Semantic Assistants support users in content retrieval, analysis, and development, by offering context-sensitive NLP services directly integrated in standard desktop clients, like a word processor. They are implemented through an open service-oriented architecture, using Semantic Web ontologies and W3C Web Services.

The growing number of publicly available information sources makes it impossible for individuals to keep track of all the various opinions on one topic. The goal of our fuzzy believer system presented in this paper is to extract and analyze statements of opinion from newspaper articles.

Beliefs are modeled using a fuzzy-theoretic approach applied after NLP-based information extraction. A fuzzy believer models a human agent, deciding what statements to believe or reject based on different, configurable strategies.

In the Mutation Miner project we investigate the combination of NLP, ontologies, and bioinformatics tools for enzyme biotechnologists.