Systems and Methods for Organizing and Finding Data

Abstract

A system and associated methods for organizing, representing, finding, discovering, and accessing data. Embodiments represent information and data in the form of a data structure termed a “Feature Graph”. A Feature Graph includes nodes and edges, where the edges serve to “connect” a node to one or more other nodes. A node in a Feature Graph may represent a variable, that is, a measurable object, characteristic or factor. An edge in a Feature Graph may represent a measure of a statistical association between a node and one or more other nodes that has been retrieved from a source or sources. Datasets that demonstrate or support the statistical association, or measure the associated variable are “linked to” from the Feature Graph.

What is claimed is: 
     
         1 . A computer-executed method for identifying a relevant dataset for use in training a model related to a topic of interest, comprising:
 accessing a source or sources, each source including information regarding a statistical association between a topic of a study described in the source and one or more variables considered in the study;   processing the accessed information from each source to identify the one or more variables considered in the study described in the source, and for each variable, to identify information regarding the statistical association between the variable and the topic of the study;   for at least one of the sources, associating a dataset to at least one of the one or more variables or to the topic of the study described in the source, the dataset including one or more of data used by the study to demonstrate the statistical association or data representing a measure of the one or more variables to which the dataset is associated;   storing the results of processing the accessed source or sources in a database, the stored results including, for each source, a reference to each of the one or more variables, a reference to the topic of the study described in the source, information regarding the statistical association and if applicable, a link or other element to enable access to the associated dataset;   constructing a feature graph based on the stored results of processing the accessed source or sources, the feature graph including a set of nodes and a set of edges, wherein each edge in the set of edges connects a node in the set of nodes to one or more other nodes, and further, wherein each node represents a variable found to be statistically associated with a topic of a study described in a source and each edge represents a statistical association between a node and the topic of the study described in the source or between a first node and a second node;   receiving a search request from a user, the search request specifying the topic of interest;   traversing the feature graph to identify a dataset or datasets associated with one or more variables that are statistically associated with the topic of interest or that are related semantically to one or more variables that are statistically associated with the topic of interest;   filtering and ranking the identified dataset or datasets; and   presenting the result of filtering and ranking the identified dataset or datasets to the user.   
     
     
         2 - 28 . (canceled)