Using Coreference in Question Answering

In this paper we present an overview of the system used by the GE/Penn team for the the Question Answering Track of TREC-8. Our system uses a simple sentence ranking method which is enhanced by the addition of coreference annotated data as its input. We will present an overview of our initial system and its components. Since this was the rst time this track has been run, we made numerous additions to our initial system. We will describe these additions and what motivated them as a series of lessons learned after which the nal system used for our submission will be described. Finally we will discuss directions for future research.