Exelixis: Evolving Ontology-Based Data Integration System

摘要

The evolution of ontologies is an undisputed necessity in ontology-based data integration. Yet, few research efforts have focused on addressing the need to reflect ontology evolution onto the underlying data integration systems. We present E.xelixis. a web platform that enables query answering over evolving ontologies without mapping redefinition. This is achieved by rewriting queries among ontology versions. First, changes between ontologies are automatically detected and described using a high level language of changes. Those changes are interpreted as sound global-as-view (GAV) mappings. Then query expansion is applied in order to consider constraints from the ontology and unfolding to apply the GAV mappings. Whenever equivalent rewritings cannot be produced we a) guide query redefinition and/or b) provide the best "over-approximations", i.e. the minimally-containing and minimally-generalized rewritings. For the demonstration we will use four versions of the CIDOC-CRM ontology and real user queries to show the functionality of the system. Then we will allow conference participants to directly interact with the system to test its capabilities.