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                          MODIFIED VERSION 

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SCIENTIFIC SCOPE

         The Information and Data Management (IDM) Program in the Division of Information and Intelligent Systems (IIS) supports research fundamental to the design, implementation, development, management, and use of databases, information retrieval, and knowledge-based systems.

         The aim is to build a "new generation" of distributed,interoperable, multi-media, intelligent, dynamic, evolvable information systems capable of sophisticated and efficient information processing. Research pertinent to this goal involves investigating novel concepts, or combining and extending conventional concepts and systems. It hinges on basic research in databases, knowledge-based systems and information retrieval systems, and includes a wide scope of related areas, ranging from artificial intelligence methodologies to new user interfaces for information access to techniques that exploit hardware technologies.

          Projects supported by the IDM Program can be divided into interrelated areas:

(1) Data, information and knowledge modeling,

(2) Information access and interaction,

(3) Knowledge discovery and data mining,

(4) System architecture and implementation and

(5) Special issues pertaining to the Web and multimedia information.

Data, Information, and Knowledge Modeling

      This area provides foundations for new, more expressive models of data, information, and knowledge. Topics include object-oriented systems; temporal, spatial, geographic, pictorial, multi-media databases; special-purpose scientific databases, including metadata representation; full-text systems; constraint-based systems; active systems; process and enterprise modeling; warehouses, workflows; and knowledge-based systems. Issues considered include type systems; declarative extensions; database and knowledge-base evolution, integrity and validation; inheritance and exceptions; and management of uncertainty arising from imprecision in data or knowledge.  Basic research in formal models of knowledge and information is supported in the Knowledge and Cognitive Systems Program, IIS. Related research in programming languages is considered in the Division of Computing-Communications Research (C-CR).

Information Access and Interaction

      The aim of research in this area is to design more intelligent, efficient, and usable information access methods. Research topics include browsing and navigation; user-centered information retrieval and dissemination; user modeling; visualization and natural-language interfaces for information retrieval and database systems; evaluation of interfaces for information access; information architecture, design,and organization; query language design; enhanced query processing (e.g., statistical sampling, approximate queries, cooperative answering, employment of feedback, thesaurus or semantic nets in information retrieval, graphical query languages); knowledge-based query optimization; resolution of incompleteness and inconsistency in heterogeneous systems; the use of linguistic resources and techniques for information access including word sense disambiguation, text categorization, discourse analysis, question-answering, and summarization; dialog management; information source discovery and information fusion; cross-lingual information retrieval, collaborative filtering/recommender systems.  Research into principles for building multi-user collaborative information systems is covered in the Computation and Social Systems Program, IIS.

Knowledge Discovery and Data Mining

       The objective of this area is the building and assessment of tools for making sense of and discovering new information from large Collections of information.  Research topics include automated and user-aided data analysis tools; algorithms for information discovery, including clustering, information visualization techniques and evaluation; text data mining (including information extraction); data cleaning and warehousing; unification of data mining with queries and search; database architectures for data mining; distributed architectures for data mining; privacy issues; human interaction and the knowledge discovery process, interactive exploration, interfaces for exploratory data analysis; visualization of large, high-dimensional datasets, cognitive foundations and evaluation of visualization systems; evaluation of discovery algorithms, validation of data mining results.

System Architecture and Implementation

       The objective of this area is building high performance systems by addressing issues in algorithms, reliable storage, access, and manipulation of actual data. Research topics include indexing and  hashing algorithms; persistent object storage; main-memory systems;  associative memory; cache-memory; utilization of optical storage; tertiary storage management (terabyte mass storage); distributed and heterogeneous systems, including support for mobile environments and ubiquitous computing; extensible systems; real-time or constrained-time/space query processing; parallel query processing; concurrency control; long duration transaction processing; fault-tolerant systems; backup and recovery; security issues; evolvable information  systems/support for the information lifecycle, including information archiving, migration, and survivability; workflows; problem solving environments.  Related research is also supported in Computer Systems Architecture Program and Software Systems Program in the Division of Computing-Communications Research (C-CR), and in the Division of Advanced Networking Infrastructure and Research (ANIR).

Web and Multimedia

        Special issues associated with the Web and multimedia data types, including but not limited to hyperlink analysis and web graph structure; personalization of web search and structure; web site design methods and evaluation; content-based image, video, and audio access and retrieval; cross-media and mixed-media retrieval and indexing; multimedia database architectures and query optimization.

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                             ORIGINAL VERSION

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SCIENTIFIC SCOPE

         The Information and Data Management (IDM) Program in the Division of Information and Intelligent Systems (IIS) supports research fundamental to the design, implementation, development, management, and use of databases, information retrieval, and knowledge-based systems.

          The aim is to build a "new generation" of distributed,Interoperable, multi-media, intelligent, dynamic, evolvable information systems capable of sophisticated and efficient information processing. Research pertinent to this goal involves investigating novel concepts, or combining and extending conventional concepts and systems. It hinges on basic research in databases, knowledge-based systems and information retrieval systems, and includes a wide scope of related areas, ranging from artificial intelligence methodologies to techniques that exploit hardware technologies.

           Projects supported by the IDM Program can be divided into

 interrelated areas:

(1)    data, information and knowledge modeling;

(2)    information access and knowledge discovery;

(3)    system architecture and implementation; and

(4)    system development and administration.

Data, Information, and Knowledge Modeling

      This area provides foundations for new, more expressive models of

data, information, and knowledge. Topics include object-oriented systems; temporal, spatial, pictorial, multi-media databases; special-purpose scientific databases, including metadata representation; full-text systems; constraint-based systems; active systems; process and enterprise modeling; warehouses, workflows; and knowledge-based systems. Issues considered include type systems; declarative extensions; database and knowledge-base evolution, integrity and validation; inheritance and exceptions; and management of uncertainty arising from imprecision in data or knowledge.  Basic research in formal models of knowledge and information is supported in the and Cognitive Systems Program, IIS. Related research in programming languages is considered in the Division of Computing-Communications Research (C-CR).

Information Access and Knowledge Discovery

      The aim of research in this area is to design more intelligent and efficient information access methods and novel approaches to Knowledge discovery or datamining. Research topics include query language design; data analysis tools, including automated and user-aided knowledge discovery/datamining from databases and information visualization; enhanced query processing (e.g., statistical sampling, approximate queries, cooperative answering, employment of feedback, thesaurus or semantic nets in information retrieval); information organization (e.g., categorization, summarization); browsing and navigation; user-centered information retrieval and dissemination; relevant information source discovery; knowledge-based query optimization; and resolution of incompleteness and inconsistency in heterogeneous systems. Related research, placing emphasis on human interfaces, e.g. user modeling, visualization or natural-language or visual interfaces, is jointly considered with the Human-Computer Interaction Program, IIS. Research into principles for building multi-user collaborative information systems is covered in the  Computation and Social Systems Program,IIS.

System Architecture and Implementation

      The objective of this area is building high performance systems by addressing issues in algorithms, reliable storage, access, and manipulation of actual data. Research topics include indexing and hashing algorithms; persistent object storage; main-memory systems; associative memory; cache-memory; utilization of optical storage; tertiary storage management (terabyte mass storage); distributed and heterogeneous systems, including mobile environments; extensible systems; real-time or constrained-time/space query processing; parallel processing; concurrency control; long duration transaction  processing; fault-tolerant systems; backup and recovery. Related research is also supported in Computer Systems Architecture Program and Software Systems Program in the  Divison of Computing-Communications Research (C-CR), and in the  Division of Advanced Networking Infrastructure and Research (ANIR).

System Development and Administration

      This category involves development of methodologies for specification, implementation, verification, maintenance and management of information systems. Research includes work in specification languages, including areas of CAD/CAM, workflows, and scientific databases; extension and development of design tools and environments; reconfigurable systems; fast prototyping; modularization of large heterogeneous systems; evolvable information systems; information  systems metrics (e.g., satisfaction of information requirements, performance, technology insertion costs); security issues; audit trails; and providing integrated interfaces for related manipulations or tasks. Related issues are supported in the Computation and Social Systems Program, IIS and in the Division of Computing-Communications Research.