FadCat

According to the Mason Gazette, Kenneth Hintz, an electrical and computer engineering professor in the Volgenau School of Information Technology and Engineering, was recently awarded with a patent for his Lexicon-Based New Idea Detector, FadCat.

FadCat works like this: First, users enter specific web sites or blogs from which they get their information and want the system to search. FadCat then builds a lexicon from those sites that enables the system to tell users when additional words are found. Users can then tell the system whether or not they wish to track the words through other domains in search of the new ideas. The system would be most commonly used to handle problems associated with law enforcement — an area that Hintz says is generally “data rich and information poor.”

Patent description from PatentStorm

Technorati Tags: idea detection, innovation, GMU