Question Triage for Experts and Documents: Expanding the Information Retrieval Function of the NSDL

University Of Massachusetts Amherst, Amherst MA

Investigators

Abstract

This Targeted Research project is investigating the merger of the information retrieval (IR) and digital reference components of the National STEM Education Digital Library (NSDL). Combining these functions enables users to find answers to questions regardless if those answers come from documents in NSDL collections or experts accessible through the NSDL's virtual reference desk. The project is using large digital reference data sets of question/answer pairs with human judgments to create ontologies of questions. These ontologies supplement automatic question triage techniques to create an enhanced NSDL IR system. The project is also developing methodologies for the creation of inductive expert profiles to allow the enhanced IR system to route questions needing human intermediation quickly and effectively.