# Mining Measured Information from Text

arXiv: https://arxiv.org/abs/1505.01072 · HTML: https://mlsanity.com/paper/1505.01072/

## Key facts

- Cited by 2 papers in the map (data through 14 Oct 2026).
- First posted on arXiv 5 May 2015.

## Built on by (most cited first, 2 of 2)

- [CQE: A Comprehensive Quantity Extractor](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2305.08853/) (2023)
- [Numbers Matter! Bringing Quantity-awareness to Retrieval Systems](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2407.10283/) (2024)

## Abstract (arXiv)

We present an approach to extract measured information from text (e.g., a 1370 degrees C melting point, a BMI greater than 29.9 kg/m2 ). Such extractions are critically important across a wide range of domains - especially those involving search and exploration of scientific and technical documents. We first propose a rule-based entity extractor to mine measured quantities (i.e., a numeric value paired with a measurement unit), which supports a vast and comprehensive set of both common and obscure measurement units. Our method is highly robust and can correctly recover valid measured quantities even when significant errors are introduced through the process of converting document formats like PDF to plain text. Next, we describe an approach to extracting the properties being measured (e.g., the property "pixel pitch" in the phrase "a pixel pitch as high as 352 μm"). Finally, we present MQSearch: the realization of a search engine with full support for measured information.