In this presentation we will focus on the principles that guided knowledge modelling in EcoLexicon as well as the future that lies ahead for the tool.

EcoLexicon is a multilingual terminological knowledge base (TKB) on the environment. The wide scope of the domain poses significant challenges for terminology work, namely a high degree of multidimensionality and contextual variation. In this sense, an important feature in the TKB is the representation of how conceptual propositions are more or less salient according to dynamic conceptualizations.

Propositions and their salience are extracted from a large classified corpora especifically compiled for EcoLexicon. So far, this has been done manually, based on iterative searches of keywords and knnowledge patterns. Given the scope of the domain, this task can be very tedious and time-consuming. Consequently, knowledge patterns are now being formalized in local grammars in order to identify and annotate the different structures that lexicalize semantic relations (i.e. hyponymy, meronymy and causality). There is still much work to be done, but the grammars have already been proven effective at: (1) extracting knowledge rich contexts; (2) accessing multidimensionality in a more straightforward way; (3) comparing the salience of conceptual propositions across different contexts in a more reliable way; (4) disambiguating polysemic KPs.

EcoLexicon was first conceived as a resource for knowledge acquisition, for users with both cognitive and linguistic needs (translators, tehnical writers, or even experts). However, in the future, we intend to take EcoLexicon a step further and fully exploit its contents for purposes of translation and natural language processing. This will entail sharing it across different platforms and linking it to others in the linguistic linked open data cloud.