INT4204

INTELLIGENT SYSTEMS
KNOWLEDGE REPRESENTATION
AND EXPERT SYSTEM-
INTRODUCTION TO EXPERT
SYSTEM
What is Expert
System
Expert systems were the first major economically successful
product resulting from the study of Artificial Intelligence
An expert system is a computer program which can do the
job of a human expert
An expert system can be defined as "a computer program
which can draw reasoned conclusions from a body of
knowledge in a restricted domain".

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What is Expert
System
An expert system is a system that employs human
knowledge captured in a computer to solve problems that
ordinarily require human expertise.
A computer program that emulates the behaviour of
human experts who are solving real-world problems
associated with a particular domain of knowledge.

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Functions of an
Expert System
An expert system represents the knowledge of one or more
domain experts.
A simple expert system may represent the knowledge of a
single expert, but most commercial expert systems
represent the knowledge on many experts.
The purpose of an expert system is to provide advice to a
user through a process of consultation.
The expert system can provide this consultation through a
series of questions to the user
Functions of an
Expert System
A good expert system will also be able to explain to the
user:
a) why certain questions are being asked
b) how it reached its conclusion
Quick Review Question
1. Identify the domain of expertise for which each of the
following human experts is well known
Jamie Oliver
Gary Lineker
Patrick Moore
Stephen Hawking
Your teacher!

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Quick Review
Question
2) Identify a domain expert for the following domains of
expertise:
 Gardening
 interior design
 weather forecasting
 popular music
3) Identify a domain of expertise of your own choice and a
human expert for that domain.
4) Identify a domain of expertise for which you are a domain
expert!

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Applications of
Expert Systems
Expert systems have been developed for a wide range of
domains. These include systems giving medical, legal or
financial advice, but the range of domains is increasing
◦ MYCIN: It was based on backward chaining and could identify various
bacteria that could cause acute infections. It could also recommend
drugs based on the patient's weight.
◦ DENDRAL: Expert system used for chemical analysis to predict molecular
structure.
◦ PXDES: Expert system used to predict the degree and type of lung cancer
◦ CaDet: Expert system that could identify cancer at early stages

Question : Survey for examples of available Expert Systems

on the net.
Categories of Expert
Systems
The output provided by expert systems can be used for:

Advice
Classification
Diagnosis
Planning.
 Tutorial Questions
Write down the category of each of the following expert systems.
a)An expert system that suggests what toy to buy for a child at Christmas.
b)An expert system that identifies different types of yachts.
c)An expert system that prepares an itinerary for a cycling holiday.
d)An expert system that suggests what is wrong with a faulty monitor.
e)An expert system that gives suggestions of jobs that the user might want to consider.
f)An expert system that contains knowledge of radio stations and suggests which radio
station a user might prefer to listen to.
g)An expert system used in garden centers to suggest appropriate treatment for different
types of soil.
h)An expert system that identifies different types of transport.
i)An expert system used by home economists to prepare special menus
Components of Expert Systems
 Components of Expert
Systems
Knowledge Base
The knowledge base is a repository of facts. It stores all the knowledge about
the problem domain.
It is like a large container of knowledge which is obtained from different experts
of a specific field.
Inference Engine
The inference engine is the brain of the expert system. Inference engine
contains rules to solve a specific problem.
It refers the knowledge from the Knowledge Base. It selects facts and rules to
apply when trying to answer the user's query.
It provides reasoning about the information in the knowledge base. It also helps
in deducting the problem to find the solution.
This component is also helpful for formulating conclusions.
 Components of Expert
Systems
Inference Engine
The inference engine work in either forward chaining or
backward chaining.
Development engine is used to create the expert system. This process
usually involved building the rule set. There are two basic approaches-
 Programming Language - LISP and Prolog
 Expert system shell - is a readymade processor 
 Components of Expert
Systems
User Interface
The user interface is the most crucial part of the expert system. This component
takes the user's query in a readable form and passes it to the inference engine.
After that, it displays the results to the user. In other words, it's an interface that
helps the user communicate with the expert system.
 Components of Expert
Systems

Other Key terms used in Expert systems

Facts and Rules
• A fact is a small portion of important information. Facts on their own are of
very limited use.
• The rules are essential to select and apply facts to a user problem.

Facts: Rules:
• if (car needs to be driven) and (engine off) then
 Engine off. start engine
 Pedestrian crossing the road in
a distance less than 10 meters • if (a pedestrian is crossing the road) and (in a distance less than 10 meters
away) then
away. break
 Components of Expert
Systems

Knowledge Acquisition
• The term knowledge acquisition means how to get required domain
knowledge by the expert system.
• The entire process starts by extracting knowledge from a human
expert, converting the acquired knowledge into rules and injecting
the developed rules into the knowledge base.
Components of Expert
Systems
Development of Expert
Systems
General Steps
•Identify Problem Domain
•Design the System
•Develop the Prototype
•Test and Refine the Prototype
•Develop and Complete the ES
•Maintain the System

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Development of Expert Systems

Identify Problem Domain

 The problem must be suitable for an expert system to solve it.
 Find the experts in task domain for the ES project.
 Establish cost-effectiveness of the system.

Design the System

 Identify the ES Technology
 Know and establish the degree of integration with the other systems and
databases.
 Realize how the concepts can represent the domain knowledge best.

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Development of Expert Systems

Develop the Prototype

From Knowledge Base: The knowledge engineer works to −
 Acquire domain knowledge from the expert.
 Represent it in the form of If-THEN-ELSE rules.

Test and Refine the Prototype

 The knowledge engineer uses sample cases to test the prototype for any
deficiencies in performance.
 End users test the prototypes of the ES.

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Development of Expert Systems

Develop and Complete the ES

 Test and ensure the interaction of the ES with all elements of its
environment, including end users, databases, and other information systems.
 Document the ES project well.
 Train the user to use ES.

Maintain the System

 Keep the knowledge base up-to-date by regular review and update.
 Cater for new interfaces with other information systems, as those systems
evolve.

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Expert Systems Technology

Expert System Development Environment includes hardware and tools.

They are −
 Workstations, minicomputers, mainframes.
 High level Symbolic Programming Languages such as LISt Programming (LISP)
and PROgrammation en LOGique (PROLOG).
 Large databases.

Tools − They reduce the effort and cost involved in developing an expert
system to large extent.
 Powerful editors and debugging tools with multi-windows.
 They provide rapid prototyping
 Have Inbuilt definitions of model, knowledge representation, and inference
design.

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Expert Systems Technology

Shells − A shell is nothing but an expert system without knowledge

base. A shell provides the developers with knowledge acquisition,
inference engine, user interface, and explanation facility. 

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Conventional System vs.
Expert System

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Human Expert vs. Expert
System

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Benefits of Expert
Systems
Consistency
Consistency is the main benefit of an expert system. Since it is a
computer-based system, all the knowledge or logic are
programmed into it. If it meets the same situation, it will make the
same decision again and again. Because always the decision will be
made based on some rules and logic.
Memory
It is one of the most important advantages of an expert system. It has a
huge amount of memory to store a large amount of knowledge and
they are all equally accessible to them. There is no chance of memory
loss by default.

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Benefits of Expert
Systems
Logic
The logic in an expert system is very clear. In an expert system, all of the
rules, conditions and their understandings on the way to making a
decision or a choice are always clear because it was programmed in.
Diligence
The expert system, by contrast, they always going to look at every single
detail even the tedious ones. Because a user can ask every single
question including the most tedious ones. So, diligence i.e. the attention
to details are never going to miss any little thing in a computer-based
system.

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Benefits of Expert
Systems
Persistence/Accessibility
The expert systems are always available. They can be accessed anytime
i.e 24*7. It is one of the important advantages of an expert system over
the human experts.
Availability
The expert systems are available for all at the same time. The multiple
users can access or use an expert system simultaneously and get
responses from it immediately. There is no kind of situations like wait or
hold on, the system is busy with someone else and you can’t use or ask
any questions to it right now.

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Benefits of Expert
Systems
Longevity
All of the human experts in the world has a fixed age limit. Because a
human never lives forever. But in case of an expert system, if you can
condense all of the knowledge and experience of a human expert in a
computer it will be accessible forever. That is great.

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Limitations of Expert
Systems
Data integrity
The expert systems need to be updated manually. So, the expert system
all itself doesn’t learn. That is why data integrity is one of the major
disadvantages of an expert system. Since the world we are living is
constantly changing, so the system has to be updated manually by some
set of programmer or some human experts in that domain.
Time & Cost
The time and cost required to buy or set up an expert system are very
high. It requires a huge amount of time to acquire the knowledge that is
needed to develop an expert system. On the other hand, the knowledge
engineers are in small quantity in the industry and very expensive.

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Limitations of Expert
Systems
Specific
The expert systems are generally developed for a specific domain.
Whereas a human expert can be specialized in more than one way or
more than one area. That is why it is also considered as a major
drawback of an expert system.
Emotionless
The human experts have a sort of awareness about the situation, that
means how they feel, how they effective in the situation. But the
expert systems have no awareness about any situation that they face.

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Limitations of Expert
Systems
Commonsense
Commonsense is the main issue with the expert systems. They can take
some dumb decision sometimes because they have to go through by
following the rules and regulations as they programmed. They can’t
provide a solution for the totally new kind of problem. That kind of
things is really hard to program.

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Benefits Limitations of
Expert Systems
Apart from the benefits and limitations of an expert system mentioned,
they may also have some another benefits or drawbacks depending
upon the domain in which the expert system is made on. But these are
the major advantages and disadvantages of an expert system that can
be found in any domain.

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Applications of Expert
Systems
Information management Planning and scheduling
Hospitals and medical facilities The configuration of manufactured
objects
Help desks management
Financial decision making
Employee performance evaluation Knowledge publishing
Loan analysis Process monitoring and control
Virus detection Supervise the operation of the plant
and controller
Useful for repair and maintenance
projects Stock market trading

Warehouse optimization Airline scheduling & cargo schedules

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Applications of Expert
Systems

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When to Use Expert
Systems

Provide a high potential payoff or significantly reduced downside risk.

Capture and preserve irreplaceable human expertise.
Provide expertise needed at a number of locations at the same time or


in a hostile environment that is dangerous to human health.


Provide expertise that is expensive or rare

Develop a solution faster than human experts can
Provide expertise needed for training and development to share the


wisdom of human experts with a large number of people

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