The First International Workshop on the role of Semantic Web in Literature-Based Discovery
http://knoesis.org/swlbd2012/
(SWLBD 2012)

in conjunction with

The IEEE International Conference on Bioinformatics and Biomedicine (BIBM 2012)
http://www.ischool.drexel.edu/ieeebibm/bibm12/
October 4-7, 2012, Philadelphia PA, USA

Call For Papers

Literature-Based Discovery (LBD) is characterized by uncovering hidden but novel information implicit in non-interacting literatures. The notion of LBD was first proposed by Don R. Swanson over two decades ago when he postulated that two concepts (A, C) may be logically related through some intermediate concept (B), common to seemingly disjoint literatures. This seminal idea has largely influenced efforts towards LBD automation in the biomedical domain and LBD continues to be an integral part of the evolution of biomedical science. Primarily, LBD has been instrumental in supplementing and guiding scientific experiments that lead to innovations in diagnosis, treatment and preventions mechanisms.

Much of the early LBD research however, relied almost entirely on Information Retrieval (IR) techniques, such as term and concept co-occurrence, to uncover unknown associations in the large volume of scientific literature now publicly available. Only recently has significant attention been devoted to semantics-based techniques that leverage Semantic Web technologies to exploit the meaning of associations between concepts to facilitate LBD. While generally more intuitive than IR techniques, the feasibility of semantics-based approaches has not been fully demonstrated. Many challenges still exist. Some of these include:

- Fine-grained extraction of semantic information (called semantic predications) from text corpora
- Extraction and identification of meaningful (semantic) associations between concepts. Such associations are typically represented by paths in large data graphs.
- Achieving scalability given the combinatorial explosion that arises when traversing large graphs. The overwhelming number of edges between concepts increases the complexity of graph traversal and compounds the difficulty of finding relevant associations.
- Developing techniques for clustering, aggregating, and analyzing extracted semantic associations for sense making, question answering and ultimately LBD.
- The semantic integration of information expressed in text corpora with background knowledge.

By engaging researchers from both the Semantic Web and LBD communities, we anticipate an exchange that will facilitate the advancement of LBD by exploiting available Semantic Web resources. Researchers are encouraged to submit original manuscripts on the application of Semantic Web technologies, representations and techniques to Literature-Based Discovery.

Some specific research topics include (but are not limited to):
1. Extraction of Semantic Information from text corpora.
2. Semantic Models and Representations for LBD.
3. Semantic Association Identification and Extraction methods from large data graphs.
4. Semantic Association Clustering, Aggregation and Analysis (i.e., Subgraph Creation) for LBD.
5. Semantic Integration of Scientific Literature and Background Knowledge.

Steering Committee:
Amit P. Sheth, Kno.e.sis Center, Wright State University, amit@knoesis.org
Olivier Bodenreider, National Library of Medicine, NLM, olivier@nlm.nih.gov

Program Co-Chairs:
Thomas C. Rindflesch, National Library of Medicine, NLM, tcr@nlm.nih.gov
Neil R. Smalheiser, University of Illinois at Chicago, neils@uic.edu
Delroy Cameron, Kno.e.sis Center, Wright State University, delroy@knoesis.org

Program Committee
Varun Bhagwan, IBM Research
Peter Bruza, Queensland University of Technology, Australia
Gully Burns, ISI, University of Southern California
Marcelo Fiszman, National Library of Medicine, NLM
Dimitar Hristovski, University of Ljubljana, Slovenia
Ramakanth Kavuluru, University of Kentucky
Halil Kilicoglu, Concordia University
Cartic Ramakrishnan, ISI, University of Southern California
Padmini Srinivasan, University of Iowa
Krishnaprasad Thirunarayan, Wright State University
Bartlomiej Wilkowski, Statens Serum Institut, Copenhagen, Denmark
Meliha Yetisgen-Yildiz, University of Washington

Invited Talk
Dr. Trevor Cohen, University of Texas, Houston

Paper Submission:
The workshop will solicit the submission of original research papers (4-6 pages) addressing analytical, theoretical and/or practical aspects of the role of Semantic Web techniques and technologies in Literature-based Discovery.

Online Submissions:
Electronic submissions (in PDF or Postscript format) are required. Selected participants will be asked to submit their revised papers in a format to be specified at the time of acceptance. Please make submissions using the online submission system: http://wi-lab.com/cyberchair/2012/bibm12/cbc_index.html

Important Dates:
Due date for full workshop papers submission: July 30, 2012
Notification of paper acceptance to authors: August 20, 2012
Camera-ready version of accepted papers: September 4, 2012
Workshops: October 4-7, 2012