CORAAL - Dive into publications, bathe in the knowledge

Abstract

Search engines used in contemporary online scientific publishing mostly exploit raw publication data (bags of words) and shallow metadata (authors, key words, citations, etc.). Exploitation of the knowledge contained implicitly in published texts is still largely not utilized. Following our long-term ambition to take advantage of such knowledge, we have implemented CORAAL (COntent extended by emeRgent and Asserted Annotations of Linked publication data), an enhanced-search prototype and the second-prize winner of the Elsevier Grand Challenge. CORAAL extracts asserted publication metadata together with the knowledge implicitly present in the relevant text, integrates the emergent content, and displays it using a multiple-perspective search&browse interface. This way we enable semantic querying for individual publications, and convenient exploration of the knowledge contained within them. In other words, recalling the metaphor in the article title, we let the users dive into publications more easily, and allow them to freely bathe in the related unlocked knowledge. © 2010 Elsevier B.V.