Exploring the feasibility and accuracy of Latent Semantic Analysis based text mining techniques to detect similarity between patent documents and scientific publications

Abstract

In this study, we examine and validate the use of existing text mining techniques (based on the vector space model and latent semantic indexing) to detect similarities between patent documents and scientific publications. Clearly, experts involved in domain studies would benefit from techniques that allow similarity to be detected—and hence facilitate mapping, categorization and classification efforts. In addition, given current debates on the relevance and appropriateness of academic patenting, the ability to assess content-relatedness between sets of documents—in this case, patents and publications—might become relevant and useful. We list several options available to arrive at content based similarity measures. Different options of a vector space model and latent semantic indexing approach have been selected and applied to the publications and patents of a sample of academic inventors (n = 6). We also validated the outcomes by using independently obtained validation scores of human raters. While we conclude that text mining techniques can be valuable for detecting similarities between patents and publications, our findings also indicate that the various options available to arrive at similarity measures vary considerably in terms of accuracy: some generally accepted text mining options, like dimensionality reduction and LSA, do not yield the best results when working with smaller document sets. Implications and directions for further research are discussed.

Appendices

Appendix 1

See Table 4.

Table 4 Basic distribution descriptions of all measures

Appendix 2: Title and abstract of one patent document and two publications (highly related and unrelated) authored by the inventor

Seed patent: Gluten biopolymers

This invention consists of a modified gluten biopolymer for use in industrial applications, such as composites and foams. In the present work, the fracture toughness of the gluten polymer was improved with the addition of a thiol-containing modifying agent. This work also resulted in the development of a gluten biopolymer-modified fibre bundle, demonstrating the potential to process fully biodegradable composite materials. Qualitative analysis suggests that a reasonably strong interface between the natural fibres and biopolymer matrix can form spontaneously under the proper conditions. Therefore, this invention relates to a modified gluten biopolymer for use in industrial applications, such as composites, stabilized foams and moulded articles of manufactures. The present invention relates to a new gluten based biopolymer with modified properties, such as an increase in impact strength, and prepared by using thiol-containing molecules. The multifunctional activity of the polythiol-containing molecules generates the potential for the development of a new material base for commodity plastics. The invention furthermore relates to a new composite material comprising gluten-coated fibre, its use and the method for preparing the composite material.

Publication 1 (highly related to the patent document): designing new materials from wheat protein

We recently discovered that wheat gluten could be formed into a tough, plastic-like substance when thiol-terminated, star-branched molecules are incorporated directly into the protein structure. This discovery offers the exciting possibility of developing biodegradable high-performance engineering plastics and composites from renewable resources that are competitive with their synthetic counterparts. Wheat gluten powder is available at a cost of less than $0.5/lb, so if processing costs can be controlled, an inexpensive alternative to synthetic polymers may be possible. In the present work, we demonstrate the ability to toughen an otherwise brittle protein-based material by increasing the yield stress and strain-to-failure, without compromising stiffness. Water absorption results suggest that the cross-link density of the polymer is increased by the presence of the thiol-terminated, star-branched additive in the protein. Size-exclusion high performance liquid chromatography data of moulded tri-thiol-modified gluten are consistent with that of a polymer that has been further cross-linked when compared directly with unmodified gluten, handled under identical conditions. Remarkably, the mechanical properties of our gluten formulations stored in ambient conditions were found to improve with time.

Publication 2 (unrelated to the patent document): in situ polymerization of thermoplastic composites based on cyclic oligomers

The high melt viscosity of thermoplastics is the main issue when producing continuously reinforced thermoplastic composites. For this reason, production methods for thermoplastic and thermoset composites differ substantially. Lowering the viscosity of thermoplastics to a value below 1 Pa s enables the use of thermoset production methods such as resin transfer molding (RTM). In order to achieve these low viscosities, a low viscous mixture of prepolymers and catalyst can be infused into a mold where the polymerization reaction takes place. Only a limited number of polymerization reactions are compatible with a closed mold process. These polymerization reactions proceed rapidly compared to the curing reaction of thermosets used in RTM. Therefore, the processing window is narrow, and managing the processing parameters is crucial. This paper describes the production and properties of a glass fiber reinforced polyester produced from cyclic oligoesters.