I am the director of the Database Laboratory and a the head of the Data Mining Group . Some of my research is supported by grants from the National Science Foundation, including a CAREER award, and grants from the McConnell Technology and Training Center (federal flow-through from the U.S. Navy).

RESEARCH INTERESTS

Databases (especially query languages, data models, metadata, conceptual modeling, heterogeneous information integration, data warehousing, cooperative query answering), applied logic, artificial intelligence (especially knowledge representation, ontologies, case-based reasoning, natural language processing), and everything that mixes two or more of the above, like Information Extraction (IE) and Question Answering (QA).

PROJECTS

My current work focuses on these areas:

Non-Relational Optimization of Relational Queries. This project was funded by NSF and run from 2000 to 2004.
Query Languages with Generalized Quantifiers. This project is funded by an NSF CAREER Award granted in 2004 and running until 2009.
Counter-Terrorism and Intelligence Applications of Database Technology
Graph-based mining, with my colleague Dr. Mehmet Kantardzic;
Focused crawling of the Web;
Dealing with text and documents in Databases.

PUBLICATIONS

NOTE: many of these are available in PDF in their respective pages (see links above). Here they appear cronologically, irrespective of type or project.

(with Bin Cao) SQL Query Optimization Through Nested Relational Algebra, to appear in the ACM Transactions on Database Systems.
(with Stijn Vansummeren) Non-Linear Quantifier Prefixes In Query Languages, to appear in PODS'07.
Question Answering and Database Querying: Bridging the Gap with Generalized Quantification, Journal of Applied Logic, Special Issue on Questions and Answers: Theoretical and Applied Perspectives, Rafaella Bernardi and Bonnie Webber, eds., v.5, n. 1, March 2007, pages 3-19, Elsevier Publishers.
(with Jothi Ravishankar and Tulay Muezzinoglu) Extracting Spatial and Temporal Information from Natural Language, poster paper, to appear in the Proceedings of the Intelligence and Security Informatics (ISI) Conference, 2007.
Personal Information Management (PIM) for Intelligence Tasks, in Proceedings of the 4th IEEE International Conference on Intelligence and Security Informatics (ISI), Lecture Notes in Computer Science 3975, May 2006, pages 510-516.
(with Tulay Muezzinoglu and Olfa Nasraoui) Focused Crawling: Experiences in a Real World Project , poster paper in the WWW 2006 Conference.
(with Bin Cao) A Nested Relational Approach to Processing SQL Subqueries, in Proceedings of the ACM SIGMOD International Conference on Management of Data, Baltimore, USA, June 2005.
Text Warehouses: Present and Future, in Processing and Managing Complex Data for Decision Support, Jerome Darmont, editor, Idea Group Publishing, 2005.
Knowledge Management and Intelligence Work: A Promising Combination, in Encyclopedia of Knowledge Management, David G. Schwartz, editor, Idea Publishing, Spring 2005.
(with Mehmed Kantardzic) Graph Building as a Mining Activity: Finding Links in the Small, in Workshop on Link Discovery: Issues, Approaches and Applications, Workshop of the SIGKDD-2005 Conference, Chicago, August 2005.
(with Mehmed Kantardzic) Link Analysis Tool for Intelligence and Counterterrorism, in Proceedings of the 3rd NSF/NIJ Symposium on Intelligence and Security Informatics, Lecture Notes in Computer Science, Springer-Verlag, 2005.
From Conceptual Models to Data Models, in Transformation of Knowledge, Information and Data: Theory and Applications, Patrick van Bommel, editor, Idea Group Publishing, 2004.
Interactive Query Languages for Intelligence Tasks, in Proceedings of the 2nd NSF/NIJ Symposium on Intelligence and Security Informatics, Lecture Notes in Computer Science 3073, Springer-Verlag, 2004.
(with Mehmed Kantardzic) Generalizing Association Rules: A Theoretical Framework and an Implementation, to appear in Proceedings of the Third International Conference on Intelligent Systems Design and Applications (ISDA 2003), Springer-Verlag.
Active Database Systems for Monitoring and Surveillance, in Proceedings of the First NSF/NIJ Symposium on Intelligence and Security Informatics, Lecture Notes in Computer Science 2635, Springer-Verlag, 2003.
(with Mehmed Kantardzic) A Data Mining Framework for Semantically Distributed Databases, to appear in Proceedings of IASTED International Conference on Artificial Intelligence and Soft Computing (ASC 2003), July 2003, Banff, Canada.
(with Patricia Cerrito, John Cerrito and James Cox) Use of Text Miner to Automatically Abstract Patient Information from A Pharmacy Order Database, to appear in proceedings of PharmsSUG 2003.
(with Patricia Cerrito) The Application of Text Mining Software to Examine Coded Information Applied to Health Outcomes, to appear in Proceedings of the SIAM Data Mining Conference, 2003.
Conceptual Modeling for Semistructured Data, in Proceesings of the International Workshop on Data Semantics in Web Information Systems (DASWIS 2002).
(with Matt Chanda and Bin Cao) Adding subqueries to MySQL, or What Does it Take to Have a Decision-Support Engine?, in Proceedings of the Fifth International Workshop on Data Warehousing and OLAP (DOLAP'02).
Handling Partial Matches in Semistructured Data with Cooperative Query Answering Techniques, to appear in Coopis'02.
A Logical Formalization of Semistructured Data Models , Proceedings of the 13th International Symposium on Methodologies for Intelligent Systems (ISMIS'02), Lecture Notes in Artificial Intelligence, pages 321-330, Springer-Verlag.
Safety, Domain Independence and Generalized Quantification , Data and Knowledge Engineering Journal, volume 38, number 2, pages 147-172, August 2001, Elsevier publisher.
(with Sanjay Kumar Madria) Cooperative Query Answering for Semistructured Data , poster presentation on DASFAA'01.
Extending Entity-Relationship Models with Higher-order Operators, in Proceedings of the 12th International Symposium on Proceedings of the 12th International Symposium on Methodologies for Intelligent Systems ISMIS'00, in Lecture Notes in Artificial Intelligence, Springer-Verlag.
Information Integration through Unification of Feature Structures, short paper in the Proceedings of the International Workshop on Description Logics (DL'99), affiliated event with the 6th International Workshop on Knowledge Representation Meets Databases (KRDB'99).
Optimization of Sequences of Relational Decision-Support Queries,in Proceedings of the First International Conference on Data Warehousing and Knowledge Discovery (DAWAK'99), symposium of the 10th International Conference on Databases and Expert Systems Applications (DEXA'99).
Cooperative Query Answering with Generalized Quantifiers, in Journal of Intelligent Information Systems, volume 12, number 1, April 1999, Kluwer Publishers.
Semantics Domains for Information Modelling, in Proceedings of the Information Resources Management Association International Conference (IRMA'99).
Extending Description Logics with Generalized Quantification, in Proceedings of the 11th International Symposium on Methodologies for Intelligent Systems ISMIS'99, Lecture Notes in Artificial Intelligence, Ras and Skowron, editors, number 1609, Springer-Verlag.
Semantic unification: A Tool for Information Integration, in Proceedings of AIDA'99.
(with S. Rao and D. Van Gucht) Providing Better Support for a Class of Decision Support Queries, in Proceedings of the ACM SIGMOD International Conference on Management of Data, Montreal, Canada, June 1996.
(with S. Rao and D. Van Gucht) Processing Queries Containing Generalized Quantifiers, Technical Report n. 428, Indiana University, April 1995.
(with M. Gyssens and D. Van Gucht) Query Languages with Generalized Quantifiers, in Application of Logic Databases, Ragu Ramakrishnan, editor, Kluwer Academic Publishers, 1995, pg. 235-258.
(with V. Sarathy and D. Van Gucht) Extended query graphs for declarative specification of set-oriented queries, in Proceedings of the Workshop on Combining Declarative and Object-Oriented Databases (in conjunction with SIGMOD 93), May 1993, Washington, D.C.

FUNDING

(as PI, with Dr. Olfa Nasraoui, co-PI) Transforming the NSTCenter Web Site into a Knowledge Portal, Innovative Productivity, Inc. Awarded: December 2004. Duration: 1 year. Amount: $119,500.
(as co-PI) Data Mining to Enhance Medical Research of Clinical Databases, NIH AREA Program. PI: Pat Cerrito, Mathematics department, University of Louisville. Awarded: June 2003. Duration: 2 years. Amount: $123,000.
CAREER: Implementation and Optimization of Generalized Quantification, National Science Foundation, CAREER program. Awarded: January 2004. Duration: 5 years. Amount: $500,000.
Developing the NST Center, McConnell Technology and Training Center and U.S. Navy. Awarded: December 2003. Duration: 12 months. Amount: $99,403.
(with dbaDIRECT; John Bostick, CEO) Knowledge-Based Event Management System for Database Management, SBIR Phase 0, Kentucky Science and Engineering Foundation. Awarded: June 2002. Duration: undefined. Amount: $4,000.
The NST Center: From Web Site to Knowledge Portal, McConnell Technology and Transfer Center and U.S. Navy. Awarded: December 2002. Duration: 12 months. Amount: $92,593.
Database and Web Site for NSTC , McConnell Technology and Transfer Center (federal fallthrough from the U.S. Navy). Awarded: April 2002. Duration: 8 months. Amount: $79,483.
Non-Relational Optimization of Relational Queries , NSF IDM Program. Awarded: February 2001. Duration: 3 years. Amount: $175,000. See link above for research on this project.
Extended Relational Systems for New Applications: Design and Implementation, Arkansas Science and Technology Authority. Awarded: May 1997. Duration: 1 year. Amount: $54,510.
Natural Language Interface for Integration of Heterogeneous Information (Phase I), Acxiom Corporation. Awarded: December 1999. Duration: 4 months. Amount: $24,000.