DOE ShowcaseDOE ShowcaseCENDI MeetingCENDI Meeting

May 5, 2010May 5, 2010

Walter L. Warnick, Ph.D.Walter L. Warnick, Ph.D.

DirectorDirector

Office of Scientific and Technical InformationOffice of Scientific and Technical Information

Accelerating Science by Accelerating the Sharing of Knowledge

MissionMission

Energy SecurityEnergy SecurityPromoting America’s energy security through reliable, clean, and affordable energy Promoting America’s energy security through reliable, clean, and affordable energy     Nuclear SecurityNuclear SecurityEnsuring America’s nuclear security Ensuring America’s nuclear security     Scientific Discovery and InnovationScientific Discovery and InnovationStrengthening U.S. scientific discovery, economic competitiveness, and improving Strengthening U.S. scientific discovery, economic competitiveness, and improving quality of life through innovations in science and technology   quality of life through innovations in science and technology  

Environmental ResponsibilityEnvironmental ResponsibilityProtecting the environment by providing a responsible resolution to the Protecting the environment by providing a responsible resolution to the environmental legacy of nuclear weapons production   environmental legacy of nuclear weapons production  

Management ExcellenceManagement ExcellenceEnabling the mission through sound managementEnabling the mission through sound management

OSTI Placement in the DepartmentOSTI Placement in the Department

OSTI has a corporate role in DOE, related to R&D, to advance science and technology.

STI Foundation in DOESTI Foundation in DOE

OSTI responsibility has been established in the:• Atomic Energy Acts of 1946 and 1954• Energy Reorganization Act of 1974• Department of Energy Act of 1977• Energy Policy Act of 2005• America COMPETES Act of 2007

From the beginning, dissemination of STI has been a foundational mission of the Department.

The methods & customers have changed totally, but the mission remains the same.

“The Secretary, through the Office of Scientific and Technical Information, shall maintain within the Department publicly available collections of scientific and technical information resulting from research, development, demonstration, and commercial applications activities supported by the Department.”

Energy Policy Act of 2005 Energy Policy Act of 2005 Called Out OSTICalled Out OSTI

Premise: Science advances only if knowledge is shared

Corollary: Accelerating the sharing of scientific knowledge accelerates the advancement of science

Accelerating the advancement of science benefits DOE researchers, the Nation, and the world

The OSTI CorollaryThe OSTI Corollary

““establish and maintain a establish and maintain a central sourcecentral source of information . . .” of information . . .”

““disseminatedisseminate scientific, technical, and scientific, technical, and practical information . . .”practical information . . .”

““The Secretary, through OSTI, shall The Secretary, through OSTI, shall maintain maintain publicly available collectionspublicly available collections of of scientific and technical information . . .”scientific and technical information . . .”

The “What”The “What”

The “Why” - HistoricalThe “Why” - Historical

““To provide that free interchange of ideas and To provide that free interchange of ideas and criticism which is essential to scientific and criticism which is essential to scientific and industrial progress and public understanding and industrial progress and public understanding and to enlarge the fund of technical information”to enlarge the fund of technical information”

““The government should accept new The government should accept new responsibilities for promoting the flow of new responsibilities for promoting the flow of new scientific knowledge . . .” scientific knowledge . . .”

(Vannevar Bush to President Truman, 1945)(Vannevar Bush to President Truman, 1945)

1. The Research Division of the District is making plans for a complete and authoritative scientific record of all research work performed by Manhattan District contractors.

• Transparency• Participation• Collaboration

Open Government

The “Why” – Current DayThe “Why” – Current Day

““My Administration will . . . disclose My Administration will . . . disclose information rapidly in forms that the information rapidly in forms that the public can readily find and use.”public can readily find and use.”

Responsibilities Remain the Same

But the Technologies and the Execution Are Dramatically Different

Times Have ChangedTimes Have Changed

OSTI provided 17 tools and services to Data.gov, including XML scientific dataset services, scientific search widgets, and science-related RSS feeds

Meeting Open Gov GoalsMeeting Open Gov Goals

http://energy.gov/open

Information Bridge DOepatents DOE R&D Project Summaries Conference Papers &

Proceedings Energy Citations Database

Information Bridge DOepatents DOE R&D Project Summaries Conference Papers &

Proceedings Energy Citations Database

Five data sets identified by DOE as “high value” data sets – including DOE R&D results that OSTI is making accessible, searchable, findable, usable.

DOE STI = “High Value” Data SetsDOE STI = “High Value” Data Sets

Cass Sunstein, head of OIRA at OMB, said, having read all 30 plans, three of them stuck out as the best - including DOE's, that it was "spectacular, off the charts good.“

The DOE plan includes a number of OSTI initiatives to enhance transparency of DOE R&D results.

DOE Open Government PlanDOE Open Government PlanIssued April 7Issued April 7

Launched on Earth Day!Launched on Earth Day!

• We’re in an era of transformational technology

• We’ve been constantly challenged to adapt & adopt

• We’ve been early adopters• We’ve found it helpful to advance web

technologies in niche areas important to our mission

Taking Advantage of TechnologyTaking Advantage of Technology

There’s no roadmap!

Enables more robust Enables more robust products performing in products performing in new and different waysnew and different ways

Permits ability to Permits ability to engage customers with engage customers with heretofore heretofore unprecedented levels of unprecedented levels of interactivityinteractivity

New Age of Digital DeliveryNew Age of Digital Delivery

• DOE research community produces many types of scientific and technical information, each of which has its own unique characteristics and life cycle

• As a consequence, OSTI set out to create new web-based tools for each type of STI and make it efficiently

accessible to users

Types of STI Required Distinct Tools

Our first priority, to make R&D technical reports full-text searchable, freely available online.

Progression of OSTI Products

THEN, a new challenge emerged: Helping researchers sort through the products to get the most relevant results quickly.

Other web tools were developed to uniquely address each type of STI and the manner in which they were published.FOR EXAMPLE:

Another unique STI product: E-Print Network – Created to address researchers’ self-published STI.

The Solution: Federated SearchThe Solution: Federated Search

Science Accelerator searches via a single query:•DOE research and development (R&D) projects and programs,•Descriptions of R&D projects under way or recently completed, •Major R&D accomplishments, and •Recent research of interest to DOE.

Federated Search technology facilitates searchingmultiple information resources in parallel.

• You need not know ahead of time which resource might have theinformation you seek.

• You are not limited to searching one resource at a time.

www.ScienceAccelerator.gov

Government should be collaborative.  Collaboration actively engages Americans in the work of their Government. Executive departments and agencies should use innovative tools, methods, and systems to cooperate among themselves, across all levels of Government, and with nonprofit organizations, businesses, and individuals in the private sector.  

Collaboration: Collaboration: CENDI Is a ModelCENDI Is a Model

Transparency and Open Government

Within DOEWithin DOE Across U.S. governmentAcross U.S. government InternationalInternational With industryWith industry

OSTI’s Ongoing Collaborative EffortsOSTI’s Ongoing Collaborative Efforts

Collaborations are valued as a means to Collaborations are valued as a means to maximize opportunities and increase maximize opportunities and increase access to R&D information at various access to R&D information at various levels:levels:

Begun as a DOE initiative, OSTI partnered with sister organization, the Office of Workforce Development for Teachers and Scientists (WDTS)Broadened project to include other agenciesBeta Version opened December 2009Provides novel single-query search of STEM education materials from six agencies.Development of grade stratification by an SBIR awardee is being assessed as one componentOpen platform used, inviting participation by teachers to comment, review, and tag resourcesModeled after Science.gov in terms of operation, governance, and search capabilities

Supporting Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics Education

Two current examples:Two current examples:

Technology InnovationTechnology Innovation

Multilingual Federated SearchMultilingual WorldWideScience.org

Multimedia Search and Retrieval “SciencePix” pilot project

OSTI Corollary 1

Scientific discovery can be accelerated by accelerating access to scientific information.

“If I have seen further, it is only by standing on the shoulders of giants.” Sir Isaac Newton

Science Advances Only If Knowledge Is SharedScience Advances Only If Knowledge Is Shared

OSTI Corollary 2

Multilingual translations of science will further accelerate scientific discovery.

We now are introducing …

The case for Multilingual WorldWideScience.org

1. A Chinese scientist submits a query in Chinese to Multilingual WorldWideScience.org.

2. WWS.org uses Microsoft to translate the Chinese query into individual languages of source databases (English, French, Portuguese, Russian, etc.)

3. Multilingual WWS.org sends the translated queries to corresponding databases, which search their contents and return results in native languages.

4. WWS.org uses Microsoft to translate native language results into Chinese and presents results to the user in relevance-ranked order.

Conversely, an English-speaking user could have a query translated into languages of non-English databases and then get results back in English.

Here’s how it will work…

Key Changes/Impacts in Internet EraKey Changes/Impacts in Internet Era

Increased use/visibility of DOE R&D: from 1995 to 2009, web transactions increase from 300,000 to 87,000,000 – a a 28,900%28,900% increase.increase.Customer base extends beyond librarians, directly to scientists and science-attentive public.Federated searching opens science’s “deep web,” where Google and other search engines are not reaching..