions? It would be wonderful if it could, so it's worth looking to see if its infrastructure is adequate to the job. The technologies of the Semantic Web make several crucial assumptions. I examine those assumptions; argue that they create significant problems; and suggest some alternative ways of achieving the Semantic Web's goals for biology.

Enhancement of chemical entity identification in text using semantic similarity validation.

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Tiago Grego

Full Text Available With the amount of chemical data being produced and reported in the literature growing at a fast pace, it is increasingly important to efficiently retrieve this information. To tackle this issue text mining tools have been applied, but despite their good performance they still provide many errors that we believe can be filtered by using semantic similarity. Thus, this paper proposes a novel method that receives the results of chemical entity identification systems, such as Whatizit, and exploits the semantic relationships in ChEBI to measure the similarity between the entities found in the text. The method assigns a single validation score to each entity based on its similarities with the other entities also identified in the text. Then, by using a given threshold, the method selects a set of validated entities and a set of outlier entities. We evaluated our method using the results of two state-of-the-art chemical entity identification tools, three semantic similarity measures and two text window sizes. The method was able to increase precision without filtering a significant number of correctly identified entities. This means that the method can effectively discriminate the correctly identified chemical entities, while discarding a significant number of identification errors. For example, selecting a validation set with 75% of all identified entities, we were able to increase the precision by 28% for one of the chemical entity identification tools (Whatizit, maintaining in that subset 97% the correctly identified entities. Our method can be directly used as an add-on by any state-of-the-art entity identification tool that provides mappings to a database, in order to improve their results. The proposed method is included in a freely accessible web tool at www.lasige.di.fc.ul.pt/webtools/ice/.

Towards Compatible and Interderivable Semantic Specifications for the Scheme Programming Language, Part I: Denotational Semantics, Natural Semantics, and Abstract Machines

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Danvy, Olivier

2008-01-01

We derive two big-step abstract machines, a natural semantics, and the valuation function of a denotational semantics based on the small-step abstract machine for Core Scheme presented by Clinger at PLDI'98. Starting from a functional implementation of this small-step abstract machine, (1) we fuse...... its transition function with its driver loop, obtaining the functional implementation of a big-step abstract machine; (2) we adjust this big-step abstract machine so that it is in defunctionalized form, obtaining the functional implementation of a second big-step abstract machine; (3) we...... refunctionalize this adjusted abstract machine, obtaining the functional implementation of a natural semantics in continuation style; and (4) we closure-unconvert this natural semantics, obtaining a compositional continuation-passing evaluation function which we identify as the functional implementation...

Temporal Representation in Semantic Graphs

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Levandoski, J J; Abdulla, G M

2007-08-07

A wide range of knowledge discovery and analysis applications, ranging from business to biological, make use of semantic graphs when modeling relationships and concepts. Most of the semantic graphs used in these applications are assumed to be static pieces of information, meaning temporal evolution of concepts and relationships are not taken into account. Guided by the need for more advanced semantic graph queries involving temporal concepts, this paper surveys the existing work involving temporal representations in semantic graphs.

Flow Logics and Operational Semantics

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Nielson, Flemming; Nielson, Hanne Riis

1998-01-01

Flow logic is a “fast prototyping” approach to program analysis that shows great promise of being able to deal with a wide variety of languages and calculi for computation. However, seemingly innocent choices in the flow logic as well as in the operational semantics may inhibit proving the analys...... correct. Our main conclusion is that environment based semantics is more flexible than either substitution based semantics or semantics making use of structural congruences (like alpha-renaming)....

Semantic Versus Syntactic Cutting Planes

OpenAIRE

Filmus, Yuval; Hrubeš, Pavel; Lauria, Massimo

2016-01-01

In this paper, we compare the strength of the semantic and syntactic version of the cutting planes proof system. First, we show that the lower bound technique of Pudlák applies also to semantic cutting planes: the proof system has feasible interpolation via monotone real circuits, which gives an exponential lower bound on lengths of semantic cutting planes refutations. Second, we show that semantic refutations are stronger than syntactic ones. In particular, we give a formula for whic...

Semantically Secure Symmetric Encryption with Error Correction for Distributed Storage

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Juha Partala

2017-01-01

Full Text Available A distributed storage system (DSS is a fundamental building block in many distributed applications. It applies linear network coding to achieve an optimal tradeoff between storage and repair bandwidth when node failures occur. Additively homomorphic encryption is compatible with linear network coding. The homomorphic property ensures that a linear combination of ciphertext messages decrypts to the same linear combination of the corresponding plaintext messages. In this paper, we construct a linearly homomorphic symmetric encryption scheme that is designed for a DSS. Our proposal provides simultaneous encryption and error correction by applying linear error correcting codes. We show its IND-CPA security for a limited number of messages based on binary Goppa codes and the following assumption: when dividing a scrambled generator matrix G^ into two parts G1^ and G2^, it is infeasible to distinguish G2^ from random and to find a statistical connection between G1^ and G2^. Our infeasibility assumptions are closely related to those underlying the McEliece public key cryptosystem but are considerably weaker. We believe that the proposed problem has independent cryptographic interest.

Semantic word category processing in semantic dementia and posterior cortical atrophy.

Science.gov (United States)

Shebani, Zubaida; Patterson, Karalyn; Nestor, Peter J; Diaz-de-Grenu, Lara Z; Dawson, Kate; Pulvermüller, Friedemann

2017-08-01

There is general agreement that perisylvian language cortex plays a major role in lexical and semantic processing; but the contribution of additional, more widespread, brain areas in the processing of different semantic word categories remains controversial. We investigated word processing in two groups of patients whose neurodegenerative diseases preferentially affect specific parts of the brain, to determine whether their performance would vary as a function of semantic categories proposed to recruit those brain regions. Cohorts with (i) Semantic Dementia (SD), who have anterior temporal-lobe atrophy, and (ii) Posterior Cortical Atrophy (PCA), who have predominantly parieto-occipital atrophy, performed a lexical decision test on words from five different lexico-semantic categories: colour (e.g., yellow), form (oval), number (seven), spatial prepositions (under) and function words (also). Sets of pseudo-word foils matched the target words in length and bi-/tri-gram frequency. Word-frequency was matched between the two visual word categories (colour and form) and across the three other categories (number, prepositions, and function words). Age-matched healthy individuals served as controls. Although broad word processing deficits were apparent in both patient groups, the deficit was strongest for colour words in SD and for spatial prepositions in PCA. The patterns of performance on the lexical decision task demonstrate (a) general lexicosemantic processing deficits in both groups, though more prominent in SD than in PCA, and (b) differential involvement of anterior-temporal and posterior-parietal cortex in the processing of specific semantic categories of words. Copyright © 2017 The Authors. Published by Elsevier Ltd.. All rights reserved.

Error Analysis for Arithmetic Word Problems--A Case Study of Primary Three Students in One Singapore School

Science.gov (United States)

Cheng, Lu Pien

2015-01-01

In this study, ways in which 9-year old students from one Singapore school solved 1-step and 2-step word problems based on the three semantic structures were examined. The students' work and diagrams provided insights into the range of errors in word problem solving for 1- step and 2-step word problems. In particular, the errors provided some…

Reanalysis and semantic persistence in native and non-native garden-path recovery.

Science.gov (United States)

Jacob, Gunnar; Felser, Claudia

2016-01-01

We report the results from an eye-movement monitoring study investigating how native and non-native speakers of English process temporarily ambiguous sentences such as While the gentleman was eating the burgers were still being reheated in the microwave, in which an initially plausible direct-object analysis is first ruled out by a syntactic disambiguation (were) and also later on by semantic information (being reheated). Both participant groups showed garden-path effects at the syntactic disambiguation, with native speakers showing significantly stronger effects of ambiguity than non-native speakers in later eye-movement measures but equally strong effects in first-pass reading times. Ambiguity effects at the semantic disambiguation and in participants' end-of-trial responses revealed that for both participant groups, the incorrect direct-object analysis was frequently maintained beyond the syntactic disambiguation. The non-native group showed weaker reanalysis effects at the syntactic disambiguation and was more likely to misinterpret the experimental sentences than the native group. Our results suggest that native language (L1) and non-native language (L2) parsing are similar with regard to sensitivity to syntactic and semantic error signals, but different with regard to processes of reanalysis.

SemantEco: a semantically powered modular architecture for integrating distributed environmental and ecological data

Science.gov (United States)

Patton, Evan W.; Seyed, Patrice; Wang, Ping; Fu, Linyun; Dein, F. Joshua; Bristol, R. Sky; McGuinness, Deborah L.

2014-01-01

We aim to inform the development of decision support tools for resource managers who need to examine large complex ecosystems and make recommendations in the face of many tradeoffs and conflicting drivers. We take a semantic technology approach, leveraging background ontologies and the growing body of linked open data. In previous work, we designed and implemented a semantically enabled environmental monitoring framework called SemantEco and used it to build a water quality portal named SemantAqua. Our previous system included foundational ontologies to support environmental regulation violations and relevant human health effects. In this work, we discuss SemantEco’s new architecture that supports modular extensions and makes it easier to support additional domains. Our enhanced framework includes foundational ontologies to support modeling of wildlife observation and wildlife health impacts, thereby enabling deeper and broader support for more holistically examining the effects of environmental pollution on ecosystems. We conclude with a discussion of how, through the application of semantic technologies, modular designs will make it easier for resource managers to bring in new sources of data to support more complex use cases.

Semantic Web Primer

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Antoniou, Grigoris; Harmelen, Frank van

2004-01-01

The development of the Semantic Web, with machine-readable content, has the potential to revolutionize the World Wide Web and its use. A Semantic Web Primer provides an introduction and guide to this still emerging field, describing its key ideas, languages, and technologies. Suitable for use as a

Wernicke's Aphasia Reflects a Combination of Acoustic-Phonological and Semantic Control Deficits: A Case-Series Comparison of Wernicke's Aphasia, Semantic Dementia and Semantic Aphasia

Science.gov (United States)

Robson, Holly; Sage, Karen; Lambon Ralph, Matthew A.

2012-01-01

Wernicke's aphasia (WA) is the classical neurological model of comprehension impairment and, as a result, the posterior temporal lobe is assumed to be critical to semantic cognition. This conclusion is potentially confused by (a) the existence of patient groups with semantic impairment following damage to other brain regions (semantic dementia and…

COTARD SYNDROME IN SEMANTIC DEMENTIA

Science.gov (United States)

Mendez, Mario F.; Ramírez-Bermúdez, Jesús

2011-01-01

Background Semantic dementia is a neurodegenerative disorder characterized by the loss of meaning of words or concepts. semantic dementia can offer potential insights into the mechanisms of content-specific delusions. Objective The authors present a rare case of semantic dementia with Cotard syndrome, a delusion characterized by nihilism or self-negation. Method The semantic deficits and other features of semantic dementia were evaluated in relation to the patient's Cotard syndrome. Results Mrs. A developed the delusional belief that she was wasting and dying. This occurred after she lost knowledge for her somatic discomforts and sensations and for the organs that were the source of these sensations. Her nihilistic beliefs appeared to emerge from her misunderstanding of her somatic sensations. Conclusion This unique patient suggests that a mechanism for Cotard syndrome is difficulty interpreting the nature and source of internal pains and sensations. We propose that loss of semantic knowledge about one's own body may lead to the delusion of nihilism or death. PMID:22054629

Hierarchical Semantic Model of Geovideo

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

XIE Xiao

2015-05-01

Full Text Available The public security incidents were getting increasingly challenging with regard to their new features, including multi-scale mobility, multistage dynamic evolution, as well as spatiotemporal concurrency and uncertainty in the complex urban environment. However, the existing video models, which were used/designed for independent archive or local analysis of surveillance video, have seriously inhibited emergency response to the urgent requirements.Aiming at the explicit representation of change mechanism in video, the paper proposed a novel hierarchical geovideo semantic model using UML. This model was characterized by the hierarchical representation of both data structure and semantics based on the change-oriented three domains (feature domain, process domain and event domain instead of overall semantic description of video streaming; combining both geographical semantics and video content semantics, in support of global semantic association between multiple geovideo data. The public security incidents by video surveillance are inspected as an example to illustrate the validity of this model.

Mapping the Structure of Semantic Memory

Science.gov (United States)

Morais, Ana Sofia; Olsson, Henrik; Schooler, Lael J.

2013-01-01

Aggregating snippets from the semantic memories of many individuals may not yield a good map of an individual's semantic memory. The authors analyze the structure of semantic networks that they sampled from individuals through a new snowball sampling paradigm during approximately 6 weeks of 1-hr daily sessions. The semantic networks of individuals…

Causality in the semantics of Esterel : revisited

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Mousavi, M.R.; Klin, B.; Sobocinski, P.

2010-01-01

We re-examine the challenges concerning causality in the semantics of Esterel and show that they pertain to the known issues in the semantics of Structured Operational Semantics with negative premises. We show that the solutions offered for the semantics of SOS also provide answers to the semantic

Deriving a probabilistic syntacto-semantic grammar for biomedicine based on domain-specific terminologies.

Science.gov (United States)

Fan, Jung-Wei; Friedman, Carol

2011-10-01

Biomedical natural language processing (BioNLP) is a useful technique that unlocks valuable information stored in textual data for practice and/or research. Syntactic parsing is a critical component of BioNLP applications that rely on correctly determining the sentence and phrase structure of free text. In addition to dealing with the vast amount of domain-specific terms, a robust biomedical parser needs to model the semantic grammar to obtain viable syntactic structures. With either a rule-based or corpus-based approach, the grammar engineering process requires substantial time and knowledge from experts, and does not always yield a semantically transferable grammar. To reduce the human effort and to promote semantic transferability, we propose an automated method for deriving a probabilistic grammar based on a training corpus consisting of concept strings and semantic classes from the Unified Medical Language System (UMLS), a comprehensive terminology resource widely used by the community. The grammar is designed to specify noun phrases only due to the nominal nature of the majority of biomedical terminological concepts. Evaluated on manually parsed clinical notes, the derived grammar achieved a recall of 0.644, precision of 0.737, and average cross-bracketing of 0.61, which demonstrated better performance than a control grammar with the semantic information removed. Error analysis revealed shortcomings that could be addressed to improve performance. The results indicated the feasibility of an approach which automatically incorporates terminology semantics in the building of an operational grammar. Although the current performance of the unsupervised solution does not adequately replace manual engineering, we believe once the performance issues are addressed, it could serve as an aide in a semi-supervised solution. Copyright © 2011 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Semantic Representatives of the Concept

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Elena N. Tsay

2013-01-01

Full Text Available In the article concept as one of the principle notions of cognitive linguistics is investigated. Considering concept as culture phenomenon, having language realization and ethnocultural peculiarities, the description of the concept “happiness” is presented. Lexical and semantic paradigm of the concept of happiness correlates with a great number of lexical and semantic variants. In the work semantic representatives of the concept of happiness, covering supreme spiritual values are revealed and semantic interpretation of their functioning in the Biblical discourse is given.

System semantics of explanatory dictionaries

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Volodymyr Shyrokov

2015-11-01

Full Text Available System semantics of explanatory dictionaries Some semantic properties of the language to be followed from the structure of lexicographical systems of big explanatory dictionaries are considered. The hyperchains and hypercycles are determined as the definite kind of automorphisms of the lexicographical system of explanatory dictionary. Some semantic consequencies following from the principles of lexicographic closure and lexicographic completeness are investigated using the hyperchains and hypercycles formalism. The connection between the hypercyle properties of the lexicographical system semantics and Goedel’s incompleteness theorem is discussed.

A common-sense probabilistic approach to assessing inadvertent human intrusion into low-level radioactive waste at the Nevada Test Site

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Black, P.; Hooten, M.; Black, K.; Moore, B.; Rawlinson, S.; Barker, L.

1997-01-01

Each site disposing of low-level radioactive waste is required to prepare and maintain a site-specific performance assessment (1) to determine potential risks posed by waste management systems to the public, and the environment, and (2) to compare these risks to established performance objectives. The DOE Nevada Operations Office, Waste Management Program recently completed a one-year study of site-specific scenarios for inadvertent human intrusion by drilling into buried low-level radioactive waste sites, as part of ongoing performance assessment studies. Intrusion scenarios focus on possible penetration of buried waste through drilling for sources of groundwater. The probability of drilling penetration into waste was judged to be driven primarily by two settlement scenarios: (1) scattered individual homesteaders, and (2) a community scenario consisting of a cluster of settlers that share drilling and distribution systems for groundwater. Management control factors include institutional control, site knowledge, placards and markers, surface barriers, and subsurface barriers. The Subject Matter Experts concluded that institutional control and site knowledge may be important factors for the first few centuries, but are not significant over the evaluation period of 10,000 years. Surface barriers can be designed that would deter the siting of a drill rig over the waste site to an effectiveness of 95%. Subsurface barriers and placards and markers will not as effectively prevent inadvertent human intrusion. Homestead and community scenarios were considered by the panel to render a site-specific probability of around 10% for inadvertent human intrusion. If management controls are designed and implemented effectively, then the probability of inadvertent human intrusion can be reduced to less than 1%

Cross border semantic interoperability for clinical research: the EHR4CR semantic resources and services

Science.gov (United States)

Daniel, Christel; Ouagne, David; Sadou, Eric; Forsberg, Kerstin; Gilchrist, Mark Mc; Zapletal, Eric; Paris, Nicolas; Hussain, Sajjad; Jaulent, Marie-Christine; MD, Dipka Kalra

2016-01-01

With the development of platforms enabling the use of routinely collected clinical data in the context of international clinical research, scalable solutions for cross border semantic interoperability need to be developed. Within the context of the IMI EHR4CR project, we first defined the requirements and evaluation criteria of the EHR4CR semantic interoperability platform and then developed the semantic resources and supportive services and tooling to assist hospital sites in standardizing their data for allowing the execution of the project use cases. The experience gained from the evaluation of the EHR4CR platform accessing to semantically equivalent data elements across 11 European participating EHR systems from 5 countries demonstrated how far the mediation model and mapping efforts met the expected requirements of the project. Developers of semantic interoperability platforms are beginning to address a core set of requirements in order to reach the goal of developing cross border semantic integration of data. PMID:27570649

Semantic Radicals Contribute More Than Phonetic Radicals to the Recognition of Chinese Phonograms: Behavioral and ERP Evidence in a Factorial Study

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Xieshun Wang

2017-12-01

Full Text Available The Chinese phonograms consist of a semantic radical and a phonetic radical. The two types of radicals have different functional contributions to their host phonogram. The semantic radical typically signifies the meaning of the phonogram, while the phonetic radical usually contains a phonological clue to the phonogram’s pronunciation. However, it is still unclear how they interplay with each other when we attempt to recognize a phonogram because previous studies rarely manipulated the functionality of the two types of radicals in a single design. Using a full factorial design, the present study aimed to probe this issue by directly manipulating the functional validity of the two types of radicals in a lexical decision task with both behavioral and event-related potential (ERP measurements. The results showed that recognition of phonograms which were related to their semantic radicals in meaning took a shorter reaction time, showed a lower error rate, and elicited a smaller P200 and a larger N400 than did recognition of those which had no semantic relation with their semantic radicals. However, the validity of phonetic radicals did not show any main effect or interaction with that of semantic radicals on either behavioral or ERP measurements. These results indicated that semantic radicals played a dominant role in the recognition of phonograms. Transparent semantic radicals, which provide valid semantic cues to phonograms, can facilitate the recognition of phonograms.

The Semantic Web Revisited

OpenAIRE

Shadbolt, Nigel; Berners-Lee, Tim; Hall, Wendy

2006-01-01

The original Scientific American article on the Semantic Web appeared in 2001. It described the evolution of a Web that consisted largely of documents for humans to read to one that included data and information for computers to manipulate. The Semantic Web is a Web of actionable information--information derived from data through a semantic theory for interpreting the symbols.This simple idea, however, remains largely unrealized. Shopbots and auction bots abound on the Web, but these are esse...

Semantic Search of Web Services

Science.gov (United States)

Hao, Ke

2013-01-01

This dissertation addresses semantic search of Web services using natural language processing. We first survey various existing approaches, focusing on the fact that the expensive costs of current semantic annotation frameworks result in limited use of semantic search for large scale applications. We then propose a vector space model based service…

Expert judgement on inadvertent human intrusion into the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Hora, S.C.; von Winterfeldt, D.; Trauth, K.M.

1991-12-01

Four expert-judgment teams have developed analyses delineating possible future societies in the next 10,000 years in the vicinity of the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant (WIPP). Expert-judgment analysis was used to address the question of future societies because neither experimentation, observation, nor modeling can resolve such uncertainties. Each of the four, four-member teams, comprised of individuals with expertise in the physical, social, or political sciences, developed detailed qualitative assessments of possible future societies. These assessments include detailed discussions of the underlying physical and societal factors that would influence society and the likely modes of human-intrusion at the WIPP, as well as the probabilities of intrusion. Technological development, population growth, economic development, conservation of information, persistence of government control, and mitigation of danger from nuclear waste were the factors the teams believed to be most important. Likely modes of human-intrusion were categorized as excavation, disposal/storage, tunneling, drilling, and offsite activities. Each team also developed quantitative assessments by providing probabilities of various alternative futures, of inadvertent human intrusion, and in some cases, of particular modes of intrusion. The information created throughout this study will be used in conjunction with other types of information, including experimental data, calculations from physical principles and computer models, and perhaps other judgments, as input to ''performance assessment.'' The more qualitative results of this study will be used as input to another expert panel considering markers to deter inadvertent human intrusion at the WIPP

Inadvertent Splenectomy During Resection for Colorectal Cancer Does Not Increase Long-term Mortality in a Propensity Score Model

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Lolle, Ida; Pommergaard, Hans-Christian; Schefte, David F

2016-01-01

BACKGROUND: Previous studies suggest that long-term mortality is increased in patients who undergo splenectomy during surgery for colorectal cancer. The reason for this association remains unclear. OBJECTIVE: The purpose of this study was to investigate the association between inadvertent...... splenectomy attributed to iatrogenic lesion to the spleen during colorectal cancer resections and long-term mortality in a national cohort of unselected patients. DESIGN: This was a retrospective, nationwide cohort study. SETTINGS: Data were collected from the database of the Danish Colorectal Cancer Group...... for patients surviving 30 days after surgery. Secondary outcomes were 30-day mortality and risk factors for inadvertent splenectomy. Multivariable and propensity-score matched Cox regression analyses were used to adjust for potential confounding. RESULTS: In total, 23,727 patients were included, of which 277...

The effect of working memory load on semantic illusions: what the phonological loop and central executive have to contribute.

Science.gov (United States)

Büttner, Anke Caroline

2012-01-01

When asked how many animals of each kind Moses took on the Ark, most people respond with "two" despite the substituted name (Moses for Noah) in the question. Possible explanations for semantic illusions appear to be related to processing limitations such as those of working memory. Indeed, individual working memory capacity has an impact upon how sentences containing substitutions are processed. This experiment examined further the role of working memory in the occurrence of semantic illusions using a dual-task working memory load approach. Participants verified statements while engaging in either articulatory suppression or random number generation. Secondary task type had a significant effect on semantic illusion rate, but only when comparing the control condition to the two dual-task conditions. Furthermore, secondary task performance in the random number generation condition declined, suggesting a tradeoff between tasks. Response time analyses also showed a different pattern of processing across the conditions. The findings suggest that the phonological loop plays a role in representing semantic illusion sentences coherently and in monitoring for details, while the role of the central executive is to assist gist-processing of sentences. This usually efficient strategy leads to error in the case of semantic illusions.

Selective impairment of living things and musical instruments on a verbal 'Semantic Knowledge Questionnaire' in a case of apperceptive visual agnosia.

Science.gov (United States)

Masullo, Carlo; Piccininni, Chiara; Quaranta, Davide; Vita, Maria Gabriella; Gaudino, Simona; Gainotti, Guido

2012-10-01

Semantic memory was investigated in a patient (MR) affected by a severe apperceptive visual agnosia, due to an ischemic cerebral lesion, bilaterally affecting the infero-mesial parts of the temporo-occipital cortices. The study was made by means of a Semantic Knowledge Questionnaire (Laiacona, Barbarotto, Trivelli, & Capitani, 1993), which takes separately into account four categories of living beings (animals, fruits, vegetables and body parts) and of artefacts (furniture, tools, vehicles and musical instruments), does not require a visual analysis and allows to distinguish errors concerning super-ordinate categorization, perceptual features and functional/encyclopedic knowledge. When the total number of errors obtained on all the categories of living and non-living beings was considered, a non-significant trend toward a higher number of errors in living stimuli was observed. This difference, however, became significant when body parts and musical instruments were excluded from the analysis. Furthermore, the number of errors obtained on the musical instruments was similar to that obtained on the living categories of animals, fruits and vegetables and significantly higher of that obtained in the other artefact categories. This difference was still significant when familiarity, frequency of use and prototypicality of each stimulus entered into a logistic regression analysis. On the other hand, a separate analysis of errors obtained on questions exploring super-ordinate categorization, perceptual features and functional/encyclopedic attributes showed that the differences between living and non-living stimuli and between musical instruments and other artefact categories were mainly due to errors obtained on questions exploring perceptual features. All these data are at variance with the 'domains of knowledge' hypothesis', which assumes that the breakdown of different categories of living and non-living things respects the distinction between biological entities and

LAIR: A Language for Automated Semantics-Aware Text Sanitization based on Frame Semantics

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Hedegaard, Steffen; Houen, Søren; Simonsen, Jakob Grue

2009-01-01

We present \\lair{}: A domain-specific language that enables users to specify actions to be taken upon meeting specific semantic frames in a text, in particular to rephrase and redact the textual content. While \\lair{} presupposes superficial knowledge of frames and frame semantics, it requires on...... with automated redaction of web pages for subjectively undesirable content; initial experiments suggest that using a small language based on semantic recognition of undesirable terms can be highly useful as a supplement to traditional methods of text sanitization.......We present \\lair{}: A domain-specific language that enables users to specify actions to be taken upon meeting specific semantic frames in a text, in particular to rephrase and redact the textual content. While \\lair{} presupposes superficial knowledge of frames and frame semantics, it requires only...... limited prior programming experience. It neither contain scripting or I/O primitives, nor does it contain general loop constructions and is not Turing-complete. We have implemented a \\lair{} compiler and integrated it in a pipeline for automated redaction of web pages. We detail our experience...

Novel Ontologies-based Optical Character Recognition-error Correction Cooperating with Graph Component Extraction

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Sarunya Kanjanawattana

2017-01-01

Full Text Available literature. Extracting graph information clearly contributes to readers, who are interested in graph information interpretation, because we can obtain significant information presenting in the graph. A typical tool used to transform image-based characters to computer editable characters is optical character recognition (OCR. Unfortunately, OCR cannot guarantee perfect results, because it is sensitive to noise and input quality. This becomes a serious problem because misrecognition provides misunderstanding information to readers and causes misleading communication. In this study, we present a novel method for OCR-error correction based on bar graphs using semantics, such as ontologies and dependency parsing. Moreover, we used a graph component extraction proposed in our previous study to omit irrelevant parts from graph components. It was applied to clean and prepare input data for this OCR-error correction. The main objectives of this paper are to extract significant information from the graph using OCR and to correct OCR errors using semantics. As a result, our method provided remarkable performance with the highest accuracies and F-measures. Moreover, we examined that our input data contained less of noise because of an efficiency of our graph component extraction. Based on the evidence, we conclude that our solution to the OCR problem achieves the objectives.

A generalized notion of semantic independence

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Fränzle, Martin; Stengel, Bernhard von; Wittmüss, Arne

1995-01-01

For programs represented semantically as relations, a concept of semantic independence is defined that is more general than previously stated notions. It allows for shared input variables and irrelevant interference due to nondeterminism.......For programs represented semantically as relations, a concept of semantic independence is defined that is more general than previously stated notions. It allows for shared input variables and irrelevant interference due to nondeterminism....

Comparing Refinements for Failure and Bisimulation Semantics

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Eshuis, H.; Fokkinga, M.M.

2002-01-01

Refinement in bisimulation semantics is defined differently from refinement in failure semantics: in bisimulation semantics refinement is based on simulations between labelled transition systems, whereas in failure semantics refinement is based on inclusions between failure systems. There exist

Semantics-based Automated Web Testing

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Hai-Feng Guo

2015-08-01

Full Text Available We present TAO, a software testing tool performing automated test and oracle generation based on a semantic approach. TAO entangles grammar-based test generation with automated semantics evaluation using a denotational semantics framework. We show how TAO can be incorporated with the Selenium automation tool for automated web testing, and how TAO can be further extended to support automated delta debugging, where a failing web test script can be systematically reduced based on grammar-directed strategies. A real-life parking website is adopted throughout the paper to demonstrate the effectivity of our semantics-based web testing approach.

Benchmarking semantic web technology

CERN Document Server

García-Castro, R

2009-01-01

This book addresses the problem of benchmarking Semantic Web Technologies; first, from a methodological point of view, proposing a general methodology to follow in benchmarking activities over Semantic Web Technologies and, second, from a practical point of view, presenting two international benchmarking activities that involved benchmarking the interoperability of Semantic Web technologies using RDF(S) as the interchange language in one activity and OWL in the other.The book presents in detail how the different resources needed for these interoperability benchmarking activities were defined:

Semantic Web and Contextual Information: Semantic Network Analysis of Online Journalistic Texts

Science.gov (United States)

Lim, Yon Soo

This study examines why contextual information is important to actualize the idea of semantic web, based on a case study of a socio-political issue in South Korea. For this study, semantic network analyses were conducted regarding English-language based 62 blog posts and 101 news stories on the web. The results indicated the differences of the meaning structures between blog posts and professional journalism as well as between conservative journalism and progressive journalism. From the results, this study ascertains empirical validity of current concerns about the practical application of the new web technology, and discusses how the semantic web should be developed.

Inadvertent pump start with gas expansion modules

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Campbell, L.R.; Harris, R.A.; Heard, F.J.; Dautel, W.A.

1992-01-01

Previous testing demonstrated the effectiveness of gas expansion modules (GEMs) in mitigating the consequences of a loss-of-flow-without-scram transient in Fast Flux Test Facility (FFTF)-sized sodium cooled cores. As a result, GEMs have been included in the advance liquid-metal reactor (PRISM) design project sponsored by the US Department of Energy. The PRISM design is under review at the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission for licensability. In the unlikely event that the reactor does not scram during a loss of low, the GEMs quickly insert sufficient negative reactivity to limit fuel and cladding temperatures to acceptable values. This is the positive benefit of the GEMs; however, the reverse situation must be considered. A primary pump could be inadvertently started from near-critical conditions resulting in a positive reactivity insertion and a power transient. One mitigating aspect of this event is that as the reactivity associated with the GEMs is inserted, the increasing flow increases core cooling. A test was conducted in the FFTF to demonstrate that the GEM and feedback reactivity are well predicted following pump start, and the reactivity transient is benign

Exploiting Speech for Automatic TV Delinearization: From Streams to Cross-Media Semantic Navigation

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Guinaudeau Camille

2011-01-01

Full Text Available The gradual migration of television from broadcast diffusion to Internet diffusion offers countless possibilities for the generation of rich navigable contents. However, it also raises numerous scientific issues regarding delinearization of TV streams and content enrichment. In this paper, we study how speech can be used at different levels of the delinearization process, using automatic speech transcription and natural language processing (NLP for the segmentation and characterization of TV programs and for the generation of semantic hyperlinks in videos. Transcript-based video delinearization requires natural language processing techniques robust to transcription peculiarities, such as transcription errors, and to domain and genre differences. We therefore propose to modify classical NLP techniques, initially designed for regular texts, to improve their robustness in the context of TV delinearization. We demonstrate that the modified NLP techniques can efficiently handle various types of TV material and be exploited for program description, for topic segmentation, and for the generation of semantic hyperlinks between multimedia contents. We illustrate the concept of cross-media semantic navigation with a description of our news navigation demonstrator presented during the NEM Summit 2009.

Semantic Keys and Reading

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Zev bar-Lev

2016-12-01

Full Text Available Semantic Keys are elements (word-parts of written language that give an iconic, general representation of the whole word’s meaning. In written Sino-Japanese the “radical” or semantic components play this role. For example, the character meaning ‘woman, female’ is the Semantic Key of the character for Ma ‘Mama’ (alongside the phonetic component Ma, which means ‘horse’ as a separate character. The theory of semantic Keys in both graphic and phonemic aspects is called qTheory or nanosemantics. The most innovative aspect of the present article is the hypothesis that, in languages using alphabetic writing systems, the role of Semantic Key is played by consonants, more specifically the first consonant. Thus, L meaning ‘LIFT’ is the Semantic Key of English Lift, Ladle, Lofty, aLps, eLevator, oLympus; Spanish Leva, Lecantarse, aLto, Lengua; Arabic aLLah, and Hebrew① ªeL-ºaL ‘upto-above’ (the Israeli airline, Polish Lot ‘flight’ (the Polish airline; Hebrew ªeL, ªeLohim ‘God’, and haLLeluyah ‘praise-ye God’ (using Parallels, ‘Lift up God’. Evidence for the universality of the theory is shown by many examples drawn from various languages, including Indo-European Semitic, Chinese and Japanese. The theory reveals hundreds of relationships within and between languages, related and unrelated, that have been “Hiding in Plain Sight”, to mention just one example: the Parallel between Spanish Pan ‘bread’ and Mandarin Fan ‘rice’.

Interpreting semantic clustering effects in free recall.

Science.gov (United States)

Manning, Jeremy R; Kahana, Michael J

2012-07-01

The order in which participants choose to recall words from a studied list of randomly selected words provides insights into how memories of the words are represented, organised, and retrieved. One pervasive finding is that when a pair of semantically related words (e.g., "cat" and "dog") is embedded in the studied list, the related words are often recalled successively. This tendency to successively recall semantically related words is termed semantic clustering (Bousfield, 1953; Bousfield & Sedgewick, 1944; Cofer, Bruce, & Reicher, 1966). Measuring semantic clustering effects requires making assumptions about which words participants consider to be similar in meaning. However, it is often difficult to gain insights into individual participants' internal semantic models, and for this reason researchers typically rely on standardised semantic similarity metrics. Here we use simulations to gain insights into the expected magnitudes of semantic clustering effects given systematic differences between participants' internal similarity models and the similarity metric used to quantify the degree of semantic clustering. Our results provide a number of useful insights into the interpretation of semantic clustering effects in free recall.

Snapshots for Semantic Maps

National Research Council Canada - National Science Library

Nielsen, Curtis W; Ricks, Bob; Goodrich, Michael A; Bruemmer, David; Few, Doug; Walton, Miles

2004-01-01

.... Semantic maps are a relatively new approach to information presentation. Semantic maps provide more detail about an environment than typical maps because they are augmented by icons or symbols that provide meaning for places or objects of interest...

Towards Compatible and Interderivable Semantic Specifications for the Scheme Programming Language, Part I: Denotational Semantics, Natural Semantics, and Abstract Machines

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Danvy, Olivier

2009-01-01

We derive two big-step abstract machines, a natural semantics, and the valuation function of a denotational semantics based on the small-step abstract machine for Core Scheme presented by Clinger at PLDI'98. Starting from a functional implementation of this small-step abstract machine, (1) we fus...

Examining lateralized semantic access using pictures.

Science.gov (United States)

Lovseth, Kyle; Atchley, Ruth Ann

2010-03-01

A divided visual field (DVF) experiment examined the semantic processing strategies employed by the cerebral hemispheres to determine if strategies observed with written word stimuli generalize to other media for communicating semantic information. We employed picture stimuli and vary the degree of semantic relatedness between the picture pairs. Participants made an on-line semantic relatedness judgment in response to sequentially presented pictures. We found that when pictures are presented to the right hemisphere responses are generally more accurate than the left hemisphere for semantic relatedness judgments for picture pairs. Furthermore, consistent with earlier DVF studies employing words, we conclude that the RH is better at accessing or maintaining access to information that has a weak or more remote semantic relationship. We also found evidence of faster access for pictures presented to the LH in the strongly-related condition. Overall, these results are consistent with earlier DVF word studies that argue that the cerebral hemispheres each play an important and separable role during semantic retrieval. Copyright 2009 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

A Denotational Semantics for Logic Programming

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Frandsen, Gudmund Skovbjerg

A fully abstract denotational semantics for logic programming has not been constructed yet. In this paper we present a denotational semantics that is almost fully abstract. We take the meaning of a logic program to be an element in a Plotkin power domain of substitutions. In this way our result...... shows that standard domain constructions suffice, when giving a semantics for logic programming. Using the well-known fixpoint semantics of logic programming we have to consider two different fixpoints in order to obtain information about both successful and failed computations. In contrast, our...... semantics is uniform in that the (single) meaning of a logic program contains information about both successful, failed and infinite computations. Finally, based on the full abstractness result, we argue that the detail level of substitutions is needed in any denotational semantics for logic programming....

CASL The Common Algebraic Specification Language Semantics

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Haxthausen, Anne

1998-01-01

This is version 1.0 of the CASL Language Summary, annotated by the CoFI Semantics Task Group with the semantics of constructs. This is the first complete but possibly imperfect version of the semantics. It was compiled prior to the CoFI workshop at Cachan in November 1998.......This is version 1.0 of the CASL Language Summary, annotated by the CoFI Semantics Task Group with the semantics of constructs. This is the first complete but possibly imperfect version of the semantics. It was compiled prior to the CoFI workshop at Cachan in November 1998....

Semantic Web status model

CSIR Research Space (South Africa)

Gerber, AJ

2006-06-01

Full Text Available Semantic Web application areas are experiencing intensified interest due to the rapid growth in the use of the Web, together with the innovation and renovation of information content technologies. The Semantic Web is regarded as an integrator across...

Semantic Memory in the Clinical Progression of Alzheimer Disease.

Science.gov (United States)

Tchakoute, Christophe T; Sainani, Kristin L; Henderson, Victor W

2017-09-01

Semantic memory measures may be useful in tracking and predicting progression of Alzheimer disease. We investigated relationships among semantic memory tasks and their 1-year predictive value in women with Alzheimer disease. We conducted secondary analyses of a randomized clinical trial of raloxifene in 42 women with late-onset mild-to-moderate Alzheimer disease. We assessed semantic memory with tests of oral confrontation naming, category fluency, semantic recognition and semantic naming, and semantic density in written narrative discourse. We measured global cognition (Alzheimer Disease Assessment Scale, cognitive subscale), dementia severity (Clinical Dementia Rating sum of boxes), and daily function (Activities of Daily Living Inventory) at baseline and 1 year. At baseline and 1 year, most semantic memory scores correlated highly or moderately with each other and with global cognition, dementia severity, and daily function. Semantic memory task performance at 1 year had worsened one-third to one-half standard deviation. Factor analysis of baseline test scores distinguished processes in semantic and lexical retrieval (semantic recognition, semantic naming, confrontation naming) from processes in lexical search (semantic density, category fluency). The semantic-lexical retrieval factor predicted global cognition at 1 year. Considered separately, baseline confrontation naming and category fluency predicted dementia severity, while semantic recognition and a composite of semantic recognition and semantic naming predicted global cognition. No individual semantic memory test predicted daily function. Semantic-lexical retrieval and lexical search may represent distinct aspects of semantic memory. Semantic memory processes are sensitive to cognitive decline and dementia severity in Alzheimer disease.

Detailed semantic analyses of human error incidents occurring at nuclear power plants. Extraction of periodical transition of error occurrence patterns by applying multivariate analysis

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Hirotsu, Yuko; Suzuki, Kunihiko; Takano, Kenichi; Kojima, Mitsuhiro

2000-01-01

It is essential for preventing the recurrence of human error incidents to analyze and evaluate them with the emphasis on human factor. Detailed and structured analyses of all incidents at domestic nuclear power plants (NPPs) reported during last 31 years have been conducted based on J-HPES, in which total 193 human error cases are identified. Results obtained by the analyses have been stored into the J-HPES database. In the previous study, by applying multivariate analysis to above case studies, it was suggested that there were several occurrence patterns identified of how errors occur at NPPs. It was also clarified that the causes related to each human error are different depending on age of their occurrence. This paper described the obtained results in respects of periodical transition of human error occurrence patterns. By applying multivariate analysis to the above data, it was suggested there were two types of error occurrence patterns as to each human error type. First type is common occurrence patterns, not depending on the age, and second type is the one influenced by periodical characteristics. (author)

A Denotational Semantics for Communicating Unstructured Code

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Nils Jähnig

2015-03-01

Full Text Available An important property of programming language semantics is that they should be compositional. However, unstructured low-level code contains goto-like commands making it hard to define a semantics that is compositional. In this paper, we follow the ideas of Saabas and Uustalu to structure low-level code. This gives us the possibility to define a compositional denotational semantics based on least fixed points to allow for the use of inductive verification methods. We capture the semantics of communication using finite traces similar to the denotations of CSP. In addition, we examine properties of this semantics and give an example that demonstrates reasoning about communication and jumps. With this semantics, we lay the foundations for a proof calculus that captures both, the semantics of unstructured low-level code and communication.

A Semantics for Distributed Execution of Statemate

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Fränzle, Martin; Niehaus, Jürgen; Metzner, Alexander

2003-01-01

We present a semantics for the statechart variant implemented in the Statemate product of i-Logix. Our semantics enables distributed code generation for Statemate models in the context of rapid prototyping for embedded control applications. We argue that it seems impossible to efficiently generate......, the changes made regarding the interaction of distributed model parts are similar to the interaction between the model and its environment in the original semantics, thus giving designers a familiar execution model. The semantics has been implemented in Grace, a framework for rapid prototyping code generation...... distributed code using the original Statemate semantics. The new, distributed semantics has the advantages that, first, it enables the generation of efficient distributed code, second, it preserves many aspects of the original semantics for those parts of a model that are not distributed, and third...

Inter-deriving Semantic Artifacts for Object-Oriented Programming

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Danvy, Olivier; Johannsen, Jacob

2008-01-01

.e., big-step operational semantics) specified in Abadi and Cardelli's monograph. This abstract machine therefore embodies the soundness of Abadi and Cardelli's reduction semantics and natural semantics relative to each other. To move closer to actual implementations, which use environments rather than......We present a new abstract machine for Abadi and Cardelli's untyped calculus of objects. What is special about this semantic artifact (i.e., man-made construct) is that is mechanically corresponds to both the reduction semantics (i.e., small-step operational semantics) and the natural semantics (i...... actual substitutions, we then represent object methods as closures and in the same inter-derivational spirit, we present three new semantic artifacts: a reduction semantics for a version of Abadi and Cardelli's untyped calculus of objects with explicit substitutions, an environment-based abstract machine...

Quality of semantic standards

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Folmer, Erwin Johan Albert

2012-01-01

Little scientific literature addresses the issue of quality of semantic standards, albeit a problem with high economic and social impact. Our problem survey, including 34 semantic Standard Setting Organizations (SSOs), gives evidence that quality of standards can be improved, but for improvement a

Morphological Cues for Lexical Semantics

National Research Council Canada - National Science Library

Light, Marc

1996-01-01

Most natural language processing tasks require lexical semantic information such as verbal argument structure and selectional restrictions, corresponding nominal semantic class, verbal aspectual class...

Semantic attributes based texture generation

Science.gov (United States)

Chi, Huifang; Gan, Yanhai; Qi, Lin; Dong, Junyu; Madessa, Amanuel Hirpa

2018-04-01

Semantic attributes are commonly used for texture description. They can be used to describe the information of a texture, such as patterns, textons, distributions, brightness, and so on. Generally speaking, semantic attributes are more concrete descriptors than perceptual features. Therefore, it is practical to generate texture images from semantic attributes. In this paper, we propose to generate high-quality texture images from semantic attributes. Over the last two decades, several works have been done on texture synthesis and generation. Most of them focusing on example-based texture synthesis and procedural texture generation. Semantic attributes based texture generation still deserves more devotion. Gan et al. proposed a useful joint model for perception driven texture generation. However, perceptual features are nonobjective spatial statistics used by humans to distinguish different textures in pre-attentive situations. To give more describing information about texture appearance, semantic attributes which are more in line with human description habits are desired. In this paper, we use sigmoid cross entropy loss in an auxiliary model to provide enough information for a generator. Consequently, the discriminator is released from the relatively intractable mission of figuring out the joint distribution of condition vectors and samples. To demonstrate the validity of our method, we compare our method to Gan et al.'s method on generating textures by designing experiments on PTD and DTD. All experimental results show that our model can generate textures from semantic attributes.

Language networks associated with computerized semantic indices.

Science.gov (United States)

Pakhomov, Serguei V S; Jones, David T; Knopman, David S

2015-01-01

Tests of generative semantic verbal fluency are widely used to study organization and representation of concepts in the human brain. Previous studies demonstrated that clustering and switching behavior during verbal fluency tasks is supported by multiple brain mechanisms associated with semantic memory and executive control. Previous work relied on manual assessments of semantic relatedness between words and grouping of words into semantic clusters. We investigated a computational linguistic approach to measuring the strength of semantic relatedness between words based on latent semantic analysis of word co-occurrences in a subset of a large online encyclopedia. We computed semantic clustering indices and compared them to brain network connectivity measures obtained with task-free fMRI in a sample consisting of healthy participants and those differentially affected by cognitive impairment. We found that semantic clustering indices were associated with brain network connectivity in distinct areas including fronto-temporal, fronto-parietal and fusiform gyrus regions. This study shows that computerized semantic indices complement traditional assessments of verbal fluency to provide a more complete account of the relationship between brain and verbal behavior involved organization and retrieval of lexical information from memory. Copyright © 2014 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

On the Existence of Semantic Working Memory: Evidence for Direct Semantic Maintenance

Science.gov (United States)

Shivde, Geeta; Anderson, Michael C.

2011-01-01

Despite widespread acknowledgment of the importance of online semantic maintenance, there has been astonishingly little work that clearly establishes this construct. We review the extant work relevant to short-term retention of meaning and show that, although consistent with semantic working memory, most data can be accommodated in other ways.…

Implicit and explicit processing in deep dyslexia: Semantic blocking as a test for failure of inhibition in the phonological output lexicon.

Science.gov (United States)

Colangelo, Annette; Buchanan, Lori

2006-12-01

The failure of inhibition hypothesis posits a theoretical distinction between implicit and explicit access in deep dyslexia. Specifically, the effects of failure of inhibition are assumed only in conditions that have an explicit selection requirement in the context of production (i.e., aloud reading). In contrast, the failure of inhibition hypothesis proposes that implicit processing and explicit access to semantic information without production demands are intact in deep dyslexia. Evidence for intact implicit and explicit access requires that performance in deep dyslexia parallels that observed in neurologically intact participants on tasks based on implicit and explicit processes. In other words, deep dyslexics should produce normal effects in conditions with implicit task demands (i.e., lexical decision) and on tasks based on explicit access without production (i.e., forced choice semantic decisions) because failure of inhibition does not impact the availability of lexical information, only explicit retrieval in the context of production. This research examined the distinction between implicit and explicit processes in deep dyslexia using semantic blocking in lexical decision and forced choice semantic decisions as a test for the failure of inhibition hypothesis. The results of the semantic blocking paradigm support the distinction between implicit and explicit processing and provide evidence for failure of inhibition as an explanation for semantic errors in deep dyslexia.

Semantic Coherence Facilitates Distributional Learning.

Science.gov (United States)

Ouyang, Long; Boroditsky, Lera; Frank, Michael C

2017-04-01

Computational models have shown that purely statistical knowledge about words' linguistic contexts is sufficient to learn many properties of words, including syntactic and semantic category. For example, models can infer that "postman" and "mailman" are semantically similar because they have quantitatively similar patterns of association with other words (e.g., they both tend to occur with words like "deliver," "truck," "package"). In contrast to these computational results, artificial language learning experiments suggest that distributional statistics alone do not facilitate learning of linguistic categories. However, experiments in this paradigm expose participants to entirely novel words, whereas real language learners encounter input that contains some known words that are semantically organized. In three experiments, we show that (a) the presence of familiar semantic reference points facilitates distributional learning and (b) this effect crucially depends both on the presence of known words and the adherence of these known words to some semantic organization. Copyright © 2016 Cognitive Science Society, Inc.

Semantic Query Processing : Estimating Relational Purity

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Kalo, Jan-Christoph; Lofi, C.; Maseli, René Pascal; Balke, Wolf-Tilo; Leyer, M.

2017-01-01

The use of semantic information found in structured knowledge bases has become an integral part of the processing pipeline of modern intelligent in-
formation systems. However, such semantic information is frequently insuffi-cient to capture the rich semantics demanded by the applications, and

Pragmatics for formal semantics

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Danvy, Olivier

2011-01-01

This tech talk describes how to write and how to inter-derive formal semantics for sequential programming languages. The progress reported here is (1) concrete guidelines to write each formal semantics to alleviate their proof obligations, and (2) simple calculational tools to obtain a formal...

A reasonable Semantic Web

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Hitzler, Pascal; Van Harmelen, Frank

2010-01-01

The realization of Semantic Web reasoning is central to substantiating the Semantic Web vision. However, current mainstream research on this topic faces serious challenges, which forces us to question established lines of research and to rethink the underlying approaches. We argue that reasoning for

Episodic memory, semantic memory, and amnesia.

Science.gov (United States)

Squire, L R; Zola, S M

1998-01-01

Episodic memory and semantic memory are two types of declarative memory. There have been two principal views about how this distinction might be reflected in the organization of memory functions in the brain. One view, that episodic memory and semantic memory are both dependent on the integrity of medial temporal lobe and midline diencephalic structures, predicts that amnesic patients with medial temporal lobe/diencephalic damage should be proportionately impaired in both episodic and semantic memory. An alternative view is that the capacity for semantic memory is spared, or partially spared, in amnesia relative to episodic memory ability. This article reviews two kinds of relevant data: 1) case studies where amnesia has occurred early in childhood, before much of an individual's semantic knowledge has been acquired, and 2) experimental studies with amnesic patients of fact and event learning, remembering and knowing, and remote memory. The data provide no compelling support for the view that episodic and semantic memory are affected differently in medial temporal lobe/diencephalic amnesia. However, episodic and semantic memory may be dissociable in those amnesic patients who additionally have severe frontal lobe damage.

Gricean Semantics and Vague Speaker-Meaning

OpenAIRE

Schiffer, Stephen

2017-01-01

Presentations of Gricean semantics, including Stephen Neale’s in “Silent Reference,” totally ignore vagueness, even though virtually every utterance is vague. I ask how Gricean semantics might be adjusted to accommodate vague speaker-meaning. My answer is that it can’t accommodate it: the Gricean program collapses in the face of vague speaker-meaning. The Gricean might, however, fi nd some solace in knowing that every other extant meta-semantic and semantic program is in the same boat.

Modeling the Interaction Between Semantic Agents and Semantic Web Services Using MDA Approach

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Kardas, Geylani; Göknil, Arda; Dikenelli, Oguz; Topaloglu, N. Yasemin

2007-01-01

In this paper, we present our metamodeling approach for integrating semantic web services and semantic web enabled agents under Model Driven Architecture (MDA) view which defines a conceptual framework to realize model driven development. We believe that agents must have well designed environment

46 CFR 308.536 - Declaration where failure to comply with Clause 21 was inadvertent, Form MA-314.

Science.gov (United States)

2010-10-01

... TRANSPORTATION EMERGENCY OPERATIONS WAR RISK INSURANCE War Risk Cargo Insurance Ii-Open Policy War Risk Cargo... Assured that fails inadvertently to maintain a collateral deposit fund or surety bond in an amount..., which may be obtained from the American War Risk Agency or MARAD. III—Facultative War Risk Cargo...

A Model for Semantic IS Standards

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Folmer, Erwin Johan Albert; Oude Luttighuis, Paul; van Hillegersberg, Jos

2011-01-01

We argue that, in order to suggest improvements of any kind to semantic information system (IS) standards, better understanding of the conceptual structure of semantic IS standard is required. This study develops a model for semantic IS standard, based on literature and expert knowledge. The model

Natural language acquisition in large scale neural semantic networks

Science.gov (United States)

Ealey, Douglas

This thesis puts forward the view that a purely signal- based approach to natural language processing is both plausible and desirable. By questioning the veracity of symbolic representations of meaning, it argues for a unified, non-symbolic model of knowledge representation that is both biologically plausible and, potentially, highly efficient. Processes to generate a grounded, neural form of this model-dubbed the semantic filter-are discussed. The combined effects of local neural organisation, coincident with perceptual maturation, are used to hypothesise its nature. This theoretical model is then validated in light of a number of fundamental neurological constraints and milestones. The mechanisms of semantic and episodic development that the model predicts are then used to explain linguistic properties, such as propositions and verbs, syntax and scripting. To mimic the growth of locally densely connected structures upon an unbounded neural substrate, a system is developed that can grow arbitrarily large, data- dependant structures composed of individual self- organising neural networks. The maturational nature of the data used results in a structure in which the perception of concepts is refined by the networks, but demarcated by subsequent structure. As a consequence, the overall structure shows significant memory and computational benefits, as predicted by the cognitive and neural models. Furthermore, the localised nature of the neural architecture also avoids the increasing error sensitivity and redundancy of traditional systems as the training domain grows. The semantic and episodic filters have been demonstrated to perform as well, or better, than more specialist networks, whilst using significantly larger vocabularies, more complex sentence forms and more natural corpora.

Semantic-based surveillance video retrieval.

Science.gov (United States)

Hu, Weiming; Xie, Dan; Fu, Zhouyu; Zeng, Wenrong; Maybank, Steve

2007-04-01

Visual surveillance produces large amounts of video data. Effective indexing and retrieval from surveillance video databases are very important. Although there are many ways to represent the content of video clips in current video retrieval algorithms, there still exists a semantic gap between users and retrieval systems. Visual surveillance systems supply a platform for investigating semantic-based video retrieval. In this paper, a semantic-based video retrieval framework for visual surveillance is proposed. A cluster-based tracking algorithm is developed to acquire motion trajectories. The trajectories are then clustered hierarchically using the spatial and temporal information, to learn activity models. A hierarchical structure of semantic indexing and retrieval of object activities, where each individual activity automatically inherits all the semantic descriptions of the activity model to which it belongs, is proposed for accessing video clips and individual objects at the semantic level. The proposed retrieval framework supports various queries including queries by keywords, multiple object queries, and queries by sketch. For multiple object queries, succession and simultaneity restrictions, together with depth and breadth first orders, are considered. For sketch-based queries, a method for matching trajectories drawn by users to spatial trajectories is proposed. The effectiveness and efficiency of our framework are tested in a crowded traffic scene.

Neonicotinoid insecticides can serve as inadvertent insect contraceptives

Science.gov (United States)

Villamar-Bouza, Laura; Bruckner, Selina; Chantawannakul, Panuwan; Gauthier, Laurent; Khongphinitbunjong, Kitiphong; Retschnig, Gina; Troxler, Aline; Vidondo, Beatriz; Neumann, Peter; Williams, Geoffrey R.

2016-01-01

There is clear evidence for sublethal effects of neonicotinoid insecticides on non-target ecosystem service-providing insects. However, their possible impact on male insect reproduction is currently unknown, despite the key role of sex. Here, we show that two neonicotinoids (4.5 ppb thiamethoxam and 1.5 ppb clothianidin) significantly reduce the reproductive capacity of male honeybees (drones), Apis mellifera. Drones were obtained from colonies exposed to the neonicotinoid insecticides or controls, and subsequently maintained in laboratory cages until they reached sexual maturity. While no significant effects were observed for male teneral (newly emerged adult) body mass and sperm quantity, the data clearly showed reduced drone lifespan, as well as reduced sperm viability (percentage living versus dead) and living sperm quantity by 39%. Our results demonstrate for the first time that neonicotinoid insecticides can negatively affect male insect reproductive capacity, and provide a possible mechanistic explanation for managed honeybee queen failure and wild insect pollinator decline. The widespread prophylactic use of neonicotinoids may have previously overlooked inadvertent contraceptive effects on non-target insects, thereby limiting conservation efforts. PMID:27466446

Semantic models for adaptive interactive systems

CERN Document Server

Hussein, Tim; Lukosch, Stephan; Ziegler, Jürgen; Calvary, Gaëlle

2013-01-01

Providing insights into methodologies for designing adaptive systems based on semantic data, and introducing semantic models that can be used for building interactive systems, this book showcases many of the applications made possible by the use of semantic models.Ontologies may enhance the functional coverage of an interactive system as well as its visualization and interaction capabilities in various ways. Semantic models can also contribute to bridging gaps; for example, between user models, context-aware interfaces, and model-driven UI generation. There is considerable potential for using

Some Novel Techniques in Operational Semantics

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Mosses, Peter David

2003-01-01

Several novel techniques for use in operational semantics are presented. They were developed in connection with a modular vatriant of the conventional Structural Operational Semantics framework, but can also be exploited when modularity is of no great concern. Gives a simple introduction to the m......Several novel techniques for use in operational semantics are presented. They were developed in connection with a modular vatriant of the conventional Structural Operational Semantics framework, but can also be exploited when modularity is of no great concern. Gives a simple introduction...

Effects of semantic context on access to words of low imageability in deep-phonological dysphasia: a treatment case study.

Science.gov (United States)

McCarthy, Laura Mary; Kalinyak-Fliszar, Michelene; Kohen, Francine; Martin, Nadine

2017-01-01

Deep dysphasia is a relatively rare subcategory of aphasia, characterised by word repetition impairment and a profound auditory-verbal short-term memory (STM) limitation. Repetition of words is better than nonwords (lexicality effect) and better for high-image than low-image words (imageability effect). Another related language impairment profile is phonological dysphasia, which includes all of the characteristics of deep dysphasia except for the occurrence of semantic errors in single word repetition. The overlap in symptoms of deep and phonological dysphasia has led to the hypothesis that they share the same root cause, impaired maintenance of activated representation of words, but that they differ in severity of that impairment, with deep dysphasia being more severe. We report a single-subject multiple baseline, multiple probe treatment study of a person who presented with a pattern of repetition that was consistent with the continuum of deep-phonological dysphasia: imageability and lexicality effects in repetition of single and multiple words and semantic errors in repetition of multiple-word utterances. The aim of this treatment study was to improve access to and repetition of low-imageability words by embedding them in modifier-noun phrases that enhanced their imageability. The treatment involved repetition of abstract noun pairs. We created modifier-abstract noun phrases that increased the semantic and syntactic cohesiveness of the words in the pair. For example, the phrases "long distance" and "social exclusion" were developed to improve repetition of the abstract pair "distance-exclusion". The goal of this manipulation was to increase the probability of accessing lexical and semantic representations of abstract words in repetition by enriching their semantic -syntactic context. We predicted that this increase in accessibility would be maintained when the words were repeated as pairs, but without the contextual phrase. Treatment outcomes indicated that

The neural substrates of semantic memory deficits in early Alzheimer's disease: Clues from semantic priming effects and FDG-PET

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Giffard, B.; Laisney, M.; Mezenge, F.; De la Sayette, V.; Eustache, F.; Desgranges, B.

2008-01-01

The neural substrates responsible for semantic dysfunction during the early stages of AD have yet to be clearly identified. After a brief overview of the literature on normal and pathological semantic memory, we describe a new approach, designed to provide fresh insights into semantic deficits in AD. We mapped the correlations between resting-state brain glucose utilisation measured by FDG-PET and semantic priming scores in a group of 17 AD patients. The priming task, which yields a particularly pure measurement of semantic memory, was composed of related pairs of words sharing an attribute relationship (e.g. tiger-stripe). The priming scores correlated positively with the metabolism of the superior temporal areas on both sides, especially the right side, and this correlation was shown to be specific to the semantic priming effect.This pattern of results is discussed in the light of recent theoretical models of semantic memory, and suggests that a dysfunction of the right superior temporal cortex may contribute to early semantic deficits, characterised by the loss of specific features of concepts in AD. (authors)

Mining Genotype-Phenotype Associations from Public Knowledge Sources via Semantic Web Querying

Science.gov (United States)

Kiefer, Richard C.; Freimuth, Robert R.; Chute, Christopher G; Pathak, Jyotishman

Gene Wiki Plus (GeneWiki+) and the Online Mendelian Inheritance in Man (OMIM) are publicly available resources for sharing information about disease-gene and gene-SNP associations in humans. While immensely useful to the scientific community, both resources are manually curated, thereby making the data entry and publication process time-consuming, and to some degree, error-prone. To this end, this study investigates Semantic Web technologies to validate existing and potentially discover new genotype-phenotype associations in GWP and OMIM. In particular, we demonstrate the applicability of SPARQL queries for identifying associations not explicitly stated for commonly occurring chronic diseases in GWP and OMIM, and report our preliminary findings for coverage, completeness, and validity of the associations. Our results highlight the benefits of Semantic Web querying technology to validate existing disease-gene associations as well as identify novel associations although further evaluation and analysis is required before such information can be applied and used effectively. PMID:24303249

Mining Genotype-Phenotype Associations from Public Knowledge Sources via Semantic Web Querying.

Science.gov (United States)

Kiefer, Richard C; Freimuth, Robert R; Chute, Christopher G; Pathak, Jyotishman

2013-01-01

Gene Wiki Plus (GeneWiki+) and the Online Mendelian Inheritance in Man (OMIM) are publicly available resources for sharing information about disease-gene and gene-SNP associations in humans. While immensely useful to the scientific community, both resources are manually curated, thereby making the data entry and publication process time-consuming, and to some degree, error-prone. To this end, this study investigates Semantic Web technologies to validate existing and potentially discover new genotype-phenotype associations in GWP and OMIM. In particular, we demonstrate the applicability of SPARQL queries for identifying associations not explicitly stated for commonly occurring chronic diseases in GWP and OMIM, and report our preliminary findings for coverage, completeness, and validity of the associations. Our results highlight the benefits of Semantic Web querying technology to validate existing disease-gene associations as well as identify novel associations although further evaluation and analysis is required before such information can be applied and used effectively.

Social Semantics for an Effective Enterprise

Science.gov (United States)

Berndt, Sarah; Doane, Mike

2012-01-01

An evolution of the Semantic Web, the Social Semantic Web (s2w), facilitates knowledge sharing with "useful information based on human contributions, which gets better as more people participate." The s2w reaches beyond the search box to move us from a collection of hyperlinked facts, to meaningful, real time context. When focused through the lens of Enterprise Search, the Social Semantic Web facilitates the fluid transition of meaningful business information from the source to the user. It is the confluence of human thought and computer processing structured with the iterative application of taxonomies, folksonomies, ontologies, and metadata schemas. The importance and nuances of human interaction are often deemphasized when focusing on automatic generation of semantic markup, which results in dissatisfied users and unrealized return on investment. Users consistently qualify the value of information sets through the act of selection, making them the de facto stakeholders of the Social Semantic Web. Employers are the ultimate beneficiaries of s2w utilization with a better informed, more decisive workforce; one not achieved with an IT miracle technology, but by improved human-computer interactions. Johnson Space Center Taxonomist Sarah Berndt and Mike Doane, principal owner of Term Management, LLC discuss the planning, development, and maintenance stages for components of a semantic system while emphasizing the necessity of a Social Semantic Web for the Enterprise. Identification of risks and variables associated with layering the successful implementation of a semantic system are also modeled.

Complex dynamics of semantic memory access in reading.

Science.gov (United States)

Baggio, Giosué; Fonseca, André

2012-02-07

Understanding a word in context relies on a cascade of perceptual and conceptual processes, starting with modality-specific input decoding, and leading to the unification of the word's meaning into a discourse model. One critical cognitive event, turning a sensory stimulus into a meaningful linguistic sign, is the access of a semantic representation from memory. Little is known about the changes that activating a word's meaning brings about in cortical dynamics. We recorded the electroencephalogram (EEG) while participants read sentences that could contain a contextually unexpected word, such as 'cold' in 'In July it is very cold outside'. We reconstructed trajectories in phase space from single-trial EEG time series, and we applied three nonlinear measures of predictability and complexity to each side of the semantic access boundary, estimated as the onset time of the N400 effect evoked by critical words. Relative to controls, unexpected words were associated with larger prediction errors preceding the onset of the N400. Accessing the meaning of such words produced a phase transition to lower entropy states, in which cortical processing becomes more predictable and more regular. Our study sheds new light on the dynamics of information flow through interfaces between sensory and memory systems during language processing.

SEMANTIC WEB MINING: ISSUES AND CHALLENGES

OpenAIRE

Karan Singh*, Anil kumar, Arun Kumar Yadav

2016-01-01

The combination of the two fast evolving scientific research areas “Semantic Web” and “Web Mining” are well-known as “Semantic Web Mining” in computer science. These two areas cover way for the mining of related and meaningful information from the web, by this means giving growth to the term “Semantic Web Mining”. The “Semantic Web” makes mining easy and “Web Mining” can construct new structure of Web. Web Mining applies Data Mining technique on web content, Structure and Usage. This paper gi...

The contribution of executive control to semantic cognition: Convergent evidence from semantic aphasia and executive dysfunction

OpenAIRE

Thompson, Hannah E; Almaghyuli, Azizah; Noonan, Krist A.; Barak, Ohr; Lambon Ralph, Matthew; Jefferies, Elizabeth

2018-01-01

Semantic cognition, as described by the Controlled Semantic Cognition (CSC) framework (Rogers, Patterson, Jefferies, & Lambon Ralph, 2015), involves two key components: activation of coherent, generalizable concepts within a heteromodal ‘hub’ in combination with modality-specific features (spokes), and a constraining mechanism that manipulates and gates this knowledge to generate time- and task- appropriate behaviour. Executive-semantic goal representations, largely supported by executive...

Inadvertent injection of formalin mistaken for local anesthetic agent: report of a case.

Science.gov (United States)

Arakeri, Gururaj; Brennan, Peter A

2012-05-01

Chemical facial cellulitis, while commonly seen in domestic accidents or attempted suicide, is uncommon in the dental office and hence rarely addressed in the dental literature. We present an unusual case of chemical facial cellulitis caused by inadvertent injection of formalin into the soft tissues of the oral cavity, which was mistaken for local anesthesia solution. This report comprises the immediate symptoms, possible root cause, and management of the difficult situation. We also provide some guidelines to avoid such unfortunate events. Copyright © 2012 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Psychologizing the Semantics of Fiction

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

John Woods

2010-04-01

Full Text Available Psychologiser la sémantique de la fictionLes théoriciens sémantistes de la fiction cherchent typiquement à expliquer nos relations sémantiques au fictionnel dans le contexte plus général des théories de la référence, privilégiant une explication de la sémantique sur le psychologique. Dans cet article, nous défendons une dépendance inverse. Par l’éclaircissement de nos relations psychologiques au fictionnel, nous trouverons un guide pour savoir comment développer une sémantique de la fiction. S’ensuivra une esquisse de la sémantique.Semantic theorists of fiction typically look for an account of our semantic relations to the fictional within general-purpose theories of reference, privileging an explanation of the semantic over the psychological. In this paper, we counsel a reverse dependency. In sorting out our psychological relations to the fictional, there is useful guidance about how to proceed with the semantics of fiction. A sketch of the semantics follows.

Jigsaw Semantics

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Paul J. E. Dekker

2010-12-01

Full Text Available In the last decade the enterprise of formal semantics has been under attack from several philosophical and linguistic perspectives, and it has certainly suffered from its own scattered state, which hosts quite a variety of paradigms which may seem to be incompatible. It will not do to try and answer the arguments of the critics, because the arguments are often well-taken. The negative conclusions, however, I believe are not. The only adequate reply seems to be a constructive one, which puts several pieces of formal semantics, in particular dynamic semantics, together again. In this paper I will try and sketch an overview of tasks, techniques, and results, which serves to at least suggest that it is possible to develop a coherent overall picture of undeniably important and structural phenomena in the interpretation of natural language. The idea is that the concept of meanings as truth conditions after all provides an excellent start for an integrated study of the meaning and use of natural language, and that an extended notion of goal directed pragmatics naturally complements this picture. None of the results reported here are really new, but we think it is important to re-collect them.ReferencesAsher, Nicholas & Lascarides, Alex. 1998. ‘Questions in Dialogue’. Linguistics and Philosophy 23: 237–309.http://dx.doi.org/10.1023/A:1005364332007Borg, Emma. 2007. ‘Minimalism versus contextualism in semantics’. In Gerhard Preyer & Georg Peter (eds. ‘Context-Sensitivity and Semantic Minimalism’, pp. 339–359. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Cappelen, Herman & Lepore, Ernest. 1997. ‘On an Alleged Connection between Indirect Quotation and Semantic Theory’. Mind and Language 12: pp. 278–296.Cappelen, Herman & Lepore, Ernie. 2005. Insensitive Semantics. Oxford: Blackwell.http://dx.doi.org/10.1002/9780470755792Dekker, Paul. 2002. ‘Meaning and Use of Indefinite Expressions’. Journal of Logic, Language and Information 11: pp. 141–194

Semantic tagging of and semantic enhancements to systematics papers: ZooKeys working examples

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Penev, L.; Agosti, D.; Georgiev, T.; Catapano, T.; Miller, J.; Blagoderov, V.; Roberts, D.; Smith, V.S.; Brake, I.; Ryrcroft, S.; Scott, B.; Johnson, N.F.; Morris, R.A.; Sautter, G.; Chavan, V.; Robertson, T.; Remsen, D.; Stoev, P.; Parr, C.; Knapp, S.; Kress, W.J.; Thompson, F.C.; Erwin, T.

2010-01-01

The concept of semantic tagging and its potential for semantic enhancements to taxonomic papers is outlined and illustrated by four exemplar papers published in the present issue of ZooKeys. The four papers were created in different ways: (i) written in Microsoft Word and submitted as non-tagged

Topics in Semantics-based Program Manipulation

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Grobauer, Bernt

four articles in the field of semantics-based techniques for program manipulation: three articles are about partial evaluation, a method for program specialization; the fourth article treats an approach to automatic cost analysis. Partial evaluation optimizes programs by specializing them with respect...... article in this dissertation describes how the second Futamura projection can be achieved for type-directed partial evaluation (TDPE), a relatively recent approach to partial evaluation: We derive an ML implementation of the second Futamura projection for TDPE. Due to the differences between ‘traditional...... denotational semantics—allows us to relate various possible semantics to each other both conceptually and formally. We thus are able to explain goal-directed evaluation using an intuitive list-based semantics, while using a continuation semantics for semantics-based compilation through partial evaluation...

Inter-deriving Semantic Artifacts for Object-Oriented Programming

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Danvy, Olivier; Johannsen, Jacob

2008-01-01

We present a new abstract machine for Abadi and Cardelli's untyped calculus of objects. What is special about this semantic artifact (i.e., man-made construct) is that is mechanically corresponds to both the reduction semantics (i.e., small-step operational semantics) and the natural semantics (i...... actual substitutions, we then represent object methods as closures and in the same inter-derivational spirit, we present three new semantic artifacts: a reduction semantics for a version of Abadi and Cardelli's untyped calculus of objects with explicit substitutions, an environment-based abstract machine...

Adherence to a Gluten-Free Diet in Mexican Subjects with Gluten-Related Disorders: A High Prevalence of Inadvertent Gluten Intake.

Science.gov (United States)

Ramírez-Cervantes, Karen Lizzette; Romero-López, Angélica Viridiana; Núñez-Álvarez, Carlos Alberto; Uscanga-Domínguez, Luis F

2016-01-01

The rate of compliance with a gluten-free diet in patients with gluten-related disorders is unknown in most Latin American countries. To study the adherence to a gluten-free diet of Mexican individuals with celiac disease and nonceliac gluten sensitivity at the time of their first medical and nutritional consultation at a tertiary referral center. A cross-sectional study was performed. A specific questionnaire was used to gather information on demographics, clinical condition, and self-reported adherence to a gluten-free diet, and to determine strict compliance and intentional or inadvertent gluten consumption. All questionnaires were applied by a nutritionist with expertise in gluten-related disorders. Fifty-six patients with celiac disease and 24 with non-celiac gluten sensitivity were included. Overall, 46 (57.5%) subjects perceived themselves as strictly adherent; however, inadvertent gluten intake was frequent in both celiac disease and non-celiac gluten sensitivity patients (39.2 vs. 33.3%; p = 0.2). Intentional consumption was more prevalent in subjects with celiac disease (48.8 vs. 29.1%; p = 0.048) and individuals with non-celiac gluten sensitivity showed better adherence (37.5 vs. 12.5%; p = 0.035). The importance of a gluten-free diet is underestimated by Mexican patients with celiac disease. The role of a team with expertise in gluten-related disorders is essential to identify inadvertent gluten intake.

13 CFR 126.308 - What happens if SBA inadvertently omits a qualified HUBZone SBC from the List?

Science.gov (United States)

2010-01-01

... writing at U.S. Small Business Administration, 409 Third Street, SW., Washington, DC 20416 or via e-mail... 13 Business Credit and Assistance 1 2010-01-01 2010-01-01 false What happens if SBA inadvertently omits a qualified HUBZone SBC from the List? 126.308 Section 126.308 Business Credit and Assistance...

Applying the intention-to-treat principle in practice: Guidance on handling randomisation errors.

Science.gov (United States)

Yelland, Lisa N; Sullivan, Thomas R; Voysey, Merryn; Lee, Katherine J; Cook, Jonathan A; Forbes, Andrew B

2015-08-01

The intention-to-treat principle states that all randomised participants should be analysed in their randomised group. The implications of this principle are widely discussed in relation to the analysis, but have received limited attention in the context of handling errors that occur during the randomisation process. The aims of this article are to (1) demonstrate the potential pitfalls of attempting to correct randomisation errors and (2) provide guidance on handling common randomisation errors when they are discovered that maintains the goals of the intention-to-treat principle. The potential pitfalls of attempting to correct randomisation errors are demonstrated and guidance on handling common errors is provided, using examples from our own experiences. We illustrate the problems that can occur when attempts are made to correct randomisation errors and argue that documenting, rather than correcting these errors, is most consistent with the intention-to-treat principle. When a participant is randomised using incorrect baseline information, we recommend accepting the randomisation but recording the correct baseline data. If ineligible participants are inadvertently randomised, we advocate keeping them in the trial and collecting all relevant data but seeking clinical input to determine their appropriate course of management, unless they can be excluded in an objective and unbiased manner. When multiple randomisations are performed in error for the same participant, we suggest retaining the initial randomisation and either disregarding the second randomisation if only one set of data will be obtained for the participant, or retaining the second randomisation otherwise. When participants are issued the incorrect treatment at the time of randomisation, we propose documenting the treatment received and seeking clinical input regarding the ongoing treatment of the participant. Randomisation errors are almost inevitable and should be reported in trial publications. The

The contribution of executive control to semantic cognition: Convergent evidence from semantic aphasia and executive dysfunction

OpenAIRE

Thompson, Hannah; Almaghyuli, Azizah; Noonan, Krist A.; barak, Ohr; Lambon Ralph, Matthew A.; Jefferies, Elizabeth

2018-01-01

Semantic cognition, as described by the controlled semantic cognition (CSC) framework (Rogers et al., 2015, Neuropsychologia, 76, 220), involves two key components: activation of coherent, generalizable concepts within a heteromodal ‘hub’ in combination with modality-specific features (spokes), and a constraining mechanism that manipulates and gates this knowledge to generate time- and task-appropriate behaviour. Executive–semantic goal representations, largely supported by executive regions ...

Survey of semantic modeling techniques

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Smith, C.L.

1975-07-01

The analysis of the semantics of programing languages was attempted with numerous modeling techniques. By providing a brief survey of these techniques together with an analysis of their applicability for answering semantic issues, this report attempts to illuminate the state-of-the-art in this area. The intent is to be illustrative rather than thorough in the coverage of semantic models. A bibliography is included for the reader who is interested in pursuing this area of research in more detail.

Semantic multimedia analysis and processing

CERN Document Server

Spyrou, Evaggelos; Mylonas, Phivos

2014-01-01

Broad in scope, Semantic Multimedia Analysis and Processing provides a complete reference of techniques, algorithms, and solutions for the design and the implementation of contemporary multimedia systems. Offering a balanced, global look at the latest advances in semantic indexing, retrieval, analysis, and processing of multimedia, the book features the contributions of renowned researchers from around the world. Its contents are based on four fundamental thematic pillars: 1) information and content retrieval, 2) semantic knowledge exploitation paradigms, 3) multimedia personalization, and 4)

Neural correlates underlying musical semantic memory.

Science.gov (United States)

Groussard, M; Viader, F; Landeau, B; Desgranges, B; Eustache, F; Platel, H

2009-07-01

Numerous functional imaging studies have examined the neural basis of semantic memory mainly using verbal and visuospatial materials. Musical material also allows an original way to explore semantic memory processes. We used PET imaging to determine the neural substrates that underlie musical semantic memory using different tasks and stimuli. The results of three PET studies revealed a greater involvement of the anterior part of the temporal lobe. Concerning clinical observations and our neuroimaging data, the musical lexicon (and most widely musical semantic memory) appears to be sustained by a temporo-prefrontal cerebral network involving right and left cerebral regions.

Flexible recruitment of semantic richness: Context modulates body-object interaction effects in lexical-semantic processing

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Cody eTousignant

2012-03-01

Full Text Available Body-object interaction (BOI is a semantic richness variable that measures the perceived ease with which the human body can physically interact with a word’s referent. Lexical and semantic processing is facilitated when words are associated with relatively more bodily experience (high BOI words, e.g., belt. To date, BOI effects have been examined in only one semantic decision context (is it imageable?. It has been argued that semantic processing is dynamic and can be modulated by context. We examined these influences by testing how task knowledge modulated BOI effects. We presented the same stimuli (high- and low-BOI entity words and a set of action words in each of four action/entity semantic categorization tasks (SCTs. Task framing was manipulated: participants were told about one (actions or entities or both (actions and entities categories of words in the decision task. Facilitatory BOI effects were observed when participants knew that ‘entity’ was part of the decision category, regardless of whether the high- and low-BOI entity words appeared on the affirmative or negative side of the decision. That BOI information was only useful when participants had expectations that object words would be presented suggests a strong role for the decision context in lexical-semantic processing, and supports a dynamic view of conceptual knowledge.

Scandinavian Semantics and the Human Body

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Levisen, Carsten

2015-01-01

, it is demonstrated that Scandinavian and English systems differ significantly in some aspects of the way in which the construe the human body with words. The study ventures an innovative combination of methods, pairing the Natural Semantic Metalanguage (NSM) approach to linguistic and conceptual analysis......This paper presents an ethnolinguistic analysis of how the space between the head and the body is construed in Scandinavian semantic systems vis-a-vis the semantic system of English. With an extensive case study of neck-related meanings in Danish, and with cross-Scandinavian reference...... with empirical evidence from the Evolution of Semantic Systems (EoSS) project. This combination of empirical and interpretative tools helps to integrate evidence from semantics and semiotics, pinning out in great detail the intricacies of the meanings of particular body words. The paper concludes that body words...

Inter-deriving Semantic Artifacts for Object-Oriented Programming

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Danvy, Olivier; Johannsen, Jacob

2010-01-01

We present a new abstract machine for Abadi and Cardelli's untyped non-imperative calculus of objects.  This abstract machine mechanically corresponds to both the reduction semantics (i.e., small-step operational semantics) and the natural semantics (i.e., big-step operational semantics) specified...

CASL - The CoFI Algebraic Specification Language - Semantics

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Haxthausen, Anne

1999-01-01

This is version 1.0 of the CASL Language Summary, annotated by the CoFI Semantics Task Group with the semantics of constructs. This is the second complete but possibly imperfect version of the semantics. It was compiled prior to the CoFI workshop in Amsterdam in March 1999.......This is version 1.0 of the CASL Language Summary, annotated by the CoFI Semantics Task Group with the semantics of constructs. This is the second complete but possibly imperfect version of the semantics. It was compiled prior to the CoFI workshop in Amsterdam in March 1999....

A top-down manner-based DCNN architecture for semantic image segmentation.

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Kai Qiao

Full Text Available Given their powerful feature representation for recognition, deep convolutional neural networks (DCNNs have been driving rapid advances in high-level computer vision tasks. However, their performance in semantic image segmentation is still not satisfactory. Based on the analysis of visual mechanism, we conclude that DCNNs in a bottom-up manner are not enough, because semantic image segmentation task requires not only recognition but also visual attention capability. In the study, superpixels containing visual attention information are introduced in a top-down manner, and an extensible architecture is proposed to improve the segmentation results of current DCNN-based methods. We employ the current state-of-the-art fully convolutional network (FCN and FCN with conditional random field (DeepLab-CRF as baselines to validate our architecture. Experimental results of the PASCAL VOC segmentation task qualitatively show that coarse edges and error segmentation results are well improved. We also quantitatively obtain about 2%-3% intersection over union (IOU accuracy improvement on the PASCAL VOC 2011 and 2012 test sets.

Using semantic analysis to improve speech recognition performance

OpenAIRE

Erdoğan, Hakan; Erdogan, Hakan; Sarıkaya, Ruhi; Sarikaya, Ruhi; Chen, Stanley F.; Gao, Yuqing; Picheny, Michael

2005-01-01

Although syntactic structure has been used in recent work in language modeling, there has not been much effort in using semantic analysis for language models. In this study, we propose three new language modeling techniques that use semantic analysis for spoken dialog systems. We call these methods concept sequence modeling, two-level semantic-lexical modeling, and joint semantic-lexical modeling. These models combine lexical information with varying amounts of semantic information, using ann...

Co-clustering for Weblogs in Semantic Space

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Zong, Yu; Xu, Guandong; Dolog, Peter

2010-01-01

Web clustering is an approach for aggregating web objects into various groups according to underlying relationships among them. Finding co-clusters of web objects in semantic space is an interesting topic in the context of web usage mining, which is able to capture the underlying user navigational...... interest and content preference simultaneously. In this paper we will present a novel web co-clustering algorithm named Co-Clustering in Semantic space (COCS) to simultaneously partition web users and pages via a latent semantic analysis approach. In COCS, we first, train the latent semantic space...... of weblog data by using Probabilistic Latent Semantic Analysis (PLSA) model, and then, project all weblog data objects into this semantic space with probability distribution to capture the relationship among web pages and web users, at last, propose a clustering algorithm to generate the co...

Discovery and Selection of Semantic Web Services

CERN Document Server

Wang, Xia

2013-01-01

For advanced web search engines to be able not only to search for semantically related information dispersed over different web pages, but also for semantic services providing certain functionalities, discovering semantic services is the key issue. Addressing four problems of current solution, this book presents the following contributions. A novel service model independent of semantic service description models is proposed, which clearly defines all elements necessary for service discovery and selection. It takes service selection as its gist and improves efficiency. Corresponding selection algorithms and their implementation as components of the extended Semantically Enabled Service-oriented Architecture in the Web Service Modeling Environment are detailed. Many applications of semantic web services, e.g. discovery, composition and mediation, can benefit from a general approach for building application ontologies. With application ontologies thus built, services are discovered in the same way as with single...

What we can learn from naming errors of children with language impairment at preschool age.

Science.gov (United States)

Biran, Michal; Novogrodsky, Rama; Harel-Nov, Efrat; Gil, Mali; Mimouni-Bloch, Aviva

2018-01-01

Naming is a complex, multi-level process. It is composed of distinct semantic and phonological levels. Children with naming deficits produce different error types when failing to retrieve the target word. This study explored the error characteristics of children with language impairment compared to those with typical language development. 46 preschool children were tested on a naming test: 16 with language impairment and a naming deficit and 30 with typical language development. The analysis compared types of error in both groups. In a group level, children with language impairment produced different error patterns compared to the control group. Based on naming error analysis and performance on other language tests, two case studies of contrasting profiles suggest different sources for lexical retrieval difficulties in children. The findings reveal differences between the two groups in naming scores and naming errors, and support a qualitative impairment in early development of children with naming deficits. The differing profiles of naming deficits emphasise the importance of including error analysis in the diagnosis.

Action representation: crosstalk between semantics and pragmatics.

Science.gov (United States)

Prinz, Wolfgang

2014-03-01

Marc Jeannerod pioneered a representational approach to movement and action. In his approach, motor representations provide both, declarative knowledge about action and procedural knowledge for action (action semantics and action pragmatics, respectively). Recent evidence from language comprehension and action simulation supports the claim that action pragmatics and action semantics draw on common representational resources, thus challenging the traditional divide between declarative and procedural action knowledge. To account for these observations, three kinds of theoretical frameworks are discussed: (i) semantics is grounded in pragmatics, (ii) pragmatics is anchored in semantics, and (iii) pragmatics is part and parcel of semantics. © 2013 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

The Semantics of Plurals: A Defense of Singularism

Science.gov (United States)

Florio, Salvatore

2010-01-01

In this dissertation, I defend "semantic singularism", which is the view that syntactically plural terms, such as "they" or "Russell and Whitehead", are semantically singular. A semantically singular term is a term that denotes a single entity. Semantic singularism is to be distinguished from "syntactic singularism", according to which…

Towards a Reactive Semantic Execution Environment

Science.gov (United States)

Komazec, Srdjan; Facca, Federico Michele

Managing complex and distributed software systems built on top of the service-oriented paradigm has never been more challenging. While Semantic Web Service technologies offer a promising set of languages and tools as a foundation to resolve the heterogeneity and scalability issues, they are still failing to provide an autonomic execution environment. In this paper we present an approach based on Semantic Web Services to enable the monitoring and self-management of a Semantic Execution Environment (SEE), a brokerage system for Semantic Web Services. Our approach is founded on the event-triggered reactivity paradigm in order to facilitate environment control, thus contributing to its autonomicity, robustness and flexibility.

Semantic Observation Integration

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Werner Kuhn

2012-09-01

Full Text Available Although the integration of sensor-based information into analysis and decision making has been a research topic for many years, semantic interoperability has not yet been reached. The advent of user-generated content for the geospatial domain, Volunteered Geographic Information (VGI, makes it even more difficult to establish semantic integration. This paper proposes a novel approach to integrating conventional sensor information and VGI, which is exploited in the context of detecting forest fires. In contrast to common logic-based semantic descriptions, we present a formal system using algebraic specifications to unambiguously describe the processing steps from natural phenomena to value-added information. A generic ontology of observations is extended and profiled for forest fire detection in order to illustrate how the sensing process, and transformations between heterogeneous sensing systems, can be represented as mathematical functions and grouped into abstract data types. We discuss the required ontological commitments and a possible generalization.

Insensitive Enough Semantics

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Richard Vallée

2006-06-01

Full Text Available According to some philosophers, sentences like (1 “It is raining” and (2 “John is ready” are context sensitive sentences even if they do not contain indexicals or demonstratives. That view initiated a context sensitivity frenzy. Cappelen and Lepore (2005 summarize the frenzy by the slogan “Every sentence is context sensitive” (Insensitive Semantics, p. 6, note 5. They suggest a view they call Minimalism according to which the truth conditions of utterances of sentences like (1/(2 are exactly what Convention T gives you. I will distinguish different propositions, and refocus semantics on sentences. As distinct from what the protagonists in the ongoing debate think, I argue that the content or truth conditions of utterances of both context sensitive sentences and sentences like (1/(2 are not interesting from a semantic point of view, and that the problem sentences like (1/(2 raises is not about context sensitivity or context insensitivity of sentences, but relevance of the content of utterances.

The Problem of Naturalizing Semantics.

Science.gov (United States)

Sullivan, Arthur

2000-01-01

Investigates conceptual barriers prevalent in the works of both proponents and opponents of semantic naturalism. Searches for a tenable definition of naturalism according to which one can be a realist, a non-reductionist, and a naturalist about semantic content. (Author/VWL)

Compiling Dictionaries Using Semantic Domains*

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Ronald Moe

2011-10-01

Full Text Available

Abstract: The task of providing dictionaries for all the world's languages is prodigious, re-quiring efficient techniques. The text corpus method cannot be used for minority languages lacking texts. To meet the need, the author has constructed a list of 1 600 semantic domains, which he has successfully used to collect words. In a workshop setting, a group of speakers can collect as many as 17 000 words in ten days. This method results in a classified word list that can be efficiently expanded into a full dictionary. The method works because the mental lexicon is a giant web or-ganized around key concepts. A semantic domain can be defined as an important concept together with the words directly related to it by lexical relations. A person can utilize the mental web to quickly jump from word to word within a domain. The author is developing a template for each domain to aid in collecting words and in de-scribing their semantics. Investigating semantics within the context of a domain yields many in-sights. The method permits the production of both alphabetically and semantically organized dic-tionaries. The list of domains is intended to be universal in scope and applicability. Perhaps due to universals of human experience and universals of linguistic competence, there are striking simi-larities in various lists of semantic domains developed for languages around the world. Using a standardized list of domains to classify multiple dictionaries opens up possibilities for cross-lin-guistic research into semantic and lexical universals.

Keywords: SEMANTIC DOMAINS, SEMANTIC FIELDS, SEMANTIC CATEGORIES, LEX-ICAL RELATIONS, SEMANTIC PRIMITIVES, DOMAIN TEMPLATES, MENTAL LEXICON, SEMANTIC UNIVERSALS, MINORITY LANGUAGES, LEXICOGRAPHY

Opsomming: Samestelling van woordeboeke deur gebruikmaking van se-mantiese domeine. Die taak van die voorsiening van woordeboeke aan al die tale van die wêreld is geweldig en vereis doeltreffende tegnieke. Die

Prevention of the inadvertent movement and illicit trafficking of radioactive and nuclear materials in Argentine border

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Bonet Duran, Stella M.; Canibano, Javier A.; Menossi, Sergio A.; Rodriguez, Carlos E.

2004-01-01

The inadvertent and illegal movements of radioactive and nuclear materials are issues of increased national and international awareness. States are progressively becoming more conscious of the need to adequately respond to these events. As regards the States' regulatory infrastructure, the design and enforcement of control and verification measures to maintain the continuity of knowledge about possession, use and movements of radioactive and nuclear materials is of critical importance. The existence of an appropriate legislative framework and a regulatory authority empowered to establish effective safety and security measures are essential to prevent inadvertent and illegal movements of nuclear materials and other radioactive materials. The events of Sep. 11, 2001 in the US have increased the States' awareness on the need to review their national infrastructure to identify additional measures against inadvertent and illegal movements of radioactive and nuclear materials as well as against sabotage of nuclear facilities. Argentina has more than a half- century- old tradition regarding the control and supervision of all activities involving the use of nuclear and radioactive materials. The Nuclear Regulatory Authority (ARN) of Argentina is the organization with federal competence in radiation protection, nuclear safety, safeguards and physical protection. It is responsible for issuing licenses and permits to any activity involving radioactive materials and for controlling and verifying that these activities are performed in full compliance with ARN standards and requirements. In the region, Argentina has been playing an important role in the prevention of illicit traffic of nuclear and radioactive materials for the last years within the framework of Security Commission of MERCOSUR. The last goals of this initiative are to define and coordinate actions and to establish a set of common operational procedures in the countries participating in the mentioned multilateral

The association between semantic dementia and surface dyslexia in Japanese.

Science.gov (United States)

Fushimi, Takao; Komori, Kenjiro; Ikeda, Manabu; Lambon Ralph, Matthew A; Patterson, Karalyn

2009-03-01

One theory about reading suggests that producing the correct pronunciations of written words, particularly less familiar words with an atypical spelling-sound relationship, relies in part on knowledge of the word's meaning. This hypothesis has been supported by reports of surface dyslexia in large case-series studies of English-speaking/reading patients with semantic dementia (SD), but would have increased credibility if it applied to other languages and writing systems as well. The hypothesis predicts that, of the two systems used to write Japanese, SD patients should be unimpaired at oral reading of kana because of its invariant relationship between orthography and phonology. By contrast, oral reading of kanji should be impaired in a graded fashion depending on the consistency characteristics of the kanji target words, with worst performance on words whose component characters take 'minority' (atypical) pronunciations, especially if the words are of lower frequency. Errors in kanji reading should primarily reflect assignment of more typical readings to the component characters in these atypical words. In the largest-ever-reported case series of Japanese patients with semantic dementia, we tested and confirmed this hypothesis.

Semantic Business Process Modeling

OpenAIRE

Markovic, Ivan

2010-01-01

This book presents a process-oriented business modeling framework based on semantic technologies. The framework consists of modeling languages, methods, and tools that allow for semantic modeling of business motivation, business policies and rules, and business processes. Quality of the proposed modeling framework is evaluated based on the modeling content of SAP Solution Composer and several real-world business scenarios.

Semantic annotation in biomedicine: the current landscape.

Science.gov (United States)

Jovanović, Jelena; Bagheri, Ebrahim

2017-09-22

The abundance and unstructured nature of biomedical texts, be it clinical or research content, impose significant challenges for the effective and efficient use of information and knowledge stored in such texts. Annotation of biomedical documents with machine intelligible semantics facilitates advanced, semantics-based text management, curation, indexing, and search. This paper focuses on annotation of biomedical entity mentions with concepts from relevant biomedical knowledge bases such as UMLS. As a result, the meaning of those mentions is unambiguously and explicitly defined, and thus made readily available for automated processing. This process is widely known as semantic annotation, and the tools that perform it are known as semantic annotators.Over the last dozen years, the biomedical research community has invested significant efforts in the development of biomedical semantic annotation technology. Aiming to establish grounds for further developments in this area, we review a selected set of state of the art biomedical semantic annotators, focusing particularly on general purpose annotators, that is, semantic annotation tools that can be customized to work with texts from any area of biomedicine. We also examine potential directions for further improvements of today's annotators which could make them even more capable of meeting the needs of real-world applications. To motivate and encourage further developments in this area, along the suggested and/or related directions, we review existing and potential practical applications and benefits of semantic annotators.

Inadvertent puncture of the aortic noncoronary cusp during postoperative left atrial tachycardia ablation

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Dursun Aras, MD

2015-08-01

Full Text Available Transseptal catheterization has become part of the interventional electrophysiologist׳s technical armamentarium since the development of left atrial catheter ablation and percutaneous technologies for treating mitral and aortic valve disease. Although frequently performed, the procedure׳s most feared complication is aortic root penetration. Focal atrial tachycardia has been described as the most common late sequela of surgical valve replacements. We present a complicated case involving the inadvertent delivery of an 8 French sheath across the noncoronary cusp during radiofrequency catheter ablation for left atrial tachycardia originating from the mitral annulus in a patient with prior mitral valve replacement.

Exploiting semantic linkages among multiple sources for semantic information retrieval

Science.gov (United States)

Li, JianQiang; Yang, Ji-Jiang; Liu, Chunchen; Zhao, Yu; Liu, Bo; Shi, Yuliang

2014-07-01

The vision of the Semantic Web is to build a global Web of machine-readable data to be consumed by intelligent applications. As the first step to make this vision come true, the initiative of linked open data has fostered many novel applications aimed at improving data accessibility in the public Web. Comparably, the enterprise environment is so different from the public Web that most potentially usable business information originates in an unstructured form (typically in free text), which poses a challenge for the adoption of semantic technologies in the enterprise environment. Considering that the business information in a company is highly specific and centred around a set of commonly used concepts, this paper describes a pilot study to migrate the concept of linked data into the development of a domain-specific application, i.e. the vehicle repair support system. The set of commonly used concepts, including the part name of a car and the phenomenon term on the car repairing, are employed to build the linkage between data and documents distributed among different sources, leading to the fusion of documents and data across source boundaries. Then, we describe the approaches of semantic information retrieval to consume these linkages for value creation for companies. The experiments on two real-world data sets show that the proposed approaches outperform the best baseline 6.3-10.8% and 6.4-11.1% in terms of top five and top 10 precisions, respectively. We believe that our pilot study can serve as an important reference for the development of similar semantic applications in an enterprise environment.

An explicit semantic relatedness measure based on random walk

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

HU Sihui

2016-10-01

Full Text Available The semantic relatedness calculation of open domain knowledge network is a significant issue.In this paper,pheromone strategy is drawn from the thought of ant colony algorithm and is integrated into the random walk which is taken as the basic framework of calculating the semantic relatedness degree.The pheromone distribution is taken as a criterion of determining the tightness degree of semantic relatedness.A method of calculating semantic relatedness degree based on random walk is proposed and the exploration process of calculating the semantic relatedness degree is presented in a dominant way.The method mainly contains Path Select Model(PSM and Semantic Relatedness Computing Model(SRCM.PSM is used to simulate the path selection of ants and pheromone release.SRCM is used to calculate the semantic relatedness by utilizing the information returned by ants.The result indicates that the method could complete semantic relatedness calculation in linear complexity and extend the feasible strategy of semantic relatedness calculation.

The neural substrates of semantic memory deficits in early Alzheimer's disease: Clues from semantic priming effects and FDG-PET

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Giffard, B.; Laisney, M.; Mezenge, F.; De la Sayette, V.; Eustache, F.; Desgranges, B. [Univ Caen Basse Normandie, INSERM, U923, Unite Rech, EPHE, Lab Neuropsychol, CHU Cote Nacre, GIP Cyceron, F-14033 Caen (France)

2008-07-01

The neural substrates responsible for semantic dysfunction during the early stages of AD have yet to be clearly identified. After a brief overview of the literature on normal and pathological semantic memory, we describe a new approach, designed to provide fresh insights into semantic deficits in AD. We mapped the correlations between resting-state brain glucose utilisation measured by FDG-PET and semantic priming scores in a group of 17 AD patients. The priming task, which yields a particularly pure measurement of semantic memory, was composed of related pairs of words sharing an attribute relationship (e.g. tiger-stripe). The priming scores correlated positively with the metabolism of the superior temporal areas on both sides, especially the right side, and this correlation was shown to be specific to the semantic priming effect.This pattern of results is discussed in the light of recent theoretical models of semantic memory, and suggests that a dysfunction of the right superior temporal cortex may contribute to early semantic deficits, characterised by the loss of specific features of concepts in AD. (authors)

A Generalization of Inquisitive Semantics

Czech Academy of Sciences Publication Activity Database

Punčochář, Vít

2016-01-01

Roč. 45, č. 4 (2016), s. 399-428 ISSN 0022-3611 R&D Projects: GA ČR(CZ) GA13-21076S Institutional support: RVO:67985955 Keywords : Intuitionistic logic * Superintuitionistic logics * Inquisitive logic * Topological semantics * Kripke semantics * Disjunction Subject RIV: AA - Philosophy ; Religion

The Role of Executive Function in the Semantic Comprehension Deficits of Stroke Aphasia and Semantic Dementia

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Curtiss Chapman

2015-05-01

Results from 5 SD patients and 4 SA patients in our ongoing study suggest similar patterns of impairment on both semantic and executive function tasks for both patient groups. Both showed multi-modal semantic deficits via poor performance on at least 3 out of 5 semantic tasks tapping different modalities. Also, SA and SD patients showed no difference in consistency across semantic tasks (see Fig. 1a & b. Both groups also showed consistently poor performance on trail-making and verbal Stroop tasks compared to controls (see Figs. 1c & 1d. SD patients seem to be less impaired on both span measures (word span range: 2.17 – 4.43; digit span: 3.17 – 5.5 than SA patients (word span range: 1.63 – 3.75; digit span: 1.17 – 4.17, and performance was variable for both groups on non-verbal Stroop and picture-word interference. SD patients found many executive tasks too difficult to understand, which may be the reason for limited prior data for them on EF tasks.. These findings suggest that the use of syndrome categories like semantic dementia and comprehension-impaired stroke aphasia are not useful in distinguishing between storage and access deficits. Patients classified as having SD seem as likely as SA patients to have certain kinds of executive deficits and SA patients may be as likely as SD patients to show consistency across semantic tasks. The results imply that some other behavioral or neuroanatomical basis rather than syndrome classification should be used to address the hypothesized separation of storage vs. control aspects of semantic memory.

Workspaces in the Semantic Web

Science.gov (United States)

Wolfe, Shawn R.; Keller, RIchard M.

2005-01-01

Due to the recency and relatively limited adoption of Semantic Web technologies. practical issues related to technology scaling have received less attention than foundational issues. Nonetheless, these issues must be addressed if the Semantic Web is to realize its full potential. In particular, we concentrate on the lack of scoping methods that reduce the size of semantic information spaces so they are more efficient to work with and more relevant to an agent's needs. We provide some intuition to motivate the need for such reduced information spaces, called workspaces, give a formal definition, and suggest possible methods of deriving them.

Semantic e-Learning: Next Generation of e-Learning?

Science.gov (United States)

Konstantinos, Markellos; Penelope, Markellou; Giannis, Koutsonikos; Aglaia, Liopa-Tsakalidi

Semantic e-learning aspires to be the next generation of e-learning, since the understanding of learning materials and knowledge semantics allows their advanced representation, manipulation, sharing, exchange and reuse and ultimately promote efficient online experiences for users. In this context, the paper firstly explores some fundamental Semantic Web technologies and then discusses current and potential applications of these technologies in e-learning domain, namely, Semantic portals, Semantic search, personalization, recommendation systems, social software and Web 2.0 tools. Finally, it highlights future research directions and open issues of the field.

Explaining Semantic Short-Term Memory Deficits: Evidence for the Critical Role of Semantic Control

Science.gov (United States)

Hoffman, Paul; Jefferies, Elizabeth; Lambon Ralph, Matthew A.

2011-01-01

Patients with apparently selective short-term memory (STM) deficits for semantic information have played an important role in developing multi-store theories of STM and challenge the idea that verbal STM is supported by maintaining activation in the language system. We propose that semantic STM deficits are not as selective as previously thought…

The Semantics of "Violence"

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Levisen, Carsten

This paper presents a semantic analysis of “violence” – a word around which Anglo-internationaldiscourses revolve. Many ethnolinguistic communities around the world are currently adapting thisEnglish lexical concept into their linguistic systems, and, presumably also, the view of the worldembodied...... by the “violence” concept.Based on semantic fieldwork in Port Vila, the creolophone capital of Vanuatu in the SouthPacific, the paper investigates the discursive introduction of “violence” into a community which,until recently, lived by other concepts. I compare and contrast the traditional Bislama concepts...... kilimand faetem with the newly imported English word vaeolens (violence). My study provides newevidence for how cognitive and semantic change co-occur in the context of postcolonial linguisticcommunities, and my paper addresses an important, ongoing controversy related to the notion of“Anglocentric bias...

A Machine Learning Based Analytical Framework for Semantic Annotation Requirements

OpenAIRE

Hamed Hassanzadeh; MohammadReza Keyvanpour

2011-01-01

The Semantic Web is an extension of the current web in which information is given well-defined meaning. The perspective of Semantic Web is to promote the quality and intelligence of the current web by changing its contents into machine understandable form. Therefore, semantic level information is one of the cornerstones of the Semantic Web. The process of adding semantic metadata to web resources is called Semantic Annotation. There are many obstacles against the Semantic Annotation, such as ...

Analyses of natural resources in 10 CFR Part 60 as related to inadvertent human intrusion

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Miklas, M.P.; Lefevre, H.E.

1993-01-01

The purpose of this paper is to examine the intent of the regulatory language of the portions of 10 CFR Part 60 which deal with considerations of the natural resources of a proposed geologic repository for high-level radioactive wastes as they relate to inadvertent human intrusion. Four Potentially Adverse Conditions (PAC) the requirements of 10 CFR 60.21(c)(13) are shown to be related to natural resources. Groundwater is identified as a natural resource known to be present at Yucca Mountain, Nevada. For economic considerations of natural resources, the open-quotes foreseeable futureclose quotes is thought to be no more than 50 years. Two of the topics addressed by the PACs, subsurface mining and drilling at a proposed repository site, are pre-site-characterization activities which must be evaluated in the context of repository performance criteria set by the US EPA standard, 40 CFR Part 191. An alternative US DOE compliance demonstration to another PAC, 10 CFR 60.122(c)(17), might be to use an open-quotes explorationist perspectiveclose quotes of natural resource assessment. The Commission intends for DOE to evaluate the likelihood and consequence of inadvertent human intrusion into a geologic repository as a result of exploration or exploitation of natural resources within or near a proposed high-level radioactive waste geologic repository

On the Semantics of Focus

Science.gov (United States)

Kess, Joseph F.

1975-01-01

This article discusses the semantics of the notion of focus, insofar as it relates to Filipino languages. The evolution of this notion is reviewed, and an alternative explanation of it is given, stressing the fact that grammar and semantics should be kept separate in a discussion of focus. (CLK)

Information Interaction as a Mechanism of Semantic Gap Elimination

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Victor Y. Tsvetkov

2013-01-01

Full Text Available The article studies semantic gap as an objective phenomenon, shows that semantic gap occurs both in parallel computing and in other areas. Semantic description of the content is revealed as a set of different descriptions. Causes of semantic gap are described. The content of information exchange is explained in the article. Information interaction in the semantic field is interpreted as a mechanism to lessen the gap

On the (un)suitability of semantic categories

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Rijkhoff, Jan

2009-01-01

Since Greenberg’s groundbreaking publication on universals of grammar, typologists have used semantic categories to investigate (constraints on) morphological and syntactic variation in the world’s languages and this tradition has been continued in the WALS project. It is argued here that the emp......Since Greenberg’s groundbreaking publication on universals of grammar, typologists have used semantic categories to investigate (constraints on) morphological and syntactic variation in the world’s languages and this tradition has been continued in the WALS project. It is argued here...... that the employment of semantic categories has some serious drawbacks, however, suggesting that semantic categories, just like formal categories, cannot be equated across languages in morphosyntactic typology. Whereas formal categories are too narrow in that they do not cover all structural variants attested across...... languages, semantic categories can be too wide, including too many structural variants. Furthermore, it appears that in some major typological studies semantic categories have been confused with formal categories. A possible solution is pointed out: typologists first need to make sure that the forms...

An Operational Semantics for Trust Policies

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Krukow, Karl

2006-01-01

In the trust-structure framework for trust management, principals specify their trusting relationships in terms of trust policies. In their paper on trust structures, Carbone et al. present a language for such policies, and provide a suitable denotational semantics. The semantics ensures that for......In the trust-structure framework for trust management, principals specify their trusting relationships in terms of trust policies. In their paper on trust structures, Carbone et al. present a language for such policies, and provide a suitable denotational semantics. The semantics ensures...... that for any collection of policies, there is always a unique global trust-state, compatible with all the policies, specifying everyone's degree of trust in everyone else. However, as the authors themselves point out, the language lacks an operational model: the global trust-state is a well......-defined mathematical object, but it is not clear how principals can actually compute it. This becomes even more apparent when one considers the intended application environment: vast numbers of autonomous principals, distributed and possibly mobile. We provide a compositional operational semantics for a language...

Study of 'inadvertent human intrusion or rare natural event scenarios' for sub-surface disposal of radioactive waste

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Nakatani, Takayoshi; Ishitoya, Kimihide; Funabashi, Hideyuki; Sugaya, Toshikatsu; Sone, Tomoyuki; Shimada, Hidemitsu; Nakai, Kunihiro

2010-03-01

Japan Atomic Energy Agency (JAEA) is making preparations for the sub-surface disposal of radioactive wastes, in an integrated fashion according to the properties of the waste material regardless of the generators or waste sources. In this study, 'Inadvertent Human Intrusion or Rare Natural Event Scenarios' of 'Three Types scenarios' was considered according to the standard of the Atomic Energy Society of Japan (AESJ) on the sub-surface disposal system that was based on 'Basic Policy for Safety Regulation Concerning Land Disposal of Low-Level Radioactive Waste (Interim Report)' by Nuclear Safety Commission of Japan (NSC). Selection of the assessed scenarios, development of the assessment tool and preliminary exposure dose assessment for general public were conducted. Among the assessed scenarios, the exposure dose of 'well water drinking scenario' was the highest under the very conservative assessment condition. This scenario assumed that the groundwater in Excavation Disturbed Zone (EDZ) was directly used as drinking water without any dilution. Although this was very conservative condition and the result exceeded 10 mSv/y, it stayed under the upper limit of standard dose value for 'Inadvertent Human Intrusion or Rare Natural Event Scenarios' (10 - 100 mSv/y). (author)

The semantic similarity ensemble

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Andrea Ballatore

2013-12-01

Full Text Available Computational measures of semantic similarity between geographic terms provide valuable support across geographic information retrieval, data mining, and information integration. To date, a wide variety of approaches to geo-semantic similarity have been devised. A judgment of similarity is not intrinsically right or wrong, but obtains a certain degree of cognitive plausibility, depending on how closely it mimics human behavior. Thus selecting the most appropriate measure for a specific task is a significant challenge. To address this issue, we make an analogy between computational similarity measures and soliciting domain expert opinions, which incorporate a subjective set of beliefs, perceptions, hypotheses, and epistemic biases. Following this analogy, we define the semantic similarity ensemble (SSE as a composition of different similarity measures, acting as a panel of experts having to reach a decision on the semantic similarity of a set of geographic terms. The approach is evaluated in comparison to human judgments, and results indicate that an SSE performs better than the average of its parts. Although the best member tends to outperform the ensemble, all ensembles outperform the average performance of each ensemble's member. Hence, in contexts where the best measure is unknown, the ensemble provides a more cognitively plausible approach.

Semantic graphs and associative memories

Science.gov (United States)

Pomi, Andrés; Mizraji, Eduardo

2004-12-01

Graphs have been increasingly utilized in the characterization of complex networks from diverse origins, including different kinds of semantic networks. Human memories are associative and are known to support complex semantic nets; these nets are represented by graphs. However, it is not known how the brain can sustain these semantic graphs. The vision of cognitive brain activities, shown by modern functional imaging techniques, assigns renewed value to classical distributed associative memory models. Here we show that these neural network models, also known as correlation matrix memories, naturally support a graph representation of the stored semantic structure. We demonstrate that the adjacency matrix of this graph of associations is just the memory coded with the standard basis of the concept vector space, and that the spectrum of the graph is a code invariant of the memory. As long as the assumptions of the model remain valid this result provides a practical method to predict and modify the evolution of the cognitive dynamics. Also, it could provide us with a way to comprehend how individual brains that map the external reality, almost surely with different particular vector representations, are nevertheless able to communicate and share a common knowledge of the world. We finish presenting adaptive association graphs, an extension of the model that makes use of the tensor product, which provides a solution to the known problem of branching in semantic nets.

ERPs, semantic processing and age.

Science.gov (United States)

Miyamoto, T; Katayama, J; Koyama, T

1998-06-01

ERPs (N400, LPC and CNV) were elicited in two sets of subjects grouped according to age (young vs. elderly) using a word-pair category matching paradigm. Each prime consisted of a Japanese noun (constructed from two to four characters of the Hiragana) followed by one Chinese character (Kanji) as the target, this latter representing one of five semantic categories. There were two equally probable target conditions: match or mismatch. Each target was preceded by a prime, either belonging to, or not belonging to, the same semantic category. The subjects were required to respond with a specified button press to the given target according to the condition. We found RTs to be longer in the elderly subjects and under the mismatch condition. N400 amplitude was reduced in the elderly subjects under the mismatch condition and there was no difference between match and mismatch response, which were similar in amplitude to that under match condition for the young subjects. In addition, the CNV amplitudes were larger in the elderly subjects. These results suggested that functional changes in semantic processing through aging (larger semantic networks and diffuse semantic activation) were the cause of this N400 reduction, attributing a subsidiary role to attentional disturbance. We also discuss the importance of taking age-related changes into consideration in clinical studies.

Semantic interpretation of search engine resultant

Science.gov (United States)

Nasution, M. K. M.

2018-01-01

In semantic, logical language can be interpreted in various forms, but the certainty of meaning is included in the uncertainty, which directly always influences the role of technology. One results of this uncertainty applies to search engines as user interfaces with information spaces such as the Web. Therefore, the behaviour of search engine results should be interpreted with certainty through semantic formulation as interpretation. Behaviour formulation shows there are various interpretations that can be done semantically either temporary, inclusion, or repeat.

Behavior Modification Through Covert Semantic Desensitization

Science.gov (United States)

Hekmat, Hamid; Vanian, Daniel

1971-01-01

Results support the hypothesized relationship between meaning and phobia. Semantic desensitization techniques based on counter conditioning of meaning were significantly effective in altering the semantic value of the word from unpleasantness to neutrality. (Author)

Semantic processing of EHR data for clinical research.

Science.gov (United States)

Sun, Hong; Depraetere, Kristof; De Roo, Jos; Mels, Giovanni; De Vloed, Boris; Twagirumukiza, Marc; Colaert, Dirk

2015-12-01

There is a growing need to semantically process and integrate clinical data from different sources for clinical research. This paper presents an approach to integrate EHRs from heterogeneous resources and generate integrated data in different data formats or semantics to support various clinical research applications. The proposed approach builds semantic data virtualization layers on top of data sources, which generate data in the requested semantics or formats on demand. This approach avoids upfront dumping to and synchronizing of the data with various representations. Data from different EHR systems are first mapped to RDF data with source semantics, and then converted to representations with harmonized domain semantics where domain ontologies and terminologies are used to improve reusability. It is also possible to further convert data to application semantics and store the converted results in clinical research databases, e.g. i2b2, OMOP, to support different clinical research settings. Semantic conversions between different representations are explicitly expressed using N3 rules and executed by an N3 Reasoner (EYE), which can also generate proofs of the conversion processes. The solution presented in this paper has been applied to real-world applications that process large scale EHR data. Copyright © 2015 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Semantic acquisition games harnessing manpower for creating semantics

CERN Document Server

Šimko, Jakub

2014-01-01

A comprehensive and extensive review of state-of-the-art in semantics acquisition game (SAG) design A set of design patterns for SAG designers A set of case studies (real SAG projects) demonstrating the use of SAG design patterns

Semantic transparency affects morphological priming . . . eventually.

Science.gov (United States)

Heyer, Vera; Kornishova, Dana

2018-05-01

Semantic transparency has been in the focus of psycholinguistic research for decades, with the controversy about the time course of the application of morpho-semantic information during the processing of morphologically complex words not yet resolved. This study reports two masked priming studies with English - ness and Russian - ost' nominalisations, investigating how semantic transparency modulates native speakers' morphological priming effects at short and long stimulus onset asynchronies (SOAs). In both languages, we found increased morphological priming for nominalisations at the transparent end of the scale (e.g. paleness - pale) in comparison to items at the opaque end of the scale (e.g. business - busy) but only at longer prime durations. The present findings are in line with models that posit an initial phase of morpho-orthographic (semantically blind) decomposition.

Semantic computing and language knowledge bases

Science.gov (United States)

Wang, Lei; Wang, Houfeng; Yu, Shiwen

2017-09-01

As the proposition of the next-generation Web - semantic Web, semantic computing has been drawing more and more attention within the circle and the industries. A lot of research has been conducted on the theory and methodology of the subject, and potential applications have also been investigated and proposed in many fields. The progress of semantic computing made so far cannot be detached from its supporting pivot - language resources, for instance, language knowledge bases. This paper proposes three perspectives of semantic computing from a macro view and describes the current status of affairs about the construction of language knowledge bases and the related research and applications that have been carried out on the basis of these resources via a case study in the Institute of Computational Linguistics at Peking University.

Extracting Semantic Information from Visual Data: A Survey

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Qiang Liu

2016-03-01

Full Text Available The traditional environment maps built by mobile robots include both metric ones and topological ones. These maps are navigation-oriented and not adequate for service robots to interact with or serve human users who normally rely on the conceptual knowledge or semantic contents of the environment. Therefore, the construction of semantic maps becomes necessary for building an effective human-robot interface for service robots. This paper reviews recent research and development in the field of visual-based semantic mapping. The main focus is placed on how to extract semantic information from visual data in terms of feature extraction, object/place recognition and semantic representation methods.

Semantic web for integrated network analysis in biomedicine.

Science.gov (United States)

Chen, Huajun; Ding, Li; Wu, Zhaohui; Yu, Tong; Dhanapalan, Lavanya; Chen, Jake Y

2009-03-01

The Semantic Web technology enables integration of heterogeneous data on the World Wide Web by making the semantics of data explicit through formal ontologies. In this article, we survey the feasibility and state of the art of utilizing the Semantic Web technology to represent, integrate and analyze the knowledge in various biomedical networks. We introduce a new conceptual framework, semantic graph mining, to enable researchers to integrate graph mining with ontology reasoning in network data analysis. Through four case studies, we demonstrate how semantic graph mining can be applied to the analysis of disease-causal genes, Gene Ontology category cross-talks, drug efficacy analysis and herb-drug interactions analysis.

Intuitions and Competence in Formal Semantics

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Martin Stokhof

2010-12-01

Full Text Available In formal semantics intuition plays a key role, in two ways. Intuitions about semantic properties of expressions are the primary data, and intuitions of the semanticists are the main access to these data. The paper investigates how this dual role is related to the concept of competence and the role that this concept plays in semantics. And it inquires whether the self-reflexive role of intuitions has consequences for the methodology of semantics as an empirical discipline.ReferencesBaggio, Giosuè, van Lambalgen, Michiel & Hagoort, Peter. 2008. ‘Computing and recomputing discourse models: an ERP study of the semantics of temporal connectives’. Journal of Memory and Language 59, no. 1: 36–53.http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.jml.2008.02.005Chierchia, Gennaro & McConnell-Ginet, Sally. 2000. Meaning and Grammar. second ed. Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press.Chomsky, Noam. 1965. Aspects of the Theory of Syntax. Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press.Cresswell, Max J. 1978. ‘Semantic competence’. In F. Guenthner & M. Guenther-Reutter (eds. ‘Meaning and Translation’, 9–27. Duckworth, London. de Swart, Henriëtte. 1998. Introduction to Natural Language Semantics. Stanford: CSLI.Dowty, David, Wall, Robert & Peters, Stanley. 1981. Introduction to Montague Semantics. Dordrecht: Reidel.Heim, Irene & Kratzer, Angelika. 1998. Semantics in Generative Grammar. Oxford: Blackwell.Larson, Richard & Segal, Gabriel. 1995. Knowledge of Meaning. Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press.Lewis, David K. 1975. ‘Languages and Language’. In Keith Gunderson (ed. ‘Language, Mind and Knowledge’, 3–35. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press.Montague, Richard. 1970. ‘Universal Grammar’. Theoria 36: 373–98.http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/j.1755-2567.1970.tb00434.xPartee, Barbara H. 1979. ‘Semantics – Mathematics or Psychology?’ In Rainer Bäuerle, Urs Egli & Arnim von Stechow (eds. ‘Semantics from Different Points of View’, 1–14. Berlin: Springer.Partee, Barbara H. 1980. �

Ontology Based Resolution of Semantic Conflicts in Information Integration

Institute of Scientific and Technical Information of China (English)

LU Han; LI Qing-zhong

2004-01-01

Semantic conflict is the conflict caused by using different ways in heterogeneous systems to express the same entity in reality.This prevents information integration from accomplishing semantic coherence.Since ontology helps to solve semantic problems, this area has become a hot topic in information integration.In this paper, we introduce semantic conflict into information integration of heterogeneous applications.We discuss the origins and categories of the conflict, and present an ontology-based schema mapping approach to eliminate semantic conflicts.

A logical correspondence between natural semantics and abstract machines

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Simmons, Robert J.; Zerny, Ian

2013-01-01

We present a logical correspondence between natural semantics and abstract machines. This correspondence enables the mechanical and fully-correct construction of an abstract machine from a natural semantics. Our logical correspondence mirrors the Reynolds functional correspondence, but we...... manipulate semantic specifications encoded in a logical framework instead of manipulating functional programs. Natural semantics and abstract machines are instances of substructural operational semantics. As a byproduct, using a substructural logical framework, we bring concurrent and stateful models...

Endovascular repair of inadvertent arterial injury induced by central venous catheterization using a vascular closure device: A case report

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Kim, So Hee; Jang, Woo Jin; Oh, Ju Heyon; Song, Yun Gyu [Samsung Changwon Hospital, Sungkyunkwan University School of Medicine, Changwon (Korea, Republic of)

2017-04-15

Central venous catheterization can cause various complications. Inadvertent subclavian artery catheterization was performed during insertion of a central venous catheter in a 73-year-old man suffering from panperitonitis due to small-bowel perforation. Endovascular treatment was conducted to treat the injured subclavian artery with a FemoSeal vascular closure device.

Computer-Assisted Program Reasoning Based on a Relational Semantics of Programs

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Wolfgang Schreiner

2012-02-01

Full Text Available We present an approach to program reasoning which inserts between a program and its verification conditions an additional layer, the denotation of the program expressed in a declarative form. The program is first translated into its denotation from which subsequently the verification conditions are generated. However, even before (and independently of any verification attempt, one may investigate the denotation itself to get insight into the "semantic essence" of the program, in particular to see whether the denotation indeed gives reason to believe that the program has the expected behavior. Errors in the program and in the meta-information may thus be detected and fixed prior to actually performing the formal verification. More concretely, following the relational approach to program semantics, we model the effect of a program as a binary relation on program states. A formal calculus is devised to derive from a program a logic formula that describes this relation and is subject for inspection and manipulation. We have implemented this idea in a comprehensive form in the RISC ProgramExplorer, a new program reasoning environment for educational purposes which encompasses the previously developed RISC ProofNavigator as an interactive proving assistant.

Recognition during recall failure: Semantic feature matching as a mechanism for recognition of semantic cues when recall fails.

Science.gov (United States)

Cleary, Anne M; Ryals, Anthony J; Wagner, Samantha R

2016-01-01

Research suggests that a feature-matching process underlies cue familiarity-detection when cued recall with graphemic cues fails. When a test cue (e.g., potchbork) overlaps in graphemic features with multiple unrecalled studied items (e.g., patchwork, pitchfork, pocketbook, pullcork), higher cue familiarity ratings are given during recall failure of all of the targets than when the cue overlaps in graphemic features with only one studied target and that target fails to be recalled (e.g., patchwork). The present study used semantic feature production norms (McRae et al., Behavior Research Methods, Instruments, & Computers, 37, 547-559, 2005) to examine whether the same holds true when the cues are semantic in nature (e.g., jaguar is used to cue cheetah). Indeed, test cues (e.g., cedar) that overlapped in semantic features (e.g., a_tree, has_bark, etc.) with four unretrieved studied items (e.g., birch, oak, pine, willow) received higher cue familiarity ratings during recall failure than test cues that overlapped in semantic features with only two (also unretrieved) studied items (e.g., birch, oak), which in turn received higher familiarity ratings during recall failure than cues that did not overlap in semantic features with any studied items. These findings suggest that the feature-matching theory of recognition during recall failure can accommodate recognition of semantic cues during recall failure, providing a potential mechanism for conceptually-based forms of cue recognition during target retrieval failure. They also provide converging evidence for the existence of the semantic features envisaged in feature-based models of semantic knowledge representation and for those more concretely specified by the production norms of McRae et al. (Behavior Research Methods, Instruments, & Computers, 37, 547-559, 2005).

TH-B-BRC-00: How to Identify and Resolve Potential Clinical Errors Before They Impact Patients Treatment: Lessons Learned

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

NONE

2016-06-15

Radiation treatment consists of a chain of events influenced by the quality of machine operation, beam data commissioning, machine calibration, patient specific data, simulation, treatment planning, imaging and treatment delivery. There is always a chance that the clinical medical physicist may make or fail to detect an error in one of the events that may impact on the patient’s treatment. In the clinical scenario, errors may be systematic and, without peer review, may have a low detectability because they are not part of routine QA procedures. During treatment, there might be errors on machine that needs attention. External reviews of some of the treatment delivery components by independent reviewers, like IROC, can detect errors, but may not be timely. The goal of this session is to help junior clinical physicists identify potential errors as well as the approach of quality assurance to perform a root cause analysis to find and eliminate an error and to continually monitor for errors. A compilation of potential errors will be presented by examples of the thought process required to spot the error and determine the root cause. Examples may include unusual machine operation, erratic electrometer reading, consistent lower electron output, variation in photon output, body parts inadvertently left in beam, unusual treatment plan, poor normalization, hot spots etc. Awareness of the possibility and detection of error in any link of the treatment process chain will help improve the safe and accurate delivery of radiation to patients. Four experts will discuss how to identify errors in four areas of clinical treatment. D. Followill, NIH grant CA 180803.

TH-B-BRC-00: How to Identify and Resolve Potential Clinical Errors Before They Impact Patients Treatment: Lessons Learned

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

2016-01-01

Radiation treatment consists of a chain of events influenced by the quality of machine operation, beam data commissioning, machine calibration, patient specific data, simulation, treatment planning, imaging and treatment delivery. There is always a chance that the clinical medical physicist may make or fail to detect an error in one of the events that may impact on the patient’s treatment. In the clinical scenario, errors may be systematic and, without peer review, may have a low detectability because they are not part of routine QA procedures. During treatment, there might be errors on machine that needs attention. External reviews of some of the treatment delivery components by independent reviewers, like IROC, can detect errors, but may not be timely. The goal of this session is to help junior clinical physicists identify potential errors as well as the approach of quality assurance to perform a root cause analysis to find and eliminate an error and to continually monitor for errors. A compilation of potential errors will be presented by examples of the thought process required to spot the error and determine the root cause. Examples may include unusual machine operation, erratic electrometer reading, consistent lower electron output, variation in photon output, body parts inadvertently left in beam, unusual treatment plan, poor normalization, hot spots etc. Awareness of the possibility and detection of error in any link of the treatment process chain will help improve the safe and accurate delivery of radiation to patients. Four experts will discuss how to identify errors in four areas of clinical treatment. D. Followill, NIH grant CA 180803

Making related errors facilitates learning, but learners do not know it.

Science.gov (United States)

Huelser, Barbie J; Metcalfe, Janet

2012-05-01

Producing an error, so long as it is followed by corrective feedback, has been shown to result in better retention of the correct answers than does simply studying the correct answers from the outset. The reasons for this surprising finding, however, have not been investigated. Our hypothesis was that the effect might occur only when the errors produced were related to the targeted correct response. In Experiment 1, participants studied either related or unrelated word pairs, manipulated between participants. Participants either were given the cue and target to study for 5 or 10 s or generated an error in response to the cue for the first 5 s before receiving the correct answer for the final 5 s. When the cues and targets were related, error-generation led to the highest correct retention. However, consistent with the hypothesis, no benefit was derived from generating an error when the cue and target were unrelated. Latent semantic analysis revealed that the errors generated in the related condition were related to the target, whereas they were not related to the target in the unrelated condition. Experiment 2 replicated these findings in a within-participants design. We found, additionally, that people did not know that generating an error enhanced memory, even after they had just completed the task that produced substantial benefits.

Russian nominal semantics and morphology

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Nørgård-Sørensen, Jens

The principal idea behind this book is that lexis and grammar make up a single coherent structure. It is shown that the grammatical patterns of the different classes of Russian nominals are closely interconnected. They can be described as reflecting a limited set of semantic distinctions which ar...... or weaker, of Russian. Students will see a pattern in what is traditionally described as disparate subsystems, and linguists may be inspired to consider the theoretical points concerning language as a coherent system, determining usage.......The principal idea behind this book is that lexis and grammar make up a single coherent structure. It is shown that the grammatical patterns of the different classes of Russian nominals are closely interconnected. They can be described as reflecting a limited set of semantic distinctions which...... are also rooted in the lexical-semantic classification of Russian nouns. The presentation focuses on semantics, both lexical and grammatical, and not least the connection between these two levels of content. The principal theoretical impact is the insight that grammar and lexis should not be seen...

Semantic Web Services Challenge, Results from the First Year. Series: Semantic Web And Beyond, Volume 8.

Science.gov (United States)

Petrie, C.; Margaria, T.; Lausen, H.; Zaremba, M.

Explores trade-offs among existing approaches. Reveals strengths and weaknesses of proposed approaches, as well as which aspects of the problem are not yet covered. Introduces software engineering approach to evaluating semantic web services. Service-Oriented Computing is one of the most promising software engineering trends because of the potential to reduce the programming effort for future distributed industrial systems. However, only a small part of this potential rests on the standardization of tools offered by the web services stack. The larger part of this potential rests upon the development of sufficient semantics to automate service orchestration. Currently there are many different approaches to semantic web service descriptions and many frameworks built around them. A common understanding, evaluation scheme, and test bed to compare and classify these frameworks in terms of their capabilities and shortcomings, is necessary to make progress in developing the full potential of Service-Oriented Computing. The Semantic Web Services Challenge is an open source initiative that provides a public evaluation and certification of multiple frameworks on common industrially-relevant problem sets. This edited volume reports on the first results in developing common understanding of the various technologies intended to facilitate the automation of mediation, choreography and discovery for Web Services using semantic annotations. Semantic Web Services Challenge: Results from the First Year is designed for a professional audience composed of practitioners and researchers in industry. Professionals can use this book to evaluate SWS technology for their potential practical use. The book is also suitable for advanced-level students in computer science.

Semantic transparency, semantic opacity, states of affairs, mental states and speech acts

OpenAIRE

Reboul , Anne

2001-01-01

There are two well-known views of linguistic communication: the code model and its counterpart, the hypothesis of the semantic transparency. If both of these views were correct, then there would be only one possible type of mishap in communication, that due to noise in the communication channel. However, none of these views is correct. I will sketch a quick history of pragmatics relative both to the code model and to the hypothesis of semantic transparency. As we will see, the most recent pra...

Semantic web data warehousing for caGrid.

Science.gov (United States)

McCusker, James P; Phillips, Joshua A; González Beltrán, Alejandra; Finkelstein, Anthony; Krauthammer, Michael

2009-10-01

The National Cancer Institute (NCI) is developing caGrid as a means for sharing cancer-related data and services. As more data sets become available on caGrid, we need effective ways of accessing and integrating this information. Although the data models exposed on caGrid are semantically well annotated, it is currently up to the caGrid client to infer relationships between the different models and their classes. In this paper, we present a Semantic Web-based data warehouse (Corvus) for creating relationships among caGrid models. This is accomplished through the transformation of semantically-annotated caBIG Unified Modeling Language (UML) information models into Web Ontology Language (OWL) ontologies that preserve those semantics. We demonstrate the validity of the approach by Semantic Extraction, Transformation and Loading (SETL) of data from two caGrid data sources, caTissue and caArray, as well as alignment and query of those sources in Corvus. We argue that semantic integration is necessary for integration of data from distributed web services and that Corvus is a useful way of accomplishing this. Our approach is generalizable and of broad utility to researchers facing similar integration challenges.

Ontology Matching with Semantic Verification.

Science.gov (United States)

Jean-Mary, Yves R; Shironoshita, E Patrick; Kabuka, Mansur R

2009-09-01

ASMOV (Automated Semantic Matching of Ontologies with Verification) is a novel algorithm that uses lexical and structural characteristics of two ontologies to iteratively calculate a similarity measure between them, derives an alignment, and then verifies it to ensure that it does not contain semantic inconsistencies. In this paper, we describe the ASMOV algorithm, and then present experimental results that measure its accuracy using the OAEI 2008 tests, and that evaluate its use with two different thesauri: WordNet, and the Unified Medical Language System (UMLS). These results show the increased accuracy obtained by combining lexical, structural and extensional matchers with semantic verification, and demonstrate the advantage of using a domain-specific thesaurus for the alignment of specialized ontologies.

Semantic Context Detection Using Audio Event Fusion

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Cheng Wen-Huang

2006-01-01

Full Text Available Semantic-level content analysis is a crucial issue in achieving efficient content retrieval and management. We propose a hierarchical approach that models audio events over a time series in order to accomplish semantic context detection. Two levels of modeling, audio event and semantic context modeling, are devised to bridge the gap between physical audio features and semantic concepts. In this work, hidden Markov models (HMMs are used to model four representative audio events, that is, gunshot, explosion, engine, and car braking, in action movies. At the semantic context level, generative (ergodic hidden Markov model and discriminative (support vector machine (SVM approaches are investigated to fuse the characteristics and correlations among audio events, which provide cues for detecting gunplay and car-chasing scenes. The experimental results demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed approaches and provide a preliminary framework for information mining by using audio characteristics.

Graph-based Operational Semantics of a Lazy Functional Languages

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Rose, Kristoffer Høgsbro

1992-01-01

Presents Graph Operational Semantics (GOS): a semantic specification formalism based on structural operational semantics and term graph rewriting. Demonstrates the method by specifying the dynamic ...

Semantic Learning Service Personalized

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Yibo Chen

2012-02-01

Full Text Available To provide users with more suitable and personalized service, personalization is widely used in various fields. Current e-Learning systems search for learning resources using information search technology, based on the keywords that selected or inputted by the user. Due to lack of semantic analysis for keywords and exploring the user contexts, the system cannot provide a good learning experiment. In this paper, we defined the concept and characteristic of the personalized learning service, and proposed a semantic learning service personalized framework. Moreover, we made full use of semantic technology, using ontologies to represent the learning contents and user profile, mining and utilizing the friendship and membership of the social relationship to construct the user social relationship profile, and improved the collaboration filtering algorithm to recommend personalized learning resources for users. The results of the empirical evaluation show that the approach is effectiveness in augmenting recommendation.

A Complex Network Approach to Distributional Semantic Models.

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Akira Utsumi

Full Text Available A number of studies on network analysis have focused on language networks based on free word association, which reflects human lexical knowledge, and have demonstrated the small-world and scale-free properties in the word association network. Nevertheless, there have been very few attempts at applying network analysis to distributional semantic models, despite the fact that these models have been studied extensively as computational or cognitive models of human lexical knowledge. In this paper, we analyze three network properties, namely, small-world, scale-free, and hierarchical properties, of semantic networks created by distributional semantic models. We demonstrate that the created networks generally exhibit the same properties as word association networks. In particular, we show that the distribution of the number of connections in these networks follows the truncated power law, which is also observed in an association network. This indicates that distributional semantic models can provide a plausible model of lexical knowledge. Additionally, the observed differences in the network properties of various implementations of distributional semantic models are consistently explained or predicted by considering the intrinsic semantic features of a word-context matrix and the functions of matrix weighting and smoothing. Furthermore, to simulate a semantic network with the observed network properties, we propose a new growing network model based on the model of Steyvers and Tenenbaum. The idea underlying the proposed model is that both preferential and random attachments are required to reflect different types of semantic relations in network growth process. We demonstrate that this model provides a better explanation of network behaviors generated by distributional semantic models.

Categorizing words through semantic memory navigation

Science.gov (United States)

Borge-Holthoefer, J.; Arenas, A.

2010-03-01

Semantic memory is the cognitive system devoted to storage and retrieval of conceptual knowledge. Empirical data indicate that semantic memory is organized in a network structure. Everyday experience shows that word search and retrieval processes provide fluent and coherent speech, i.e. are efficient. This implies either that semantic memory encodes, besides thousands of words, different kind of links for different relationships (introducing greater complexity and storage costs), or that the structure evolves facilitating the differentiation between long-lasting semantic relations from incidental, phenomenological ones. Assuming the latter possibility, we explore a mechanism to disentangle the underlying semantic backbone which comprises conceptual structure (extraction of categorical relations between pairs of words), from the rest of information present in the structure. To this end, we first present and characterize an empirical data set modeled as a network, then we simulate a stochastic cognitive navigation on this topology. We schematize this latter process as uncorrelated random walks from node to node, which converge to a feature vectors network. By doing so we both introduce a novel mechanism for information retrieval, and point at the problem of category formation in close connection to linguistic and non-linguistic experience.

The Influence of Semantic Neighbours on Visual Word Recognition

Science.gov (United States)

Yates, Mark

2012-01-01

Although it is assumed that semantics is a critical component of visual word recognition, there is still much that we do not understand. One recent way of studying semantic processing has been in terms of semantic neighbourhood (SN) density, and this research has shown that semantic neighbours facilitate lexical decisions. However, it is not clear…

Psycholinguistic measures for German verb pairs: Semantic transparency, semantic relatedness, verb family size, and age of reading acquisition.

Science.gov (United States)

Smolka, Eva; Eulitz, Carsten

2018-06-18

A central issue in visual and spoken word recognition is the lexical representation of complex words-in particular, whether the lexical representation of complex words depends on semantic transparency: Is a complex verb like understand lexically represented as a whole word or via its base stand, given that its meaning is not transparent from the meanings of its parts? To study this issue, a number of stimulus characteristics are of interest that are not yet available in public databases of German. This article provides semantic association ratings, lexical paraphrases, and vector-based similarity measures for German verbs, measuring (a) the semantic transparency between 1,259 complex verbs and their bases, (b) the semantic relatedness between 1,109 verb pairs with 432 different bases, and (c) the vector-based similarity measures of 846 verb pairs. Additionally, we include the verb regularity of all verbs and two counts of verb family size for 184 base verbs, as well as estimates of age of acquisition and age of reading for 200 verbs. Together with lemma and type frequencies from public lexical databases, all measures can be downloaded along with this article. Statistical analyses indicate that verb family size, morphological complexity, frequency, and verb regularity affect the semantic transparency and relatedness ratings as well as the age of acquisition estimates, indicating that these are relevant variables in psycholinguistic experiments. Although lexical paraphrases, vector-based similarity measures, and semantic association ratings may deliver complementary information, the interrater reliability of the semantic association ratings for each verb pair provides valuable information when selecting stimuli for psycholinguistic experiments.

The role of the left anterior temporal lobe in semantic composition vs. semantic memory.

Science.gov (United States)

Westerlund, Masha; Pylkkänen, Liina

2014-05-01

The left anterior temporal lobe (LATL) is robustly implicated in semantic processing by a growing body of literature. However, these results have emerged from two distinct bodies of work, addressing two different processing levels. On the one hand, the LATL has been characterized as a 'semantic hub׳ that binds features of concepts across a distributed network, based on results from semantic dementia and hemodynamic findings on the categorization of specific compared to basic exemplars. On the other, the LATL has been implicated in combinatorial operations in language, as shown by increased activity in this region associated with the processing of sentences and of basic phrases. The present work aimed to reconcile these two literatures by independently manipulating combination and concept specificity within a minimal MEG paradigm. Participants viewed simple nouns that denoted either low specificity (fish) or high specificity categories (trout) presented in either combinatorial (spotted fish/trout) or non-combinatorial contexts (xhsl fish/trout). By combining these paradigms from the two literatures, we directly compared the engagement of the LATL in semantic memory vs. semantic composition. Our results indicate that although noun specificity subtly modulates the LATL activity elicited by single nouns, it most robustly affects the size of the composition effect when these nouns are adjectivally modified, with low specificity nouns eliciting a much larger effect. We conclude that these findings are compatible with an account in which the specificity and composition effects arise from a shared mechanism of meaning specification. Copyright © 2014 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Semantic matchmaking with nonmonotonic description logics

CERN Document Server

Grimm, S

2009-01-01

Semantic web has grown into a mature field of research. Its methods find innovative applications on and off the World Wide Web. Its underlying technologies have significant impact on adjacent fields of research and on industrial applications. This new book series reports on the state-of-the-art in foundations, methods, and applications of semantic web and its underlying technologies. It is a central forum for the communication of recent developments and comprises research monographs, textbooks and edited volumes on all topics related to the semantic web. In this first volume several non-monoto

Change management for semantic web services

CERN Document Server

Liu, Xumin; Bouguettaya, Athman

2011-01-01

Change Management for Semantic Web Services provides a thorough analysis of change management in the lifecycle of services for databases and workflows, including changes that occur at the individual service level or at the aggregate composed service level. This book describes taxonomy of changes that are expected in semantic service oriented environments. The process of change management consists of detecting, propagating, and reacting to changes. Change Management for Semantic Web Services is one of the first books that discuss the development of a theoretical foundation for managing changes

Preserved cumulative semantic interference despite amnesia

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Gary Michael Oppenheim

2015-05-01

As predicted by Oppenheim et al’s (2010 implicit incremental learning account, WRP’s BCN RTs demonstrated strong (and significant repetition priming and semantic blocking effects (Figure 1. Similar to typical results from neurally intact undergraduates, WRP took longer to name pictures presented in semantically homogeneous blocks than in heterogeneous blocks, an effect that increased with each cycle. This result challenges accounts that ascribe cumulative semantic interference in this task to explicit memory mechanisms, instead suggesting that the effect has the sort of implicit learning bases that are typically spared in hippocampal amnesia.

When the Wedding March becomes sad: Semantic memory impairment for music in the semantic variant of primary progressive aphasia.

Science.gov (United States)

Macoir, Joël; Berubé-Lalancette, Sarah; Wilson, Maximiliano A; Laforce, Robert; Hudon, Carol; Gravel, Pierre; Potvin, Olivier; Duchesne, Simon; Monetta, Laura

2016-12-01

Music can induce particular emotions and activate semantic knowledge. In the semantic variant of primary progressive aphasia (svPPA), semantic memory is impaired as a result of anterior temporal lobe (ATL) atrophy. Semantics is responsible for the encoding and retrieval of factual knowledge about music, including associative and emotional attributes. In the present study, we report the performance of two individuals with svPPA in three experiments. NG with bilateral ATL atrophy and ND with atrophy largely restricted to the left ATL. Experiment 1 assessed the recognition of musical excerpts and both patients were unimpaired. Experiment 2 studied the emotions conveyed by music and only NG showed impaired performance. Experiment 3 tested the association of semantic concepts to musical excerpts and both patients were impaired. These results suggest that the right ATL seems essential for the recognition of emotions conveyed by music and that the left ATL is involved in binding music to semantics. They are in line with the notion that the ATLs are devoted to the binding of different modality-specific properties and suggest that they are also differentially involved in the processing of factual and emotional knowledge associated with music.

Chemical Entity Semantic Specification: Knowledge representation for efficient semantic cheminformatics and facile data integration

Science.gov (United States)

2011-01-01

Background Over the past several centuries, chemistry has permeated virtually every facet of human lifestyle, enriching fields as diverse as medicine, agriculture, manufacturing, warfare, and electronics, among numerous others. Unfortunately, application-specific, incompatible chemical information formats and representation strategies have emerged as a result of such diverse adoption of chemistry. Although a number of efforts have been dedicated to unifying the computational representation of chemical information, disparities between the various chemical databases still persist and stand in the way of cross-domain, interdisciplinary investigations. Through a common syntax and formal semantics, Semantic Web technology offers the ability to accurately represent, integrate, reason about and query across diverse chemical information. Results Here we specify and implement the Chemical Entity Semantic Specification (CHESS) for the representation of polyatomic chemical entities, their substructures, bonds, atoms, and reactions using Semantic Web technologies. CHESS provides means to capture aspects of their corresponding chemical descriptors, connectivity, functional composition, and geometric structure while specifying mechanisms for data provenance. We demonstrate that using our readily extensible specification, it is possible to efficiently integrate multiple disparate chemical data sources, while retaining appropriate correspondence of chemical descriptors, with very little additional effort. We demonstrate the impact of some of our representational decisions on the performance of chemically-aware knowledgebase searching and rudimentary reaction candidate selection. Finally, we provide access to the tools necessary to carry out chemical entity encoding in CHESS, along with a sample knowledgebase. Conclusions By harnessing the power of Semantic Web technologies with CHESS, it is possible to provide a means of facile cross-domain chemical knowledge integration with full

Detailed semantic analyses of human error incidents occurring at nuclear power plant in USA (interim report). Characteristics of human error incidents occurring in the period from 1992 to 1996

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Hirotsu, Yuko; Tsuge, Tadashi; Sano, Toshiaki; Takano, Kenichi; Gouda, Hidenori

2001-01-01

CRIEPI has been conducting detailed analyses of all human error incidents at domestic nuclear power plants (NPPs) collected from Japanese Licensee Event Reports (LERs) using J-HPES (Japanese version of HPES) as an analysis method. Results obtained by the analyses have been stored in J-HPES database. Since 1999, human error incidents have been selected from U.S. LERs, and they are analyzed using J-HPES. In this report, the results, which classified error action, cause, and preventive measure, are summarized for U.S. human error cases occurring in the period from 1992 to 1996. It was suggested as a result of classification that the categories of error action were almost the same as those of Japanese human error cases. Therefore, problems in the process of error action and checkpoints for preventing errors will be extracted by analyzing both U.S. and domestic human error cases. It was also suggested that the interrelations between error actions, causes, and organizational factors could be identified. While taking these suggestions into consideration, we will continue to analyze U.S. human error cases. (author)

Activation of semantic information at the sublexical level during handwriting production: Evidence from inhibition effects of Chinese semantic radicals in the picture-word interference paradigm.

Science.gov (United States)

Chen, Xuqian; Liao, Yuanlan; Chen, Xianzhe

2017-08-01

Using a non-alphabetic language (e.g., Chinese), the present study tested a novel view that semantic information at the sublexical level should be activated during handwriting production. Over 80% of Chinese characters are phonograms, in which semantic radicals represent category information (e.g., 'chair,' 'peach,' 'orange' are related to plants) while phonetic radicals represent phonetic information (e.g., 'wolf,' 'brightness,' 'male,' are all pronounced /lang/). Under different semantic category conditions at the lexical level (semantically related in Experiment 1; semantically unrelated in Experiment 2), the orthographic relatedness and semantic relatedness of semantic radicals in the picture name and its distractor were manipulated under different SOAs (i.e., stimulus onset asynchrony, the interval between the onset of the picture and the onset of the interference word). Two questions were addressed: (1) Is it possible that semantic information could be activated in the sublexical level conditions? (2) How are semantic and orthographic information dynamically accessed in word production? Results showed that both orthographic and semantic information were activated under the present picture-word interference paradigm, dynamically under different SOAs, which supported our view that discussions on semantic processes in the writing modality should be extended to the sublexical level. The current findings provide possibility for building new orthography-phonology-semantics models in writing. © 2017 Scandinavian Psychological Associations and John Wiley & Sons Ltd.

The semantic structure of gratitude

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Smirnov, Alexander V.

2016-06-01

Full Text Available In the modern social and economic environment of Russia, gratitude might be considered an ambiguous phenomenon. It can have different meaning for a person in different contexts and can manifest itself differently as well (that is, as an expression of sincere feelings or as an element of corruption. In this respect it is topical to investigate the system of meanings and relationships that define the semantic space of gratitude. The goal of the study was the investigation and description of the content and structure of the semantic space of the gratitude phenomenon as well as the determination of male, female, age, and ethnic peculiarities of the expression of gratitude. The objective was achieved by using the semantic differential designed by the authors to investigate attitudes toward gratitude. This investigation was carried out with the participation of 184 respondents (Russians, Tatars, Ukrainians, Jews living in the Russian Federation, Belarus, Kazakhstan, Tajikistan, Israel, Australia, Canada, and the United Kingdom and identifying themselves as representatives of one of these nationalities. The structural components of gratitude were singled out by means of exploratory factor analysis of the empirical data from the designed semantic differential. Gender, age, and ethnic differences were differentiated by means of Student’s t-test. Gratitude can be represented by material and nonmaterial forms as well as by actions in response to help given. The empirical data allowed us to design the ethnically nonspecified semantic structure of gratitude. During the elaboration of the differential, semantic universals of gratitude, which constitute its psychosemantic content, were distinguished. Peculiarities of attitudes toward gratitude by those in different age and gender groups were revealed. Differences in the degree of manifestation of components of the psychosemantic structure of gratitude related to ethnic characteristics were not discovered

The surplus value of semantic annotations

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Marx, M.

2010-01-01

We compare the costs of semantic annotation of textual documents to its benefits for information processing tasks. Semantic annotation can improve the performance of retrieval tasks and facilitates an improved search experience through faceted search, focused retrieval, better document summaries,

The MMI Semantic Framework: Rosetta Stones for Earth Sciences

Science.gov (United States)

Rueda, C.; Bermudez, L. E.; Graybeal, J.; Alexander, P.

2009-12-01

Semantic interoperability—the exchange of meaning among computer systems—is needed to successfully share data in Ocean Science and across all Earth sciences. The best approach toward semantic interoperability requires a designed framework, and operationally tested tools and infrastructure within that framework. Currently available technologies make a scientific semantic framework feasible, but its development requires sustainable architectural vision and development processes. This presentation outlines the MMI Semantic Framework, including recent progress on it and its client applications. The MMI Semantic Framework consists of tools, infrastructure, and operational and community procedures and best practices, to meet short-term and long-term semantic interoperability goals. The design and prioritization of the semantic framework capabilities are based on real-world scenarios in Earth observation systems. We describe some key uses cases, as well as the associated requirements for building the overall infrastructure, which is realized through the MMI Ontology Registry and Repository. This system includes support for community creation and sharing of semantic content, ontology registration, version management, and seamless integration of user-friendly tools and application programming interfaces. The presentation describes the architectural components for semantic mediation, registry and repository for vocabularies, ontology, and term mappings. We show how the technologies and approaches in the framework can address community needs for managing and exchanging semantic information. We will demonstrate how different types of users and client applications exploit the tools and services for data aggregation, visualization, archiving, and integration. Specific examples from OOSTethys (http://www.oostethys.org) and the Ocean Observatories Initiative Cyberinfrastructure (http://www.oceanobservatories.org) will be cited. Finally, we show how semantic augmentation of web

Concealed semantic and episodic autobiographical memory electrified

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Giorgio eGanis

2013-01-01

Full Text Available Electrophysiology-based concealed information tests (CIT try to determine whether somebody possesses concealed information about a probe item by comparing event-related potentials (ERPs between this item and comparison items (irrelevants. Although the broader field is sometimes referred to as memory detection, little attention has been paid to the precise type of underlying memory involved. This study begins addressing this issue by examining the key distinction between semantic and episodic memory in the autobiographical domain within a CIT paradigm. This study also addressed the issue of whether multiple repetitions of the items over the course of the session habituate the brain responses. Participants were tested in a 3-stimulus CIT with semantic autobiographical probes (their own date of birth and episodic autobiographical probes (a secret date learned just before the study. Results dissociated these two memory conditions on several ERP components. Semantic probes elicited a smaller frontal N2 than episodic probes, consistent with the idea that the frontal N2 decreases with greater pre-existing semantic knowledge about the item. Likewise, semantic probes elicited a smaller central N400 than episodic probes. Semantic probes also elicited a larger P3b than episodic probes because of their richer meaning. In contrast, episodic probes elicited a larger late positive component (LPC than semantic probes, because of the recent episodic memory associated with them. All these ERPs showed a difference between probes and irrelevants in both memory conditions, except for the N400, which showed a difference only in the semantic condition. Finally, although repetition affected the ERPs, it did not reduce the difference between probes and irrelevants. Thus, the type of memory associated with a probe has both theoretical and practical importance for CIT research.

Developing Visualization Techniques for Semantics-based Information Networks

Science.gov (United States)

Keller, Richard M.; Hall, David R.

2003-01-01

Information systems incorporating complex network structured information spaces with a semantic underpinning - such as hypermedia networks, semantic networks, topic maps, and concept maps - are being deployed to solve some of NASA s critical information management problems. This paper describes some of the human interaction and navigation problems associated with complex semantic information spaces and describes a set of new visual interface approaches to address these problems. A key strategy is to leverage semantic knowledge represented within these information spaces to construct abstractions and views that will be meaningful to the human user. Human-computer interaction methodologies will guide the development and evaluation of these approaches, which will benefit deployed NASA systems and also apply to information systems based on the emerging Semantic Web.

Episodic Memory, Semantic Memory, and Fluency.

Science.gov (United States)

Schaefer, Carl F.

1980-01-01

Suggests that creating a second-language semantic network can be conceived as developing a plan for retrieving second-language word forms. Characteristics of linguistic performance which will promote fluency are discussed in light of the distinction between episodic and semantic memory. (AMH)

Quality model for semantic IS standards

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Folmer, Erwin Johan Albert

2011-01-01

Semantic IS (Information Systems) standards are essential for achieving interoperability between organizations. However a recent survey suggests that not the full benefits of standards are achieved, due to the quality issues. This paper presents a quality model for semantic IS standards, that should

Semantique et psychologie (Semantics and Psychology)

Science.gov (United States)

Le Ny, Jean-Francois

1975-01-01

Semantic activities constitute a sub-class of psychological activities; from this point of departure the article discusses such topics as: idiosyncrasies, meaning and causality, internal determinants, neo-associationism, componential theories, noun- and verb-formation, sentences and propositions, semantics and cognition, mnemesic compontents, and…

Adding Recursive Constructs to Bialgebraic Semantics

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Klin, Bartek

2004-01-01

This paper aims at fitting a general class of recursive equations into the framework of ‘well-behaved' structural operational semantics, formalized as bialgebraic semantics by Turi and Plotkin. Rather than interpreting recursive constructs by means of operational rules, separate recursive equatio...

Preserved semantic priming effect in alexia.

Science.gov (United States)

Mimura, M; Goodglass, H; Milberg, W

1996-09-01

BH, a left-handed patient with alexia and nonfluent aphasia, was presented with a lexical-decision task in which words and pronounceable pseudowords were preceded by semantically related or unrelated picture primes (Experiment 1). In Experiment 2, BH was given an explicit reading task using the word lists from Experiment 1. Performance on Experiment 2 disclosed severe reading deficits in both oral reading and semantic matching of the words to pictures. However, in Experiment 1, BH demonstrated a significant semantic priming effect, responding more accurately and more quickly to words preceded by related primes than by unrelated primes. The present results suggest that even in a patient with severe alexia, implicit access to semantic information can be preserved in the absence of explicit identification. The possibility of categorical gradient in implicit activation (living vs. nonliving) in BH was also discussed, which, however, needs to be clarified in the further investigation.

Enabling Semantic Queries Against the Spatial Database

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PENG, X.

2012-02-01

Full Text Available The spatial database based upon the object-relational database management system (ORDBMS has the merits of a clear data model, good operability and high query efficiency. That is why it has been widely used in spatial data organization and management. However, it cannot express the semantic relationships among geospatial objects, making the query results difficult to meet the user's requirement well. Therefore, this paper represents an attempt to combine the Semantic Web technology with the spatial database so as to make up for the traditional database's disadvantages. In this way, on the one hand, users can take advantages of ORDBMS to store and manage spatial data; on the other hand, if the spatial database is released in the form of Semantic Web, the users could describe a query more concisely with the cognitive pattern which is similar to that of daily life. As a consequence, this methodology enables the benefits of both Semantic Web and the object-relational database (ORDB available. The paper discusses systematically the semantic enriched spatial database's architecture, key technologies and implementation. Subsequently, we demonstrate the function of spatial semantic queries via a practical prototype system. The query results indicate that the method used in this study is feasible.

Semantics by analogy for illustrative volume visualization☆

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Gerl, Moritz; Rautek, Peter; Isenberg, Tobias; Gröller, Eduard

2012-01-01

We present an interactive graphical approach for the explicit specification of semantics for volume visualization. This explicit and graphical specification of semantics for volumetric features allows us to visually assign meaning to both input and output parameters of the visualization mapping. This is in contrast to the implicit way of specifying semantics using transfer functions. In particular, we demonstrate how to realize a dynamic specification of semantics which allows to flexibly explore a wide range of mappings. Our approach is based on three concepts. First, we use semantic shader augmentation to automatically add rule-based rendering functionality to static visualization mappings in a shader program, while preserving the visual abstraction that the initial shader encodes. With this technique we extend recent developments that define a mapping between data attributes and visual attributes with rules, which are evaluated using fuzzy logic. Second, we let users define the semantics by analogy through brushing on renderings of the data attributes of interest. Third, the rules are specified graphically in an interface that provides visual clues for potential modifications. Together, the presented methods offer a high degree of freedom in the specification and exploration of rule-based mappings and avoid the limitations of a linguistic rule formulation. PMID:23576827

Errors in translation made by English major students: A study on types and causes

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Pattanapong Wongranu

2017-05-01

Full Text Available Many Thai English major students have problems when they translate Thai texts into English, as numerous errors can be found. Therefore, a study of translation errors is needed to find solutions to these problems. The objectives of this research were: 1 to examine types of translation errors in translation from Thai into English, 2 to determine the types of translation errors that are most common, and 3 to find possible explanations for the causes of errors. The results of this study will be used to improve translation teaching and the course “Translation from Thai into English”. The participants were 26 third-year, English major students at Kasetsart University. The data were collected from the students' exercises and examinations. Interviews and stimulated recall were also used to determine translation problems and causes of errors. The data were analyzed by considering the frequency and percentage, and by content analysis. The results shows that the most frequent translation errors were syntactic errors (65%, followed by semantic errors (26.5% and miscellaneous errors (8.5%, respectively. The causes of errors found in this study included translation procedures, carelessness, low self-confidence, and anxiety. It is recommended that more class time be spent to address the problematic points. In addition, more authentic translation and group work should be implemented to increase self-confidence and decrease anxiety.

Somatotopic Semantic Priming and Prediction in the Motor System

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Grisoni, Luigi; Dreyer, Felix R.; Pulvermüller, Friedemann

2016-01-01

The recognition of action-related sounds and words activates motor regions, reflecting the semantic grounding of these symbols in action information; in addition, motor cortex exerts causal influences on sound perception and language comprehension. However, proponents of classic symbolic theories still dispute the role of modality-preferential systems such as the motor cortex in the semantic processing of meaningful stimuli. To clarify whether the motor system carries semantic processes, we investigated neurophysiological indexes of semantic relationships between action-related sounds and words. Event-related potentials revealed that action-related words produced significantly larger stimulus-evoked (Mismatch Negativity-like) and predictive brain responses (Readiness Potentials) when presented in body-part-incongruent sound contexts (e.g., “kiss” in footstep sound context; “kick” in whistle context) than in body-part-congruent contexts, a pattern reminiscent of neurophysiological correlates of semantic priming. Cortical generators of the semantic relatedness effect were localized in areas traditionally associated with semantic memory, including left inferior frontal cortex and temporal pole, and, crucially, in motor areas, where body-part congruency of action sound–word relationships was indexed by a somatotopic pattern of activation. As our results show neurophysiological manifestations of action-semantic priming in the motor cortex, they prove semantic processing in the motor system and thus in a modality-preferential system of the human brain. PMID:26908635

Semantic guidance of eye movements in real-world scenes.

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Hwang, Alex D; Wang, Hsueh-Cheng; Pomplun, Marc

2011-05-25

The perception of objects in our visual world is influenced by not only their low-level visual features such as shape and color, but also their high-level features such as meaning and semantic relations among them. While it has been shown that low-level features in real-world scenes guide eye movements during scene inspection and search, the influence of semantic similarity among scene objects on eye movements in such situations has not been investigated. Here we study guidance of eye movements by semantic similarity among objects during real-world scene inspection and search. By selecting scenes from the LabelMe object-annotated image database and applying latent semantic analysis (LSA) to the object labels, we generated semantic saliency maps of real-world scenes based on the semantic similarity of scene objects to the currently fixated object or the search target. An ROC analysis of these maps as predictors of subjects' gaze transitions between objects during scene inspection revealed a preference for transitions to objects that were semantically similar to the currently inspected one. Furthermore, during the course of a scene search, subjects' eye movements were progressively guided toward objects that were semantically similar to the search target. These findings demonstrate substantial semantic guidance of eye movements in real-world scenes and show its importance for understanding real-world attentional control. Copyright © 2011 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Semantic amnesia without dementia: documentation of a case.

Science.gov (United States)

Rusconi, M L; Zago, S; Basso, A

1997-06-01

We described the case of a patient affected by a progressive semantic memory disorder associated with prevalent temporal lobe atrophy. This deficit seems to be "pure" in the sense that it has not been found to overlap with other cognitive deficits (intellectual, linguistic, perceptual, visuo-spatial etc.) for a long time. Furthermore, despite his impaired semantic knowledge, the autobiographical memory of the patient was largely intact. This case therefore represents a form of "semantic amnesia" without dementia, and supports the hypothesis that there is a partial distinction between "semantic" and "episodic" memory.

Towards Semantic Interpretation of Movement Behavior

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Baglioni, M.; Macedo, J.; Renso, C.; Trasarti, R.; Wachowicz, M.

2009-01-01

In this paper we aim at providing a model for the conceptual representation and deductive reasoning of trajectory patterns obtained from mining raw trajectories. This has been achieved by means of a semantic enrichment process, where raw trajectories are enhanced with semantic information and

Semantic Tagging with Deep Residual Networks

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Bjerva, Johannes; Plank, Barbara; Bos, Johan

2016-01-01

We propose a novel semantic tagging task, semtagging, tailored for the purpose of multilingual semantic parsing, and present the first tagger using deep residual networks (ResNets). Our tagger uses both word and character representations and includes a novel residual bypass architecture. We evaluate

Semantics and expressiveness of ordered SOS

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Mousavi, M.R.; Phillips, I.C.C.; Reniers, M.A.; Ulidowski, I.

2009-01-01

Structured Operational Semantics (SOS) is a popular method for defining semantics by means of transition rules. An important feature of SOS rules is negative premises, which are crucial in the definitions of such phenomena as priority mechanisms and time-outs. However, the inclusion of negative

Semantic search during divergent thinking.

Science.gov (United States)

Hass, Richard W

2017-09-01

Divergent thinking, as a method of examining creative cognition, has not been adequately analyzed in the context of modern cognitive theories. This article casts divergent thinking responding in the context of theories of memory search. First, it was argued that divergent thinking tasks are similar to semantic fluency tasks, but are more constrained, and less well structured. Next, response time distributions from 54 participants were analyzed for temporal and semantic clustering. Participants responded to two prompts from the alternative uses test: uses for a brick and uses for a bottle, for two minutes each. Participants' cumulative response curves were negatively accelerating, in line with theories of search of associative memory. However, results of analyses of semantic and temporal clustering suggested that clustering is less evident in alternative uses responding compared to semantic fluency tasks. This suggests either that divergent thinking responding does not involve an exhaustive search through a clustered memory trace, but rather that the process is more exploratory, yielding fewer overall responses that tend to drift away from close associates of the divergent thinking prompt. Copyright © 2017 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

Auto-Generated Semantic Processing Services

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Davis, Rodney; Hupf, Greg

2009-01-01

Auto-Generated Semantic Processing (AGSP) Services is a suite of software tools for automated generation of other computer programs, denoted cross-platform semantic adapters, that support interoperability of computer-based communication systems that utilize a variety of both new and legacy communication software running in a variety of operating- system/computer-hardware combinations. AGSP has numerous potential uses in military, space-exploration, and other government applications as well as in commercial telecommunications. The cross-platform semantic adapters take advantage of common features of computer- based communication systems to enforce semantics, messaging protocols, and standards of processing of streams of binary data to ensure integrity of data and consistency of meaning among interoperating systems. The auto-generation aspect of AGSP Services reduces development time and effort by emphasizing specification and minimizing implementation: In effect, the design, building, and debugging of software for effecting conversions among complex communication protocols, custom device mappings, and unique data-manipulation algorithms is replaced with metadata specifications that map to an abstract platform-independent communications model. AGSP Services is modular and has been shown to be easily integrable into new and legacy NASA flight and ground communication systems.

Musical and verbal semantic memory: two distinct neural networks?

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Groussard, M; Viader, F; Hubert, V; Landeau, B; Abbas, A; Desgranges, B; Eustache, F; Platel, H

2010-02-01

Semantic memory has been investigated in numerous neuroimaging and clinical studies, most of which have used verbal or visual, but only very seldom, musical material. Clinical studies have suggested that there is a relative neural independence between verbal and musical semantic memory. In the present study, "musical semantic memory" is defined as memory for "well-known" melodies without any knowledge of the spatial or temporal circumstances of learning, while "verbal semantic memory" corresponds to general knowledge about concepts, again without any knowledge of the spatial or temporal circumstances of learning. Our aim was to compare the neural substrates of musical and verbal semantic memory by administering the same type of task in each modality. We used high-resolution PET H(2)O(15) to observe 11 young subjects performing two main tasks: (1) a musical semantic memory task, where the subjects heard the first part of familiar melodies and had to decide whether the second part they heard matched the first, and (2) a verbal semantic memory task with the same design, but where the material consisted of well-known expressions or proverbs. The musical semantic memory condition activated the superior temporal area and inferior and middle frontal areas in the left hemisphere and the inferior frontal area in the right hemisphere. The verbal semantic memory condition activated the middle temporal region in the left hemisphere and the cerebellum in the right hemisphere. We found that the verbal and musical semantic processes activated a common network extending throughout the left temporal neocortex. In addition, there was a material-dependent topographical preference within this network, with predominantly anterior activation during musical tasks and predominantly posterior activation during semantic verbal tasks. Copyright (c) 2009 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Electrocortical N400 Effects of Semantic Satiation

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Kim Ströberg

2017-12-01

Full Text Available Semantic satiation is characterised by the subjective and temporary loss of meaning after high repetition of a prime word. To study the nature of this effect, previous electroencephalography (EEG research recorded the N400, an ERP component that is sensitive to violations of semantic context. The N400 is characterised by a relative negativity to words that are unrelated vs. related to the semantic context. The semantic satiation hypothesis predicts that the N400 should decrease with high repetition. However, previous findings have been inconsistent. Because of these inconsistent findings and the shortcomings of previous research, we used a modified design that minimises confounding effects from non-semantic processes. We recorded 64-channel EEG and analysed the N400 in a semantic priming task in which the primes were repeated 3 or 30 times. Critically, we separated low and high repetition trials and excluded response trials. Further, we varied the physical features (letter case and format of consecutive primes to minimise confounding effects from perceptual habituation. For centrofrontal electrodes, the N400 was reduced after 30 repetitions (vs. 3 repetitions. Explorative source reconstructions suggested that activity decreased after 30 repetitions in bilateral inferior temporal gyrus, the right posterior section of the superior and middle temporal gyrus, right supramarginal gyrus, bilateral lateral occipital cortex, and bilateral lateral orbitofrontal cortex. These areas overlap broadly with those typically involved in the N400, namely middle temporal gyrus and inferior frontal gyrus. The results support the semantic rather than the perceptual nature of the satiation effect.

Evolution of semantic systems

CERN Document Server

Küppers, Bernd-Olaf; Artmann, Stefan

2013-01-01

Complex systems in nature and society make use of information for the development of their internal organization and the control of their functional mechanisms. Alongside technical aspects of storing, transmitting and processing information, the various semantic aspects of information, such as meaning, sense, reference and function, play a decisive part in the analysis of such systems.With the aim of fostering a better understanding of semantic systems from an evolutionary and multidisciplinary perspective, this volume collects contributions by philosophers and natural scientists, linguists, i

Discovering EEG resting state alterations of semantic dementia.

Science.gov (United States)

Grieder, Matthias; Koenig, Thomas; Kinoshita, Toshihiko; Utsunomiya, Keita; Wahlund, Lars-Olof; Dierks, Thomas; Nishida, Keiichiro

2016-05-01

Diagnosis of semantic dementia relies on cost-intensive MRI or PET, although resting EEG markers of other dementias have been reported. Yet the view still holds that resting EEG in patients with semantic dementia is normal. However, studies using increasingly sophisticated EEG analysis methods have demonstrated that slightest alterations of functional brain states can be detected. We analyzed the common four resting EEG microstates (A, B, C, and D) of 8 patients with semantic dementia in comparison with 8 healthy controls and 8 patients with Alzheimer's disease. Topographical differences between the groups were found in microstate classes B and C, while microstate classes A and D were comparable. The data showed that the semantic dementia group had a peculiar microstate E, but the commonly found microstate C was lacking. Furthermore, the presence of microstate E was significantly correlated with lower MMSE and language scores. Alterations in resting EEG can be found in semantic dementia. Topographical shifts in microstate C might be related to semantic memory deficits. This is the first study that discovered resting state EEG abnormality in semantic dementia. The notion that resting EEG in this dementia subtype is normal has to be revised. Copyright © 2016 International Federation of Clinical Neurophysiology. Published by Elsevier Ireland Ltd. All rights reserved.

LEARNING SEMANTICS-ENHANCED LANGUAGE MODELS APPLIED TO UNSUEPRVISED WSD

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

VERSPOOR, KARIN [Los Alamos National Laboratory; LIN, SHOU-DE [Los Alamos National Laboratory

2007-01-29

An N-gram language model aims at capturing statistical syntactic word order information from corpora. Although the concept of language models has been applied extensively to handle a variety of NLP problems with reasonable success, the standard model does not incorporate semantic information, and consequently limits its applicability to semantic problems such as word sense disambiguation. We propose a framework that integrates semantic information into the language model schema, allowing a system to exploit both syntactic and semantic information to address NLP problems. Furthermore, acknowledging the limited availability of semantically annotated data, we discuss how the proposed model can be learned without annotated training examples. Finally, we report on a case study showing how the semantics-enhanced language model can be applied to unsupervised word sense disambiguation with promising results.

The Universality of Semantic Prototypes in Spanish Lexical Availability

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Marjana Šifrar Kalan

2016-12-01

Full Text Available The article presents the words with highest index of availability on the basis of semantic fluency tests. The conceptual stability of highly available words in various semantic categories enables them to be classified as semantic prototypes according to the theory of prototype. The aim of this article is to compare the semantic prototypes in nine semantic categories from different lexical availability studies: those carried out in Spanish as a mother tongue and Spanish as a foreign language (with Slovene, Finnish, Turkish, Chinese students and students of various other mother tongues who studied Spanish in Madrid and Salamanca. The informants who come from different countries and cultures and speak different first languages demonstrate that human beings share the same or similar categorization and universality of semantic prototypes.

NASA and The Semantic Web

Science.gov (United States)

Ashish, Naveen

2005-01-01

We provide an overview of several ongoing NASA endeavors based on concepts, systems, and technology from the Semantic Web arena. Indeed NASA has been one of the early adopters of Semantic Web Technology and we describe ongoing and completed R&D efforts for several applications ranging from collaborative systems to airspace information management to enterprise search to scientific information gathering and discovery systems at NASA.

Principal semantic components of language and the measurement of meaning.

Science.gov (United States)

Samsonovich, Alexei V; Samsonovic, Alexei V; Ascoli, Giorgio A

2010-06-11

Metric systems for semantics, or semantic cognitive maps, are allocations of words or other representations in a metric space based on their meaning. Existing methods for semantic mapping, such as Latent Semantic Analysis and Latent Dirichlet Allocation, are based on paradigms involving dissimilarity metrics. They typically do not take into account relations of antonymy and yield a large number of domain-specific semantic dimensions. Here, using a novel self-organization approach, we construct a low-dimensional, context-independent semantic map of natural language that represents simultaneously synonymy and antonymy. Emergent semantics of the map principal components are clearly identifiable: the first three correspond to the meanings of "good/bad" (valence), "calm/excited" (arousal), and "open/closed" (freedom), respectively. The semantic map is sufficiently robust to allow the automated extraction of synonyms and antonyms not originally in the dictionaries used to construct the map and to predict connotation from their coordinates. The map geometric characteristics include a limited number ( approximately 4) of statistically significant dimensions, a bimodal distribution of the first component, increasing kurtosis of subsequent (unimodal) components, and a U-shaped maximum-spread planar projection. Both the semantic content and the main geometric features of the map are consistent between dictionaries (Microsoft Word and Princeton's WordNet), among Western languages (English, French, German, and Spanish), and with previously established psychometric measures. By defining the semantics of its dimensions, the constructed map provides a foundational metric system for the quantitative analysis of word meaning. Language can be viewed as a cumulative product of human experiences. Therefore, the extracted principal semantic dimensions may be useful to characterize the general semantic dimensions of the content of mental states. This is a fundamental step toward a

Principal semantic components of language and the measurement of meaning.

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Alexei V Samsonovich

Full Text Available Metric systems for semantics, or semantic cognitive maps, are allocations of words or other representations in a metric space based on their meaning. Existing methods for semantic mapping, such as Latent Semantic Analysis and Latent Dirichlet Allocation, are based on paradigms involving dissimilarity metrics. They typically do not take into account relations of antonymy and yield a large number of domain-specific semantic dimensions. Here, using a novel self-organization approach, we construct a low-dimensional, context-independent semantic map of natural language that represents simultaneously synonymy and antonymy. Emergent semantics of the map principal components are clearly identifiable: the first three correspond to the meanings of "good/bad" (valence, "calm/excited" (arousal, and "open/closed" (freedom, respectively. The semantic map is sufficiently robust to allow the automated extraction of synonyms and antonyms not originally in the dictionaries used to construct the map and to predict connotation from their coordinates. The map geometric characteristics include a limited number ( approximately 4 of statistically significant dimensions, a bimodal distribution of the first component, increasing kurtosis of subsequent (unimodal components, and a U-shaped maximum-spread planar projection. Both the semantic content and the main geometric features of the map are consistent between dictionaries (Microsoft Word and Princeton's WordNet, among Western languages (English, French, German, and Spanish, and with previously established psychometric measures. By defining the semantics of its dimensions, the constructed map provides a foundational metric system for the quantitative analysis of word meaning. Language can be viewed as a cumulative product of human experiences. Therefore, the extracted principal semantic dimensions may be useful to characterize the general semantic dimensions of the content of mental states. This is a fundamental step

Ontological semantics in modified categorial grammar

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Szymczak, Bartlomiej Antoni

2009-01-01

Categorial Grammar is a well established tool for describing natural language semantics. In the current paper we discuss some of its drawbacks and how it could be extended to overcome them. We use the extended version for deriving ontological semantics from text. A proof-of-concept implementation...

Rewriting Logic Semantics of a Plan Execution Language

Science.gov (United States)

Dowek, Gilles; Munoz, Cesar A.; Rocha, Camilo

2009-01-01

The Plan Execution Interchange Language (PLEXIL) is a synchronous language developed by NASA to support autonomous spacecraft operations. In this paper, we propose a rewriting logic semantics of PLEXIL in Maude, a high-performance logical engine. The rewriting logic semantics is by itself a formal interpreter of the language and can be used as a semantic benchmark for the implementation of PLEXIL executives. The implementation in Maude has the additional benefit of making available to PLEXIL designers and developers all the formal analysis and verification tools provided by Maude. The formalization of the PLEXIL semantics in rewriting logic poses an interesting challenge due to the synchronous nature of the language and the prioritized rules defining its semantics. To overcome this difficulty, we propose a general procedure for simulating synchronous set relations in rewriting logic that is sound and, for deterministic relations, complete. We also report on the finding of two issues at the design level of the original PLEXIL semantics that were identified with the help of the executable specification in Maude.

Automaticity Revisited: When Print Doesn't Activate Semantics

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Elsa Magdalena Labuschagne

2015-02-01

Full Text Available It is widely accepted that the presentation of a printed word automatically triggers processing that ends with full semantic activation. This processing, among other characteristics, is held to occur without intention, and cannot be stopped. The results of the present experiment show that this account is problematic in the context of a variant of the Stroop paradigm. Subjects named the print color of words that were either neutral or semantically related to color. When the letters were all colored, all spatially cued, and the spaces between letters were filled with characters from the top of the keyboard (i.e., 4, #, 5, %, 6, and *, color naming yielded a semantically based Stroop effect and a semantically based negative priming effect. In contrast, the same items yielded neither a semantic Stroop effect nor a negative priming effect when a single target letter was uniquely colored and spatially cued. These findings undermine the widespread view that lexical-semantic activation in word reading is automatic in the sense that it occurs without intention and cannot be derailed.

The semantic sphere of juvenile offenders

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Oshevsky D.S.

2017-01-01

Full Text Available The article presents the results of a preliminary empirical study aimed to identify features of the semantic sphere of adolescents who have committed illegal, including aggressive acts. The study included 50 male juveniles aged of 16 - 17 years. The first group consisted of adolescents convicted of aggressive and violent crimes; the second – of property socially dangerous acts (SDA. It is shown that evaluation of such adolescents is generally categorical and polar, the semantic field is subdifferentiable, less hierarchic, and has not enough realistic structure of meanings. Developed structure of motives and meanings is the basis of voluntary regulation of socially significant behavior. Thus, assessing the semantic sphere of juvenile offenders we can highlight its characteristics as risk factors of unlawful behavior, as well as the resource side, that will contribute to addressing issues of prevention and correction of unlawful behavior. Key words: juvenile offenders, semantic field of juvenile offenders, unlawful behavior.

High-performance analysis of filtered semantic graphs

OpenAIRE

Buluç, A; Fox, A; Gilbert, JR; Kamil, S; Lugowski, A; Oliker, L; Williams, S

2012-01-01

High performance is a crucial consideration when executing a complex analytic query on a massive semantic graph. In a semantic graph, vertices and edges carry \\attributes" of various types. Analytic queries on semantic graphs typically depend on the values of these attributes; thus, the computation must either view the graph through a filter that passes only those individual vertices and edges of interest, or else must first materialize a subgraph or subgraphs consisting of only the vertices ...

An Algebraic Specification of the Semantic Web

OpenAIRE

Ksystra, Katerina; Triantafyllou, Nikolaos; Stefaneas, Petros; Frangos, Panayiotis

2011-01-01

We present a formal specification of the Semantic Web, as an extension of the World Wide Web using the well known algebraic specification language CafeOBJ. Our approach allows the description of the key elements of the Semantic Web technologies, in order to give a better understanding of the system, without getting involved with their implementation details that might not yet be standardized. This specification is part of our work in progress concerning the modeling the Social Semantic Web.

Remote semantic memory is impoverished in hippocampal amnesia.

Science.gov (United States)

Klooster, Nathaniel B; Duff, Melissa C

2015-12-01

The necessity of the hippocampus for acquiring new semantic concepts is a topic of considerable debate. However, it is generally accepted that any role the hippocampus plays in semantic memory is time limited and that previously acquired information becomes independent of the hippocampus over time. This view, along with intact naming and word-definition matching performance in amnesia, has led to the notion that remote semantic memory is intact in patients with hippocampal amnesia. Motivated by perspectives of word learning as a protracted process where additional features and senses of a word are added over time, and by recent discoveries about the time course of hippocampal contributions to on-line relational processing, reconsolidation, and the flexible integration of information, we revisit the notion that remote semantic memory is intact in amnesia. Using measures of semantic richness and vocabulary depth from psycholinguistics and first and second language-learning studies, we examined how much information is associated with previously acquired, highly familiar words in a group of patients with bilateral hippocampal damage and amnesia. Relative to healthy demographically matched comparison participants and a group of brain-damaged comparison participants, the patients with hippocampal amnesia performed significantly worse on both productive and receptive measures of vocabulary depth and semantic richness. These findings suggest that remote semantic memory is impoverished in patients with hippocampal amnesia and that the hippocampus may play a role in the maintenance and updating of semantic memory beyond its initial acquisition. Copyright © 2015 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Semantic Priming for Coordinate Distant Concepts in Alzheimer's Disease Patients

Science.gov (United States)

Perri, R.; Zannino, G. D.; Caltagirone, C.; Carlesimo, G. A.

2011-01-01

Semantic priming paradigms have been used to investigate semantic knowledge in patients with Alzheimer's disease (AD). While priming effects produced by prime-target pairs with associative relatedness reflect processes at both lexical and semantic levels, priming effects produced by words that are semantically related but not associated should…

Semantic Document Model to Enhance Data and Knowledge Interoperability

Science.gov (United States)

Nešić, Saša

To enable document data and knowledge to be efficiently shared and reused across application, enterprise, and community boundaries, desktop documents should be completely open and queryable resources, whose data and knowledge are represented in a form understandable to both humans and machines. At the same time, these are the requirements that desktop documents need to satisfy in order to contribute to the visions of the Semantic Web. With the aim of achieving this goal, we have developed the Semantic Document Model (SDM), which turns desktop documents into Semantic Documents as uniquely identified and semantically annotated composite resources, that can be instantiated into human-readable (HR) and machine-processable (MP) forms. In this paper, we present the SDM along with an RDF and ontology-based solution for the MP document instance. Moreover, on top of the proposed model, we have built the Semantic Document Management System (SDMS), which provides a set of services that exploit the model. As an application example that takes advantage of SDMS services, we have extended MS Office with a set of tools that enables users to transform MS Office documents (e.g., MS Word and MS PowerPoint) into Semantic Documents, and to search local and distant semantic document repositories for document content units (CUs) over Semantic Web protocols.

Semantic Convergence in the Bilingual Lexicon

Science.gov (United States)

Ameel, Eef; Malt, Barbara C.; Storms, Gert; Van Assche, Fons

2009-01-01

Bilinguals' lexical mappings for their two languages have been found to converge toward a common naming pattern. The present paper investigates in more detail how semantic convergence is manifested in bilingual lexical knowledge. We examined how semantic convergence affects the centers and boundaries of lexical categories for common household…

A study of expertise effects for products with contradictory semantics

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Wang Ching-Yi

2017-01-01

Full Text Available In the design studies, researchers often use the semantic differential method with bipolar adjectives, such as “modern vs. classical” or “simple vs. complex” when investigating the semantics projected by product forms. However, in design practice, some design examples clearly exhibit the simultaneous use of contradictory meanings in product semantics. For example, retro car evokes nostalgia by borrowing characteristics from classical cars. At the same time it exhibits a modern style. However, most studies measure the product semantics mostly by using subjective measurement. There is lack objective measurement for that. In this research, we examined the results of applying the semantic differential method to measure contradiction in product semantics. The results showed that the distributions of semantic differential ratings for the stimuli with contradictory meanings have higher standard deviations. The sensitivity of semantic recognition may depend on participant expertise. The design experts are trained to be good at visual thinking that could easily identify the contradiction semantics between products. In general, successful embedding of contradictory meanings into product forms are based on simple, typical, and rational forms that can display complex, novel, and perceptual images by adding supplementary elements.

Fast Distributed Dynamics of Semantic Networks via Social Media

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Facundo Carrillo

2015-01-01

Full Text Available We investigate the dynamics of semantic organization using social media, a collective expression of human thought. We propose a novel, time-dependent semantic similarity measure (TSS, based on the social network Twitter. We show that TSS is consistent with static measures of similarity but provides high temporal resolution for the identification of real-world events and induced changes in the distributed structure of semantic relationships across the entire lexicon. Using TSS, we measured the evolution of a concept and its movement along the semantic neighborhood, driven by specific news/events. Finally, we showed that particular events may trigger a temporary reorganization of elements in the semantic network.

The semantic basis of taste-shape associations

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Carlos Velasco

2016-02-01

Full Text Available Previous research shows that people systematically match tastes with shapes. Here, we assess the extent to which matched taste and shape stimuli share a common semantic space and whether semantically congruent versus incongruent taste/shape associations can influence the speed with which people respond to both shapes and taste words. In Experiment 1, semantic differentiation was used to assess the semantic space of both taste words and shapes. The results suggest a common semantic space containing two principal components (seemingly, intensity and hedonics and two principal clusters, one including round shapes and the taste word “sweet,” and the other including angular shapes and the taste words “salty,” “sour,” and “bitter.” The former cluster appears more positively-valenced whilst less potent than the latter. In Experiment 2, two speeded classification tasks assessed whether congruent versus incongruent mappings of stimuli and responses (e.g., sweet with round versus sweet with angular would influence the speed of participants’ responding, to both shapes and taste words. The results revealed an overall effect of congruence with congruent trials yielding faster responses than their incongruent counterparts. These results are consistent with previous evidence suggesting a close relation (or crossmodal correspondence between tastes and shape curvature that may derive from common semantic coding, perhaps along the intensity and hedonic dimensions.

Semantic-Web Technology: Applications at NASA

Science.gov (United States)

Ashish, Naveen

2004-01-01

We provide a description of work at the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) on building system based on semantic-web concepts and technologies. NASA has been one of the early adopters of semantic-web technologies for practical applications. Indeed there are several ongoing 0 endeavors on building semantics based systems for use in diverse NASA domains ranging from collaborative scientific activity to accident and mishap investigation to enterprise search to scientific information gathering and integration to aviation safety decision support We provide a brief overview of many applications and ongoing work with the goal of informing the external community of these NASA endeavors.

Semantic Web Requirements through Web Mining Techniques

OpenAIRE

Hassanzadeh, Hamed; Keyvanpour, Mohammad Reza

2012-01-01

In recent years, Semantic web has become a topic of active research in several fields of computer science and has applied in a wide range of domains such as bioinformatics, life sciences, and knowledge management. The two fast-developing research areas semantic web and web mining can complement each other and their different techniques can be used jointly or separately to solve the issues in both areas. In addition, since shifting from current web to semantic web mainly depends on the enhance...

Inferentializing Semantics

Czech Academy of Sciences Publication Activity Database

Peregrin, Jaroslav

2010-01-01

Roč. 39, č. 3 (2010), s. 255-274 ISSN 0022-3611 R&D Projects: GA ČR(CZ) GA401/07/0904 Institutional research plan: CEZ:AV0Z90090514 Keywords : inference * proof theory * model theory * inferentialism * semantics Subject RIV: AA - Philosophy ; Religion

The Semantic Web in Teacher Education

Science.gov (United States)

Czerkawski, Betül Özkan

2014-01-01

The Semantic Web enables increased collaboration among computers and people by organizing unstructured data on the World Wide Web. Rather than a separate body, the Semantic Web is a functional extension of the current Web made possible by defining relationships among websites and other online content. When explicitly defined, these relationships…

An Educational Tool for Browsing the Semantic Web

Science.gov (United States)

Yoo, Sujin; Kim, Younghwan; Park, Seongbin

2013-01-01

The Semantic Web is an extension of the current Web where information is represented in a machine processable way. It is not separate from the current Web and one of the confusions that novice users might have is where the Semantic Web is. In fact, users can easily encounter RDF documents that are components of the Semantic Web while they navigate…

Approximate semantic matching of music classes on the internet

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Aleksovski, Zharko; Kate, Warner Ten; Van Harmelen, Frank

2006-01-01

We address the problem of semantic matching, which concerns the search for semantic agreement between heterogeneous concept hierarchies. We propose a new approximation method to discover and assess the "strength" (preciseness) of a semantic match between concepts from two such concept hierarchies.

A layered semantics for a parallel object-oriented language

NARCIS (Netherlands)

P.H.M. America (Pierre); J.J.M.M. Rutten (Jan)

1990-01-01

textabstractWe develop a denotational semantics for POOL, a parallel object-oriented programming language. The main contribution of this semantics is an accurate mathematical model of the most important concept in object-oriented programming: the object. This is achieved by structuring the semantics

Learning semantic and visual similarity for endomicroscopy video retrieval.

Science.gov (United States)

Andre, Barbara; Vercauteren, Tom; Buchner, Anna M; Wallace, Michael B; Ayache, Nicholas

2012-06-01

Content-based image retrieval (CBIR) is a valuable computer vision technique which is increasingly being applied in the medical community for diagnosis support. However, traditional CBIR systems only deliver visual outputs, i.e., images having a similar appearance to the query, which is not directly interpretable by the physicians. Our objective is to provide a system for endomicroscopy video retrieval which delivers both visual and semantic outputs that are consistent with each other. In a previous study, we developed an adapted bag-of-visual-words method for endomicroscopy retrieval, called "Dense-Sift," that computes a visual signature for each video. In this paper, we present a novel approach to complement visual similarity learning with semantic knowledge extraction, in the field of in vivo endomicroscopy. We first leverage a semantic ground truth based on eight binary concepts, in order to transform these visual signatures into semantic signatures that reflect how much the presence of each semantic concept is expressed by the visual words describing the videos. Using cross-validation, we demonstrate that, in terms of semantic detection, our intuitive Fisher-based method transforming visual-word histograms into semantic estimations outperforms support vector machine (SVM) methods with statistical significance. In a second step, we propose to improve retrieval relevance by learning an adjusted similarity distance from a perceived similarity ground truth. As a result, our distance learning method allows to statistically improve the correlation with the perceived similarity. We also demonstrate that, in terms of perceived similarity, the recall performance of the semantic signatures is close to that of visual signatures and significantly better than those of several state-of-the-art CBIR methods. The semantic signatures are thus able to communicate high-level medical knowledge while being consistent with the low-level visual signatures and much shorter than them

Building a semantic search engine with games and crowdsourcing

OpenAIRE

Wieser, Christoph

2014-01-01

Semantic search engines aim at improving conventional search with semantic information, or meta-data, on the data searched for and/or on the searchers. So far, approaches to semantic search exploit characteristics of the searchers like age, education, or spoken language for selecting and/or ranking search results. Such data allow to build up a semantic search engine as an extension of a conventional search engine. The crawlers of well established search engines like Google, Yahoo! or Bing ...

Semantic Business Intelligence - a New Generation of Business Intelligence

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Dinu AIRINEI

2012-01-01

Full Text Available Business Intelligence Solutions represents applications used by companies to manage process and analyze data to provide substantiated decision. In the context of Semantic Web develop-ment trend is to integrate semantic unstructured data, making business intelligence solutions to be redesigned in such a manner that can analyze, process and synthesize, in addition to traditional data and data integrated with semantic another form and structure. This invariably leads appearance of new BI solution, called Semantic Business Intelligence.

The use of protective barriers to deter inadvertent human intrusion into a mined geologic facility for the disposal of radioactive waste: A review of previous investigations and potential concepts

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Tolan, T.L.

1993-06-01

Sandia National Laboratories is evaluating the feasibility of developing protective barrier system for the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant (WIPP) to thwart inadvertent human intrusion into this radioactive-waste disposal system for a period of 9,900 years after assumed loss of active institutional controls. The protective barrier system would be part of a series of enduring passive institutional controls whose long-term function will be to reduce the likelihood of inadvertent human activities (e.g., exploratory drilling for resources) that could disrupt the WIPP disposal system

The Semantic Web: opportunities and challenges for next-generation Web applications

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

2002-01-01

Full Text Available Recently there has been a growing interest in the investigation and development of the next generation web - the Semantic Web. While most of the current forms of web content are designed to be presented to humans, but are barely understandable by computers, the content of the Semantic Web is structured in a semantic way so that it is meaningful to computers as well as to humans. In this paper, we report a survey of recent research on the Semantic Web. In particular, we present the opportunities that this revolution will bring to us: web-services, agent-based distributed computing, semantics-based web search engines, and semantics-based digital libraries. We also discuss the technical and cultural challenges of realizing the Semantic Web: the development of ontologies, formal semantics of Semantic Web languages, and trust and proof models. We hope that this will shed some light on the direction of future work on this field.

Recall from Semantic and Episodic Memory.

Science.gov (United States)

Gillund, Gary; Perlmutter, Marion

Although research in episodic recall memory, comparing younger and older adults, favors the younger adults, findings in semantic memory research are less consistent. To examine age differences in semantic and episodic memory recall, 72 young adults (mean age, 20.8) and 72 older adults (mean age 71) completed three memory tests under varied…

Social Networking on the Semantic Web

Science.gov (United States)

Finin, Tim; Ding, Li; Zhou, Lina; Joshi, Anupam

2005-01-01

Purpose: Aims to investigate the way that the semantic web is being used to represent and process social network information. Design/methodology/approach: The Swoogle semantic web search engine was used to construct several large data sets of Resource Description Framework (RDF) documents with social network information that were encoded using the…

Relaxation as a Factor in Semantic Desensitization

Science.gov (United States)

Bechtel, James E.; McNamara, J. Regis

1975-01-01

Relaxation and semantic desensitization were used to alleviate the fear of phobic females. Results showed that semantic desensitization, alone or in combination with relaxation, failed to modify the evaluative meanings evoked by the feared object. (SE)

Grammaticalization and Semantic Maps: Evidence from Artificial Language

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Remi van Trijp

2010-01-01

Full Text Available Semantic maps have offered linguists an appealing and empirically rooted methodology for describing recurrent structural patterns in language development and the multifunctionality of grammatical categories. Although some researchers argue that semantic maps are universal and given, others provide evidence that there are no fixed or universal maps. This paper takes the position that semantic maps are a useful way to visualize the grammatical evolution of a language (particularly the evolution of semantic structuring but that this grammatical evolution is a consequence of distributed processes whereby language users shape and reshape their language. So it is a challenge to find out what these processes are and whether they indeed generate the kind of semantic maps observed for human languages. This work takes a design stance towards the question of the emergence of linguistic structure and investigates how grammar can be formed in populations of autonomous artificial ?agents? that play ?language games? with each other about situations they perceive through a sensori-motor embodiment. The experiments reported here investigate whether semantic maps for case markers could emerge through grammaticalization processes without the need for a universal conceptual space.

Semi-Supervised Learning to Identify UMLS Semantic Relations.

Science.gov (United States)

Luo, Yuan; Uzuner, Ozlem

2014-01-01

The UMLS Semantic Network is constructed by experts and requires periodic expert review to update. We propose and implement a semi-supervised approach for automatically identifying UMLS semantic relations from narrative text in PubMed. Our method analyzes biomedical narrative text to collect semantic entity pairs, and extracts multiple semantic, syntactic and orthographic features for the collected pairs. We experiment with seeded k-means clustering with various distance metrics. We create and annotate a ground truth corpus according to the top two levels of the UMLS semantic relation hierarchy. We evaluate our system on this corpus and characterize the learning curves of different clustering configuration. Using KL divergence consistently performs the best on the held-out test data. With full seeding, we obtain macro-averaged F-measures above 70% for clustering the top level UMLS relations (2-way), and above 50% for clustering the second level relations (7-way).

Arabic web pages clustering and annotation using semantic class features

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Hanan M. Alghamdi

2014-12-01

Full Text Available To effectively manage the great amount of data on Arabic web pages and to enable the classification of relevant information are very important research problems. Studies on sentiment text mining have been very limited in the Arabic language because they need to involve deep semantic processing. Therefore, in this paper, we aim to retrieve machine-understandable data with the help of a Web content mining technique to detect covert knowledge within these data. We propose an approach to achieve clustering with semantic similarities. This approach comprises integrating k-means document clustering with semantic feature extraction and document vectorization to group Arabic web pages according to semantic similarities and then show the semantic annotation. The document vectorization helps to transform text documents into a semantic class probability distribution or semantic class density. To reach semantic similarities, the approach extracts the semantic class features and integrates them into the similarity weighting schema. The quality of the clustering result has evaluated the use of the purity and the mean intra-cluster distance (MICD evaluation measures. We have evaluated the proposed approach on a set of common Arabic news web pages. We have acquired favorable clustering results that are effective in minimizing the MICD, expanding the purity and lowering the runtime.

Semantic categorization: A comparison between deaf and hearing children

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Ormel, E.A.; Gijsel, M.A.R.; Hermans, D.; Bosman, A.M.T.; Knoors, H.E.T.; Verhoeven, L.T.W.

2010-01-01

Learning to read is a major obstacle for children who are deaf. The otherwise significant role of phonology is often limited as a result of hearing loss. However, semantic knowledge may facilitate reading comprehension. One important aspect of semantic knowledge concerns semantic categorization. In

Learning With Social Semantic Technologies - Exploiting Latest Tools

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Gisela Granitzer

2008-12-01

Full Text Available Even though it was only about three years ago that Social Software became a trend, it has become a common practice to utilize Social Software in learning institutions. It brought about a lot of advantages, but also challenges. Amounts of distributed and often unstructured user generated content make it difficult to meaningfully process and find relevant information. According to the estimate of the authors, the solution lies in underpinning Social Software with structure resulting in Social Semantic Software. In this contribution we introduce the central concepts Social Software, Semantic Web and Social Semantic Web and show how Social Semantic Technologies might be utilized in the higher education context.

Are Some Semantic Changes Predictable?

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Schousboe, Steen

2010-01-01

  Historical linguistics is traditionally concerned with phonology and syntax. With the exception of grammaticalization - the development of auxiliary verbs, the syntactic rather than localistic use of prepositions, etc. - semantic change has usually not been described as a result of regular...... developments, but only as specific meaning changes in individual words. This paper will suggest some regularities in semantic change, regularities which, like sound laws, have predictive power and can be tested against recorded languages....

Interventions for treating inadvertent postoperative hypothermia.

Science.gov (United States)

Warttig, Sheryl; Alderson, Phil; Campbell, Gillian; Smith, Andrew F

2014-11-20

Inadvertent postoperative hypothermia (a drop in core body temperature to below 36°C) occurs as an effect of surgery when anaesthetic drugs and exposure of the skin for long periods of time during surgery result in interference with normal temperature regulation. Once hypothermia has occurred, it is important that patients are rewarmed promptly to minimise potential complications. Several different interventions are available for rewarming patients. To estimate the effectiveness of treating inadvertent perioperative hypothermia through postoperative interventions to decrease heat loss and apply passive and active warming systems in adult patients who have undergone surgery. We searched the Cochrane Central Register of Controlled Trials (CENTRAL) (2014, Issue 2), MEDLINE (Ovid SP) (1956 to 21 February 2014), EMBASE (Ovid SP) (1982 to 21 February 2014), the Institute for Scientific Information (ISI) Web of Science (1950 to 21 February 2014) and the Cumulative Index to Nursing and Allied Health Literature (CINAHL), EBSCO host (1980 to 21 February 2014), as well as reference lists of articles. We also searched www.controlled-trials.com and www.clincialtrials.gov. Randomized controlled trials of postoperative warming interventions aiming to reverse hypothermia compared with control or with each other. Three review authors identified studies for inclusion in this review. One review author extracted data and completed risk of bias assessments; two review authors checked the details. Meta-analysis was conducted when appropriate by using standard methodological procedures as expected by The Cochrane Collaboration. We included 11 trials with 699 participants. Ten trials provided data for analysis. Trials varied in the numbers and types of participants included and in the types of surgery performed. Most trials were at high or unclear risk of bias because of inappropriate or unclear randomization procedures, and because blinding of assessors and participants generally was

Pregnancy outcome after 1st-trimester inadvertent exposure to barium sulphate as a contrast media for upper gastrointestinal tract radiography.

Science.gov (United States)

Han, B H; Lee, K S; Han, J Y; Choi, J S; Ahn, H K; Ryu, H M; Yang, J H; Han, H W; Nava-Ocampo, A A

2011-10-01

Despite barium being used as a contrast media for decades, the specific assessment of its safety in pregnant women is scarce. We are reporting the favourable pregnancy outcome in women who were inadvertently exposed to barium swallow and associated ionising radiation, early in pregnancy. A control group of age- and gravidity-matched unexposed pregnant women was also included. There were 32 live-born babies in the exposed group and 94 in the control group. Women had undergone diagnostic upper gastrointestinal tract (UGT) fluoroscopic examination at 3.3 ± 1.5 weeks' gestation. Estimated maternal radiation dose secondary to barium swallow varied widely, the maximum dose was estimated to be 2.45 mSv. Similar pregnancy outcomes were observed between the groups. The number of babies born with major malformations was not significantly different (p = 1.0) between cases and controls: one (3.1%) vs three (3.2%), respectively. In conclusion, our small prospective cohort study of women suggests no association between inadvertent exposure to ionising radiation and barium sulphate during fluoroscopic barium swallow and adverse fetal outcomes.

Semantic Interoperability in Heterogeneous IoT Infrastructure for Healthcare

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Sohail Jabbar

2017-01-01

Full Text Available Interoperability remains a significant burden to the developers of Internet of Things’ Systems. This is due to the fact that the IoT devices are highly heterogeneous in terms of underlying communication protocols, data formats, and technologies. Secondly due to lack of worldwide acceptable standards, interoperability tools remain limited. In this paper, we proposed an IoT based Semantic Interoperability Model (IoT-SIM to provide Semantic Interoperability among heterogeneous IoT devices in healthcare domain. Physicians communicate their patients with heterogeneous IoT devices to monitor their current health status. Information between physician and patient is semantically annotated and communicated in a meaningful way. A lightweight model for semantic annotation of data using heterogeneous devices in IoT is proposed to provide annotations for data. Resource Description Framework (RDF is a semantic web framework that is used to relate things using triples to make it semantically meaningful. RDF annotated patients’ data has made it semantically interoperable. SPARQL query is used to extract records from RDF graph. For simulation of system, we used Tableau, Gruff-6.2.0, and Mysql tools.

Categorical model of structural operational semantics for imperative language

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

William Steingartner

2016-12-01

Full Text Available Definition of programming languages consists of the formal definition of syntax and semantics. One of the most popular semantic methods used in various stages of software engineering is structural operational semantics. It describes program behavior in the form of state changes after execution of elementary steps of program. This feature makes structural operational semantics useful for implementation of programming languages and also for verification purposes. In our paper we present a new approach to structural operational semantics. We model behavior of programs in category of states, where objects are states, an abstraction of computer memory and morphisms model state changes, execution of a program in elementary steps. The advantage of using categorical model is its exact mathematical structure with many useful proved properties and its graphical illustration of program behavior as a path, i.e. a composition of morphisms. Our approach is able to accentuate dynamics of structural operational semantics. For simplicity, we assume that data are intuitively typed. Visualization and facility of our model is  not only  a  new model of structural operational semantics of imperative programming languages but it can also serve for education purposes.

Personal semantics: Is it distinct from episodic and semantic memory? An electrophysiological study of memory for autobiographical facts and repeated events in honor of Shlomo Bentin.

Science.gov (United States)

Renoult, Louis; Tanguay, Annick; Beaudry, Myriam; Tavakoli, Paniz; Rabipour, Sheida; Campbell, Kenneth; Moscovitch, Morris; Levine, Brian; Davidson, Patrick S R

2016-03-01

Declarative memory is thought to consist of two independent systems: episodic and semantic. Episodic memory represents personal and contextually unique events, while semantic memory represents culturally-shared, acontextual factual knowledge. Personal semantics refers to aspects of declarative memory that appear to fall somewhere in between the extremes of episodic and semantic. Examples include autobiographical knowledge and memories of repeated personal events. These two aspects of personal semantics have been studied little and rarely compared to both semantic and episodic memory. We recorded the event-related potentials (ERPs) of 27 healthy participants while they verified the veracity of sentences probing four types of questions: general (i.e., semantic) facts, autobiographical facts, repeated events, and unique (i.e., episodic) events. Behavioral results showed equivalent reaction times in all 4 conditions. True sentences were verified faster than false sentences, except for unique events for which no significant difference was observed. Electrophysiological results showed that the N400 (which is classically associated with retrieval from semantic memory) was maximal for general facts and the LPC (which is classically associated with retrieval from episodic memory) was maximal for unique events. For both ERP components, the two personal semantic conditions (i.e., autobiographical facts and repeated events) systematically differed from semantic memory. In addition, N400 amplitudes also differentiated autobiographical facts from unique events. Autobiographical facts and repeated events did not differ significantly from each other but their corresponding scalp distributions differed from those associated with general facts. Our results suggest that the neural correlates of personal semantics can be distinguished from those of semantic and episodic memory, and may provide clues as to how unique events are transformed to semantic memory. Copyright © 2015 Elsevier

Concealed semantic and episodic autobiographical memory electrified.

Science.gov (United States)

Ganis, Giorgio; Schendan, Haline E

2012-01-01

Electrophysiology-based concealed information tests (CIT) try to determine whether somebody possesses concealed information about a crime-related item (probe) by comparing event-related potentials (ERPs) between this item and comparison items (irrelevants). Although the broader field is sometimes referred to as "memory detection," little attention has been paid to the precise type of underlying memory involved. This study begins addressing this issue by examining the key distinction between semantic and episodic memory in the autobiographical domain within a CIT paradigm. This study also addresses the issue of whether multiple repetitions of the items over the course of the session habituate the brain responses. Participants were tested in a 3-stimulus CIT with semantic autobiographical probes (their own date of birth) and episodic autobiographical probes (a secret date learned just before the study). Results dissociated these two memory conditions on several ERP components. Semantic probes elicited a smaller frontal N2 than episodic probes, consistent with the idea that the frontal N2 decreases with greater pre-existing knowledge about the item. Likewise, semantic probes elicited a smaller central N400 than episodic probes. Semantic probes also elicited a larger P3b than episodic probes because of their richer meaning. In contrast, episodic probes elicited a larger late positive complex (LPC) than semantic probes, because of the recent episodic memory associated with them. All these ERPs showed a difference between probes and irrelevants in both memory conditions, except for the N400, which showed a difference only in the semantic condition. Finally, although repetition affected the ERPs, it did not reduce the difference between probes and irrelevants. These findings show that the type of memory associated with a probe has both theoretical and practical importance for CIT research.

Concealed semantic and episodic autobiographical memory electrified

Science.gov (United States)

Ganis, Giorgio; Schendan, Haline E.

2013-01-01

Electrophysiology-based concealed information tests (CIT) try to determine whether somebody possesses concealed information about a crime-related item (probe) by comparing event-related potentials (ERPs) between this item and comparison items (irrelevants). Although the broader field is sometimes referred to as “memory detection,” little attention has been paid to the precise type of underlying memory involved. This study begins addressing this issue by examining the key distinction between semantic and episodic memory in the autobiographical domain within a CIT paradigm. This study also addresses the issue of whether multiple repetitions of the items over the course of the session habituate the brain responses. Participants were tested in a 3-stimulus CIT with semantic autobiographical probes (their own date of birth) and episodic autobiographical probes (a secret date learned just before the study). Results dissociated these two memory conditions on several ERP components. Semantic probes elicited a smaller frontal N2 than episodic probes, consistent with the idea that the frontal N2 decreases with greater pre-existing knowledge about the item. Likewise, semantic probes elicited a smaller central N400 than episodic probes. Semantic probes also elicited a larger P3b than episodic probes because of their richer meaning. In contrast, episodic probes elicited a larger late positive complex (LPC) than semantic probes, because of the recent episodic memory associated with them. All these ERPs showed a difference between probes and irrelevants in both memory conditions, except for the N400, which showed a difference only in the semantic condition. Finally, although repetition affected the ERPs, it did not reduce the difference between probes and irrelevants. These findings show that the type of memory associated with a probe has both theoretical and practical importance for CIT research. PMID:23355816

Building a Semantic Framework for eScience

Science.gov (United States)

Movva, S.; Ramachandran, R.; Maskey, M.; Li, X.

2009-12-01

The e-Science vision focuses on the use of advanced computing technologies to support scientists. Recent research efforts in this area have focused primarily on “enabling” use of infrastructure resources for both data and computational access especially in Geosciences. One of the existing gaps in the existing e-Science efforts has been the failure to incorporate stable semantic technologies within the design process itself. In this presentation, we describe our effort in designing a framework for e-Science built using Service Oriented Architecture. Our framework provides users capabilities to create science workflows and mine distributed data. Our e-Science framework is being designed around a mass market tool to promote reusability across many projects. Semantics is an integral part of this framework and our design goal is to leverage the latest stable semantic technologies. The use of these stable semantic technologies will provide the users of our framework the useful features such as: allow search engines to find their content with RDFa tags; create RDF triple data store for their content; create RDF end points to share with others; and semantically mash their content with other online content available as RDF end point.

Towards Compatible and Interderivable Semantic Specifications for the Scheme Programming Language, Part II: Reduction Semantics and Abstract Machines

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Biernacka, Malgorzata; Danvy, Olivier

2009-01-01

We present a context-sensitive reduction semantics for a lambmda-calculus with explicit substitutions and we show that the functional implementation of this small-step semantics mechanically corresponds to that of the abstract machine for Core Scheme presented by Clinger at PLDI'98, including fir...

Semantics by levels: An example for an image language

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Fasciano, M.; Levialdi, S.; Tortora, G.

1984-01-01

Ambiguities in formal language constructs may decrease both the understanding and the coding efficiency of a program. Within an image language, two semantic levels have been detected, corresponding to the lower level (pixel-based) and to the higher level (image-based). Denotational semantics has been used to define both levels within PIXAL (an image language) in order to enable the reader to visualize a concrete application of the semantic levels and their implications in a programming environment. This paper presents the semantics of different levels of conceptualization in the abstract formal description of an image language. The disambiguation of the meaning of special purpose constructs that imply either the elementary (pixels) level or the high image (array) level is naturally obtained by means of such semantic clauses. Perhaps non Von architectures on which hierarchical computations may be performed could also benefit from the use of semantic clauses to explicit the different levels where such computations are executed

Patterns of Semantic Memory Impairment in Mild Cognitive Impairment

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Sven Joubert

2008-01-01

Full Text Available Although the semantic memory impairment has been largely documented in Alzheimer's disease, little is known about semantic memory in the preclinical phase of the disease (Mild Cognitive Impairment. The purpose of this study was to document the nature of semantic breakdown using a battery of tests assessing different aspects of conceptual knowledge: knowledge about common objects, famous people and famous public events. Results indicate that all domains of semantic memory were impaired in MCI individuals but knowledge about famous people and famous events was affected to a greater extent than knowledge about objects. This pattern of results suggests that conceptual entities with distinctive and unique properties may be more prone to semantic breakdown in MCI. In summary, results of this study support the view that genuine semantic deficits are present in MCI. It could be useful to investigate the etiological outcome of patients failing or succeeding at such tests.

Semantic Neighborhood Effects for Abstract versus Concrete Words.

Science.gov (United States)

Danguecan, Ashley N; Buchanan, Lori

2016-01-01

Studies show that semantic effects may be task-specific, and thus, that semantic representations are flexible and dynamic. Such findings are critical to the development of a comprehensive theory of semantic processing in visual word recognition, which should arguably account for how semantic effects may vary by task. It has been suggested that semantic effects are more directly examined using tasks that explicitly require meaning processing relative to those for which meaning processing is not necessary (e.g., lexical decision task). The purpose of the present study was to chart the processing of concrete versus abstract words in the context of a global co-occurrence variable, semantic neighborhood density (SND), by comparing word recognition response times (RTs) across four tasks varying in explicit semantic demands: standard lexical decision task (with non-pronounceable non-words), go/no-go lexical decision task (with pronounceable non-words), progressive demasking task, and sentence relatedness task. The same experimental stimulus set was used across experiments and consisted of 44 concrete and 44 abstract words, with half of these being low SND, and half being high SND. In this way, concreteness and SND were manipulated in a factorial design using a number of visual word recognition tasks. A consistent RT pattern emerged across tasks, in which SND effects were found for abstract (but not necessarily concrete) words. Ultimately, these findings highlight the importance of studying interactive effects in word recognition, and suggest that linguistic associative information is particularly important for abstract words.

SPARK: Adapting Keyword Query to Semantic Search

Science.gov (United States)

Zhou, Qi; Wang, Chong; Xiong, Miao; Wang, Haofen; Yu, Yong

Semantic search promises to provide more accurate result than present-day keyword search. However, progress with semantic search has been delayed due to the complexity of its query languages. In this paper, we explore a novel approach of adapting keywords to querying the semantic web: the approach automatically translates keyword queries into formal logic queries so that end users can use familiar keywords to perform semantic search. A prototype system named 'SPARK' has been implemented in light of this approach. Given a keyword query, SPARK outputs a ranked list of SPARQL queries as the translation result. The translation in SPARK consists of three major steps: term mapping, query graph construction and query ranking. Specifically, a probabilistic query ranking model is proposed to select the most likely SPARQL query. In the experiment, SPARK achieved an encouraging translation result.

Self-referential processing is distinct from semantic elaboration: evidence from long-term memory effects in a patient with amnesia and semantic impairments.

Science.gov (United States)

Sui, Jie; Humphreys, Glyn W

2013-11-01

We report data demonstrating that self-referential encoding facilitates memory performance in the absence of effects of semantic elaboration in a severely amnesic patient also suffering semantic problems. In Part 1, the patient, GA, was trained to associate items with the self or a familiar other during the encoding phase of a memory task (self-ownership decisions in Experiment 1 and self-evaluation decisions in Experiment 2). Tests of memory showed a consistent self-reference advantage, relative to a condition where the reference was another person in both experiments. The pattern of the self-reference advantage was similar to that in healthy controls. In Part 2 we demonstrate that GA showed minimal effects of semantic elaboration on memory for items he semantically classified, compared with items subject to physical size decisions; in contrast, healthy controls demonstrated enhanced memory performance after semantic relative to physical encoding. The results indicate that self-referential encoding, not semantic elaboration, improves memory in amnesia. Self-referential processing may provide a unique scaffold to help improve learning in amnesic cases. Copyright © 2013 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Designing learning management system interoperability in semantic web

Science.gov (United States)

Anistyasari, Y.; Sarno, R.; Rochmawati, N.

2018-01-01

The extensive adoption of learning management system (LMS) has set the focus on the interoperability requirement. Interoperability is the ability of different computer systems, applications or services to communicate, share and exchange data, information, and knowledge in a precise, effective and consistent way. Semantic web technology and the use of ontologies are able to provide the required computational semantics and interoperability for the automation of tasks in LMS. The purpose of this study is to design learning management system interoperability in the semantic web which currently has not been investigated deeply. Moodle is utilized to design the interoperability. Several database tables of Moodle are enhanced and some features are added. The semantic web interoperability is provided by exploited ontology in content materials. The ontology is further utilized as a searching tool to match user’s queries and available courses. It is concluded that LMS interoperability in Semantic Web is possible to be performed.

Semantic web implications for technologies and business practices

CERN Document Server

2016-01-01

This book examines recent developments in semantic systems that can respond to situations and environments and events. The contributors to this book cover how to design, implement, and utilize disruptive technologies from the semantic and Web 3.0 arena. The editor and the contributors discuss two fundamental sets of disruptive technologies: the development of semantic technologies including description logics, ontologies, and agent frameworks; and the development of semantic information rendering including graphical forms of displays of high-density time-sensitive data to improve situational awareness. Beyond practical illustrations of emerging technologies, the goal of this book is to help readers learn about managing information resources in new ways and reinforcing the learning as they read on.   ·         Examines the contrast of competing paradigms and approaches to problem solving and decision-making using technology tools and techniques ·         Covers how to use semantic principle...

Semantics by analogy for illustrative volume visualization

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Gerl, Moritz; Rautek, Peter; Isenberg, Tobias; Groeller, Eduard

We present an interactive graphical approach for the explicit specification of semantics for volume visualization. This explicit and graphical specification of semantics for volumetric features allows us to visually assign meaning to both input and output parameters of the visualization mapping.

Semantic Web Without SPARQL.pdf

OpenAIRE

Szekely, Pedro

2016-01-01

Discuss the creation of large Semantic Web applications with billions of triples. Instead of using a traditional SPARQL endpoint, our toolchain is a pure JSON toolchain using JSON-LD and ElasticSearch to support queries. The toolchain is familiar to all developers, does not require knowledge of Semantic Web technologies, and performance is 10X better than using SPARQL endpoints. The presentation illustrates the approach in the context of an application to fight human trafficking, using data f...

Efficient computation of argumentation semantics

CERN Document Server

Liao, Beishui

2013-01-01

Efficient Computation of Argumentation Semantics addresses argumentation semantics and systems, introducing readers to cutting-edge decomposition methods that drive increasingly efficient logic computation in AI and intelligent systems. Such complex and distributed systems are increasingly used in the automation and transportation systems field, and particularly autonomous systems, as well as more generic intelligent computation research. The Series in Intelligent Systems publishes titles that cover state-of-the-art knowledge and the latest advances in research and development in intelligen

Semantic Web Development

National Research Council Canada - National Science Library

Berners-Lee, Tim; Swick, Ralph

2006-01-01

...) project between 2002 and 2005 provided key steps in the research in the Semantic Web technology, and also played an essential role in delivering the technology to industry and government in the form...

TRECVid Semantic Indexing of Video: A 6-year Retrospective

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Awad, G.; Snoek, C.G.M.; Smeaton, A.F.; Quénot, G.

2016-01-01

Semantic indexing, or assigning semantic tags to video samples, is a key component for content-based access to video documents and collections. The Semantic Indexing task has been run at TRECVid from 2010 to 2015 with the support of NIST and the Quaero project. As with the previous High-Level

Auditory Distraction in Semantic Memory: A Process-Based Approach

Science.gov (United States)

Marsh, John E.; Hughes, Robert W.; Jones, Dylan M.

2008-01-01

Five experiments demonstrate auditory-semantic distraction in tests of memory for semantic category-exemplars. The effects of irrelevant sound on category-exemplar recall are shown to be functionally distinct from those found in the context of serial short-term memory by showing sensitivity to: The lexical-semantic, rather than acoustic,…

The Role of Simple Semantics in the Process of Artificial Grammar Learning.

Science.gov (United States)

Öttl, Birgit; Jäger, Gerhard; Kaup, Barbara

2017-10-01

This study investigated the effect of semantic information on artificial grammar learning (AGL). Recursive grammars of different complexity levels (regular language, mirror language, copy language) were investigated in a series of AGL experiments. In the with-semantics condition, participants acquired semantic information prior to the AGL experiment; in the without-semantics control condition, participants did not receive semantic information. It was hypothesized that semantics would generally facilitate grammar acquisition and that the learning benefit in the with-semantics conditions would increase with increasing grammar complexity. Experiment 1 showed learning effects for all grammars but no performance difference between conditions. Experiment 2 replicated the absence of a semantic benefit for all grammars even though semantic information was more prominent during grammar acquisition as compared to Experiment 1. Thus, we did not find evidence for the idea that semantics facilitates grammar acquisition, which seems to support the view of an independent syntactic processing component.

Meaningful Memory in Acute Anorexia Nervosa Patients-Comparing Recall, Learning, and Recognition of Semantically Related and Semantically Unrelated Word Stimuli.

Science.gov (United States)

Terhoeven, Valentin; Kallen, Ursula; Ingenerf, Katrin; Aschenbrenner, Steffen; Weisbrod, Matthias; Herzog, Wolfgang; Brockmeyer, Timo; Friederich, Hans-Christoph; Nikendei, Christoph

2017-03-01

It is unclear whether observed memory impairment in anorexia nervosa (AN) depends on the semantic structure (categorized words) of material to be encoded. We aimed to investigate the processing of semantically related information in AN. Memory performance was assessed in a recall, learning, and recognition test in 27 adult women with AN (19 restricting, 8 binge-eating/purging subtype; average disease duration: 9.32 years) and 30 healthy controls using an extended version of the Rey Auditory Verbal Learning Test, applying semantically related and unrelated word stimuli. Short-term memory (immediate recall, learning), regardless of semantics of the words, was significantly worse in AN patients, whereas long-term memory (delayed recall, recognition) did not differ between AN patients and controls. Semantics of stimuli do not have a better effect on memory recall in AN compared to CO. Impaired short-term versus long-term memory is discussed in relation to dysfunctional working memory in AN. Copyright © 2016 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd and Eating Disorders Association. Copyright © 2016 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd and Eating Disorders Association.

Semantic Technologies for Nuclear Knowledge Modelling and Applications

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Beraha, D.; Gladyshev, M.

2016-01-01

Full text: The IAEA has been engaged in working with Member States to preserve and enhance nuclear knowledge, and in supporting wide dissemination of safety related technical and technological information enhancing nuclear safety. The knowledge organization systems (ontologies, taxonomies, thesauri, etc.) provide one of the means to model and structure a given knowledge domain. The significance of knowledge organization systems (KOS) has been greatly enhanced by the evolution of the semantic technologies, enabling machines to “understand” the concepts described in a KOS, and to use them in a variety of applications. Over recent years semantic technologies have emerged as efficient means to improve access to information and knowledge. The Semantic Web Standards play an important role in creating an infrastructure of interoperable data sources based on principles of Linked Data. The status of utilizing semantic technologies in the nuclear domain is shortly reviewed, noting that such technologies are in their early stage of adoption, and considering some aspects which are specific to nuclear knowledge management. Several areas are described where semantic technologies are already deployed, and other areas are indicated where applications based on semantic technologies will have a strong impact on nuclear knowledge management in the near future. (author

Towards the multilingual semantic web principles, methods and applications

CERN Document Server

Buitelaar, Paul

2014-01-01

To date, the relation between multilingualism and the Semantic Web has not yet received enough attention in the research community. One major challenge for the Semantic Web community is to develop architectures, frameworks and systems that can help in overcoming national and language barriers, facilitating equal access to information produced in different cultures and languages. As such, this volume aims at documenting the state-of-the-art with regard to the vision of a Multilingual Semantic Web, in which semantic information will be accessible in and across multiple languages. The Multiling

Recommendations based on semantically enriched museum collections

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Wang, Y.; Stash, N.; Aroyo, L.M.; Gorgels, P.; Rutledge, L.W.; Schreiber, G.

2008-01-01

This article presents the CHIP demonstrator1 for providing personalized access to digital museum collections. It consists of three main components: Art Recommender, Tour Wizard, and Mobile Tour Guide. Based on the semantically enriched Rijksmuseum Amsterdam2 collection, we show how Semantic Web

Designing equivalent semantic models for process creation

NARCIS (Netherlands)

P.H.M. America (Pierre); J.W. de Bakker (Jaco)

1986-01-01

textabstractOperational and denotational semantic models are designed for languages with process creation, and the relationships between the two semantics are investigated. The presentation is organized in four sections dealing with a uniform and static, a uniform and dynamic, a nonuniform and

Constraint-Based Abstract Semantics for Temporal Logic

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Banda, Gourinath; Gallagher, John Patrick

2010-01-01

Abstract interpretation provides a practical approach to verifying properties of infinite-state systems. We apply the framework of abstract interpretation to derive an abstract semantic function for the modal mu-calculus, which is the basis for abstract model checking. The abstract semantic funct...

Semantic Categorization: A Comparison between Deaf and Hearing Children

Science.gov (United States)

Ormel, Ellen A.; Gijsel, Martine A. R.; Hermans, Daan; Bosman, Anna M. T.; Knoors, Harry; Verhoeven, Ludo

2010-01-01

Learning to read is a major obstacle for children who are deaf. The otherwise significant role of phonology is often limited as a result of hearing loss. However, semantic knowledge may facilitate reading comprehension. One important aspect of semantic knowledge concerns semantic categorization. In the present study, the quality of the semantic…

A Semantic Analysis of the Language of Advertising | Emodi | African ...

African Journals Online (AJOL)

A Semantic Analysis of the Language of Advertising. ... After a brief introduction to semantics and advertising language, the paper is focused on the linguistic realizations in English advertising from the semantic ... AJOL African Journals Online.

On a syntactic-semantic model with the locative case

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Antonić Ivana

2008-01-01

Full Text Available The topic of this paper is a syntactic-semantic model whose distinctive element is the locative case with the preposition U (IN and the relevant feature (+ human being. This model is realized in three different variants - with the intransitive (A or transitive verb (B, where the nominative in the function of subject and the locative indicate different (B1 or the same (B2 referents. Furthermore, the verb belongs to a semantic class which denotes emerging, stimulation, duration, fading away, diminishing or change in the intensity, in principle, of any phenomenon, and concretely in this model such verbs appear in the collocational link with the nouns implying man's psychological, physiological or mental states, feelings or mood. With an adequate analytic procedure, all the three variants of this model are approached from the syntactic-semantic and pragmatic perspective. The paper points to the causative semantics of these structures, reduced to the metalinguistic formula 'make that X V', which confirms that the semantics of these verb-noun collocational links, syntactically speaking, condenses a complex two-member sentential structure represented by the semantically deficient verb (= causative component in the basic, matrix structure, and the complement clause with the conjunction DA (THAT and the basic verb. And precisely from this semantic feature there follows that the notion in the locative case semantically, actually, represents the BEARER of a physiological, physiological or mental state, feeling, mood, so that it represents the GRAMMATICAL SUBJECT of the corresponding basic subordinated predication whose exponent, actually, is the grammatical subject in the structure with the intransitive verb (or with the syntactically-semantically intransitive verb structure, that is the object in the structure with the transitive verb. Two possible semantic interpretations of this model are presented: the one related to the referential pointing to the

Exploring and linking biomedical resources through multidimensional semantic spaces.

Science.gov (United States)

Berlanga, Rafael; Jiménez-Ruiz, Ernesto; Nebot, Victoria

2012-01-25

The semantic integration of biomedical resources is still a challenging issue which is required for effective information processing and data analysis. The availability of comprehensive knowledge resources such as biomedical ontologies and integrated thesauri greatly facilitates this integration effort by means of semantic annotation, which allows disparate data formats and contents to be expressed under a common semantic space. In this paper, we propose a multidimensional representation for such a semantic space, where dimensions regard the different perspectives in biomedical research (e.g., population, disease, anatomy and protein/genes). This paper presents a novel method for building multidimensional semantic spaces from semantically annotated biomedical data collections. This method consists of two main processes: knowledge and data normalization. The former one arranges the concepts provided by a reference knowledge resource (e.g., biomedical ontologies and thesauri) into a set of hierarchical dimensions for analysis purposes. The latter one reduces the annotation set associated to each collection item into a set of points of the multidimensional space. Additionally, we have developed a visual tool, called 3D-Browser, which implements OLAP-like operators over the generated multidimensional space. The method and the tool have been tested and evaluated in the context of the Health-e-Child (HeC) project. Automatic semantic annotation was applied to tag three collections of abstracts taken from PubMed, one for each target disease of the project, the Uniprot database, and the HeC patient record database. We adopted the UMLS Meta-thesaurus 2010AA as the reference knowledge resource. Current knowledge resources and semantic-aware technology make possible the integration of biomedical resources. Such an integration is performed through semantic annotation of the intended biomedical data resources. This paper shows how these annotations can be exploited for

Semantic Dysfunction in Women With Schizotypal Personality Disorder

OpenAIRE

Niznikiewicz, Margaret A.; Shenton, Martha E.; Voglmaier, Martina; Nestor, Paul G.; Dickey, Chandlee C.; Frumin, Melissa; Seidman, Larry J.; Allen, Christopher G.; McCarley, Robert W.

2002-01-01

Objective: This study examined whether early or late processes in semantic networks were abnormal in women with a diagnosis of schizotypal personality disorder. The N400 component of the EEG event-related potentials was used as a probe of semantic processes. Method: Word pairs were presented with short and long stimulus-onset asynchronies to investigate, respectively, early and late semantic processes in 16 women with schizotypal personality disorder and 15 normal female comparison subjects. ...

Unsure When to Stop? Ask Your Semantic Neighbors

OpenAIRE

Gonçalves, Ivo; Silva, Sara; Fonseca, Carlos M.; Castelli, Mauro

2017-01-01

In iterative supervised learning algorithms it is common to reach a point in the search where no further induction seems to be possible with the available data. If the search is continued beyond this point, the risk of overfitting increases significantly. Following the recent developments in inductive semantic stochastic methods, this paper studies the feasibility of using information gathered from the semantic neighborhood to decide when to stop the search. Two semantic stopping criteria are...

The Semantic Web and Educational Technology

Science.gov (United States)

Maddux, Cleborne D., Ed.

2008-01-01

The "Semantic Web" is an idea proposed by Tim Berners-Lee, the inventor of the "World Wide Web." The topic has been generating a great deal of interest and enthusiasm, and there is a rapidly growing body of literature dealing with it. This article attempts to explain how the Semantic Web would work, and explores short-term and long-term…

A Walk in the Semantic Park

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Danvy, Olivier; Johannsen, Jacob; Zerny, Ian

2011-01-01

To celebrate the 20th anniversary of PEPM, we are inviting you to a walk in the semantic park and to inter-derive reduction-based and reduction-free negational normalization functions.......To celebrate the 20th anniversary of PEPM, we are inviting you to a walk in the semantic park and to inter-derive reduction-based and reduction-free negational normalization functions....

An Analysis of Errors Committed by Saudi Non-English Major Students in the English Paragraph Writing: A Study of Comparisons

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Mohammed Nuruzzaman

2018-01-01

Full Text Available The present study investigates the writing errors of ninety Saudi non-English major undergraduate students of different proficiency levels from three faculties, who studied English as a foundation course at the English Language Center in the College of Languages &Translation at King Khalid University, Saudi Arabia in the academic year 2016-17. The findings reveal that the common errors the Saudi EFL students make in writing English paragraphs fall under four categories namely grammar, lexis, semantics and mechanics. Then it compares the categories, types and frequency of errors committed by these three groups of students. Among these categories, grammar has been observed as the most error-prone area where students commit errors the most. The study also posits that among the three groups, the students of the College of Medicine make the minimum errors in all the types and the highest number of errors is committed by the students of Engineering College. The College of Computer Science is in the second position in making errors. The frequency of error types is also found different among these three groups.

Knowledge represented using RDF semantic network in the concept of semantic web

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Lukasova, A., E-mail: alena.lukasova@osu.cz; Vajgl, M., E-mail: marek.vajgl@osu.cz; Zacek, M., E-mail: martin.zacek@osu.cz [Department of Informatics and Computers, Faculty of Science, University of Ostrava 30. dubna 22, 701 03 Ostrava, Czech Republic http://prf.osu.eu/kip/ (Czech Republic)

2016-06-08

The RDF(S) model has been declared as the basic model to capture knowledge of the semantic web. It provides a common and flexible way to decompose composed knowledge to elementary statements, which can be represented by RDF triples or by RDF graph vectors. From the logical point of view, elements of knowledge can be expressed using at most binary predicates, which can be converted to RDF-triples or graph vectors. However, it is not able to capture implicit knowledge representable by logical formulas. This contribution shows how existing approaches (semantic networks and clausal form logic) can be combined together with RDF to obtain RDF-compatible system with ability to represent implicit knowledge and inference over knowledge base.

Knowledge represented using RDF semantic network in the concept of semantic web

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Lukasova, A.; Vajgl, M.; Zacek, M.

2016-01-01

The RDF(S) model has been declared as the basic model to capture knowledge of the semantic web. It provides a common and flexible way to decompose composed knowledge to elementary statements, which can be represented by RDF triples or by RDF graph vectors. From the logical point of view, elements of knowledge can be expressed using at most binary predicates, which can be converted to RDF-triples or graph vectors. However, it is not able to capture implicit knowledge representable by logical formulas. This contribution shows how existing approaches (semantic networks and clausal form logic) can be combined together with RDF to obtain RDF-compatible system with ability to represent implicit knowledge and inference over knowledge base.

Semantic processing in deaf and hard-of-hearing children: Large N400 mismatch effects in brain responses, despite poor semantic ability

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Petter Kallioinen

2016-08-01

Full Text Available Difficulties in auditory and phonological processing affect semantic processing in speech comprehension of deaf and hard-of-hearing (DHH children. However, little is known about brain responses of semantic processing in this group. We investigated event-related potentials (ERPs in DHH children with cochlear implants (CI and/or hearing aids (HA, and in normally hearing controls (NH. We used a semantic priming task with spoken word primes followed by picture targets. In both DHH children and controls, response differences between matching and mismatching targets revealed a typical N400-effect associated with semantic processing. Children with CI had the largest mismatch response despite poor semantic abilities overall, children with CI also had the largest ERP differentiation between mismatch types, with small effects of within-category mismatches (target from same category as prime and large effects between-category mismatches (were target is from a different category than prime. NH and HA children had similar responses to both mismatch types. While the large and differentiated ERP responses in the CI group were unexpected and should be interpreted with caution, the results could reflect less precision in semantic processing among children with CI, or a stronger reliance on predictive processing.

A developer's guide to the semantic web

CERN Document Server

Yu, Liyang

2014-01-01

The Semantic Web represents a vision for how to make the huge amount of information on the Web automatically processable by machines on a large scale. For this purpose, a whole suite of standards, technologies and related tools have been specified and developed over the last couple of years and they have now become the foundation for numerous new applications. A Developer's Guide to the Semantic Web helps the reader to learn the core standards, key components and underlying concepts. It provides in-depth coverage of both the what-is and how-to aspects of the Semantic Web. From Yu's presentat

Semantics of the VDM Real-Time Dialect

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Lausdahl, Kenneth; Coleman, Joey; Larsen, Peter Gorm

All formally defined languages need to be given an unambiguous semantics such that the meaning of all models expressed using the language is clear. In this technical report a semantic model is provided for the Real-Time dialect of the Vienna Development Method (VDM). This builds upon both...... the formal semantics provided for the ISO standard VDM Specification Language, and on other work on the core of the VDM-RT notation. Although none of the VDM dialects are executable in general, the primary focus of the work presented here is on the executable subset. This focus is result of parallel work...

A Developer's Guide to the Semantic Web

CERN Document Server

Yu, Liyang

2011-01-01

The Semantic Web represents a vision for how to make the huge amount of information on the Web automatically processable by machines on a large scale. For this purpose, a whole suite of standards, technologies and related tools have been specified and developed over the last couple of years, and they have now become the foundation for numerous new applications. A Developer's Guide to the Semantic Web helps the reader to learn the core standards, key components, and underlying concepts. It provides in-depth coverage of both the what-is and how-to aspects of the Semantic Web. From Yu's presentat

Reflect: a practical approach to web semantics

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

O'Donoghue, S.I.; Horn, Heiko; Pafilisa, E.

2010-01-01

To date, adding semantic capabilities to web content usually requires considerable server-side re-engineering, thus only a tiny fraction of all web content currently has semantic annotations. Recently, we announced Reflect (http://reflect.ws), a free service that takes a more practical approach......: Reflect uses augmented browsing to allow end-users to add systematic semantic annotations to any web-page in real-time, typically within seconds. In this paper we describe the tagging process in detail and show how further entity types can be added to Reflect; we also describe how publishers and content...... web technologies....

Individual differences in children's memory and reading comprehension: an investigation of semantic and inhibitory deficits.

Science.gov (United States)

Cain, Kate

2006-07-01

Three experiments compared the verbal memory skills of children with poor reading comprehension with that of same-age good comprehenders. The aims were to determine if semantic and/or inhibitory deficits explained comprehenders' problems on measures of verbal short-term memory and verbal working memory. In Experiment 1 there were no group differences on word- and number-based measures of short-term storage and no evidence that semantic knowledge mediated word recall. In Experiment 2 poor comprehenders were impaired on word- and number-based assessments of working memory, the greatest deficit found on the word-based task. Error analysis of both word-based tasks revealed that poor comprehenders were more likely to recall items that should have been inhibited than were good comprehenders. Experiment 3 extended this finding: Poor comprehenders were less able to inhibit information that was no longer relevant. Together, these findings suggest that individual differences in inhibitory processing influence the ability to regulate the contents of working memory, which may contribute to the differential memory performance of good and poor comprehenders.

[Electrophysiological bases of semantic processing of objects].

Science.gov (United States)

Kahlaoui, Karima; Baccino, Thierry; Joanette, Yves; Magnié, Marie-Noële

2007-02-01

How pictures and words are stored and processed in the human brain constitute a long-standing question in cognitive psychology. Behavioral studies have yielded a large amount of data addressing this issue. Generally speaking, these data show that there are some interactions between the semantic processing of pictures and words. However, behavioral methods can provide only limited insight into certain findings. Fortunately, Event-Related Potential (ERP) provides on-line cues about the temporal nature of cognitive processes and contributes to the exploration of their neural substrates. ERPs have been used in order to better understand semantic processing of words and pictures. The main objective of this article is to offer an overview of the electrophysiologic bases of semantic processing of words and pictures. Studies presented in this article showed that the processing of words is associated with an N 400 component, whereas pictures elicited both N 300 and N 400 components. Topographical analysis of the N 400 distribution over the scalp is compatible with the idea that both image-mediated concrete words and pictures access an amodal semantic system. However, given the distinctive N 300 patterns, observed only during picture processing, it appears that picture and word processing rely upon distinct neuronal networks, even if they end up activating more or less similar semantic representations.

Semantic and syntactic reading comprehension strategies used by deaf children with early and late cochlear implantation.

Science.gov (United States)

Gallego, Carlos; Martín-Aragoneses, M Teresa; López-Higes, Ramón; Pisón, Guzmán

2016-01-01

Deaf students have traditionally exhibited reading comprehension difficulties. In recent years, these comprehension problems have been partially offset through cochlear implantation (CI), and the subsequent improvement in spoken language skills. However, the use of cochlear implants has not managed to fully bridge the gap in language and reading between normally hearing (NH) and deaf children, as its efficacy depends on variables such as the age at implant. This study compared the reading comprehension of sentences in 19 children who received a cochlear implant before 24 months of age (early-CI) and 19 who received it after 24 months (late-CI) with a control group of 19 NH children. The task involved completing sentences in which the last word had been omitted. To complete each sentence children had to choose a word from among several alternatives that included one syntactic and two semantic foils in addition to the target word. The results showed that deaf children with late-CI performed this task significantly worse than NH children, while those with early-CI exhibited no significant differences with NH children, except under more demanding processing conditions (long sentences with infrequent target words). Further, the error analysis revealed a preference of deaf students with early-CI for selecting the syntactic foil over a semantic one, which suggests that they draw upon syntactic cues during sentence processing in the same way as NH children do. In contrast, deaf children with late-CI do not appear to use a syntactic strategy, but neither a semantic strategy based on the use of key words, as the literature suggests. Rather, the numerous errors of both kinds that the late-CI group made seem to indicate an inconsistent and erratic response when faced with a lack of comprehension. These findings are discussed in relation to differences in receptive vocabulary and short-term memory and their implications for sentence reading comprehension. Copyright © 2015

Type-specific proactive interference in patients with semantic and phonological STM deficits.

Science.gov (United States)

Harris, Lara; Olson, Andrew; Humphreys, Glyn

2014-01-01

Prior neuropsychological evidence suggests that semantic and phonological components of short-term memory (STM) are functionally and neurologically distinct. The current paper examines proactive interference (PI) from semantic and phonological information in two STM-impaired patients, DS (semantic STM deficit) and AK (phonological STM deficit). In Experiment 1 probe recognition tasks with open and closed sets of stimuli were used. Phonological PI was assessed using nonword items, and semantic and phonological PI was assessed using words. In Experiment 2 phonological and semantic PI was elicited by an item recognition probe test with stimuli that bore phonological and semantic relations to the probes. The data suggested heightened phonological PI for the semantic STM patient, and exaggerated effects of semantic PI in the phonological STM case. The findings are consistent with an account of extremely rapid decay of activated type-specific representations in cases of severely impaired phonological and semantic STM.