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E-MEME: Epidemiological Modeling of the Evolution of Messages

Award Information

Agency:
Department of Defense 		Branch:
Office of the Secretary of Defense 		Award ID:
 Program Year/Program:
2011 / SBIR
Agency Tracking Number:
O2-0984 		Solicitation Year:
2007 		Solicitation Topic Code:
OSD07-CR1 		Solicitation Number:
2007.2
Small Business Information
Aptima, Inc.
12 Gill Street Suite 1400 Woburn, MA -
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Woman-Owned: No
Minority-Owned: No
HUBZone-Owned: No
 
Phase 2
Fiscal Year: 2011
Title: E-MEME: Epidemiological Modeling of the Evolution of Messages
Agency / Branch: DOD / OSD
Contract: N00014-11-C-0324
Award Amount: $750,000.00
 

Abstract:

We are now fighting"wars of perceptions,"according to General Stanley McChrystal,"in the minds of the participants."Missions operate at multiple geographic and temporal scales villages to nations, hours to months. Planning, execution, and assessment of counter insurgency and related missions require understanding the effects of our (and others") actions on those"perceptions."In Phase I of E-MEME, we successfully applied epidemiological models to reproduce empirically observed diffusion of ideas"memes"across electronic media, using real data from the Muslim world. We applied statistical language processing methods to extract memes, parameterized simple epidemiological models based on the observed patterns, and ran those models to reproduce the patterns. Details of our results strongly suggest that we modeled signal rather than noise. In Phase II, we will: add more data sources, including fast-paced social media like Twitter; make some straightforward engineering enhancements; and extend our innovative methods in both meme extraction and epidemiological modeling. The resulting technologies will be embedded in a collection of web services, making them readily usable in various applications. This work will be of direct operational relevance for intelligence analysts, watch officers, and for military operations more broadly at tactical, operational, and strategic scales.

Principal Investigator:

Robert McCormack
Senior Applied Mathematic
(781) 496-2476
rmccormack@aptima.com

Business Contact:

Thomas J. McKenna
Chief Financial Officer
(781) 496-2423
mckenna@aptima.com
Small Business Information at Submission:

Aptima, Inc.
12 Gill Street Suite 1400 Woburn, MA -

EIN/Tax ID: 043281859
DUNS: N/A
Number of Employees:
Woman-Owned: No
Minority-Owned: No
HUBZone-Owned: No