**4. Discussion and conclusion**

The structured approach to initiating the development of a new KMS seems to paying off – tools and methodology have been seen to be applicable to a wide range of JAEA activities for deep geological disposal of radioactive waste and provide a better overview of context that was previously available. The need for a major change in approach of the JAEA activities to introduce KMS concept, processes and technologies/tools is now widely accepted by senior managers and younger staff, in particular, has provided positive feedback to the initiatives investigated. Nevertheless, in some critical areas – especially associated with the development of smart search engines – progress has been limited to defining project specifications and a key challenge will be assembling the support team to carry out the required software tailoring work. Probably most promising is the observation that, even at an early stage, the tools used provide hints of how increasing numbers of knowledge management functions can be automated, which will be a key to any next generation system.

A Challenge on Development of an Advanced Knowledge Management

Phoenix, AZ, USA, 1–5 March 2009 (CD-ROM)

Oxford University Press, New York Oxford

*'09)*, Phoenix, AZ, USA, 1–5 March 2009 (CD-ROM)

11–15 October 2009 (CD-ROM)

JAEA-Research 2010-068

TR- 04-03

2010-067

Springer-Verlag, London

Tokyo, Japan, 3–7 October 2005

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So far, progress on the knowledge communication side has been focused on CoolRep and the range of concepts and proposals implemented within this platform, utilising the concept of cultivating communities of practice (e.g. Wenger et al., 2002).

Further development here will, however, be one of the main focuses of work in the coming years as the Japanese geological disposal programme moves closer to site-specific work. It is also applicable to implement disposal of many types of radioactive waste generated by the accident of the Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear power station. There is no doubt that the envisaged system is at (or even beyond) the limits of what is feasible with existing technology. Nevertheless, this is an extremely dynamic and fast-moving field and there seem to be good chances that all defined goals can be met.

The works will be very challenging but, as the fundamental requirement for a 21st century approach to the management of knowledge becomes more widely accepted, the opportunities to share the load in collaborative projects will expand. Certainly, JAEA will work closely with other relevant organisations in Japan that are producers and/or users of knowledge, but extended cooperation with international partners is also a high priority goal for the near future.

### **5. Acknowledgment**

The authors gratefully acknowledge the support in developing and applying this KMS from many individuals within both JAEA and supporting organisations. Special thanks go to Dr. Ian G. McKinley (McKinley consulting) and Dr. Hiroyasu Takase (Quintessa Limited K.K.). The authors also thank the ASME (American Society of Mechanical Engineers) for granting permission to use excerpts from the Proceedings of the ICEM'09: 12th International Conference on Environmental and Radioactive Waste Management (Osawa et al., 2009b; Semba et al., 2009). This study includes the output of research carried out under a contract with METI (Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry) as part of its R&D support programme for developing geological disposal technology.

#### **6. References**


So far, progress on the knowledge communication side has been focused on CoolRep and the range of concepts and proposals implemented within this platform, utilising the concept

Further development here will, however, be one of the main focuses of work in the coming years as the Japanese geological disposal programme moves closer to site-specific work. It is also applicable to implement disposal of many types of radioactive waste generated by the accident of the Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear power station. There is no doubt that the envisaged system is at (or even beyond) the limits of what is feasible with existing technology. Nevertheless, this is an extremely dynamic and fast-moving field and there

The works will be very challenging but, as the fundamental requirement for a 21st century approach to the management of knowledge becomes more widely accepted, the opportunities to share the load in collaborative projects will expand. Certainly, JAEA will work closely with other relevant organisations in Japan that are producers and/or users of knowledge, but extended cooperation with international partners is also a high priority goal

The authors gratefully acknowledge the support in developing and applying this KMS from many individuals within both JAEA and supporting organisations. Special thanks go to Dr. Ian G. McKinley (McKinley consulting) and Dr. Hiroyasu Takase (Quintessa Limited K.K.). The authors also thank the ASME (American Society of Mechanical Engineers) for granting permission to use excerpts from the Proceedings of the ICEM'09: 12th International Conference on Environmental and Radioactive Waste Management (Osawa et al., 2009b; Semba et al., 2009). This study includes the output of research carried out under a contract with METI (Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry) as part of its R&D support

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for the near future.

**6. References** 

Associates Inc

**5. Acknowledgment** 


**11** 

Ruth Cobos

*Spain* 

**Knowledge Crystallisation** 

*Universidad Autónoma de Madrid* 

**Supported by the KnowCat System** 

Nowadays, it is commonly accepted that the World-Wide Web is the most popular tool for sharing knowledge and information (Berners-Lee, 1996). However, there is a huge and growing amount of information and it is getting more and more difficult to make sense out of it. The research work presented in this paper is an effort to address this Overload

The main proposal of this work consists in managing the knowledge of a user community by means of a mechanism for knowledge construction in a distributed and incremental way. More specifically, knowledge evolves towards a structured and refined state by means of

The aim of this mechanism is to achieve the crystallisation of user community knowledge as a result of user interactions, and without the need of an editor or manager of this task. The crystallised knowledge is the most accepted one by the community and, on the other hand, the knowledge that has not obtained enough acceptation will be likely to be

It is important to highlight that knowledge is constantly evolving. Even crystallised knowledge may receive interactions from the community for further improvement. The key point is the evolution and improvement of knowledge by means of user

The user community knowledge is subject to a maturation process involving two main phases. At first, due to the lack of critical mass of knowledge and interaction, a steering committee needs to be in charge of knowledge evaluation. Once enough mass is reached, knowledge crystallisation turns to be based on the evaluation performed by virtual

Those users who have added knowledge that has been crystallised are considered as experts, that is, their work have been recognised by the rest of the community. Virtual communities of experts are constructed in terms of sub areas of knowledge community, and they are in charge of the collaborative evaluation of the knowledge of their sub areas. This is

A collaborative Knowledge Management system called KnowCat has been designed and implemented ("Knowledge Catalyser"). KnowCat is based on the concept of Knowledge Crystallisation, supported by virtual communities of experts. KnowCat allows a user community to share, evaluate and structure collective knowledge. The system allows

**1. Introduction** 

user interactions.

removed.

evaluation.

communities of experts.

similar to the peer review mechanism.

Information problem (Gross, 1964).

*Conference on Environmental and Radioactive Waste Management*, ICEM2009-16355, Liverpool, UK, 11–15 October 2009 (CD-ROM)

