Modular Approach for a New Ontology

摘要

In the life sciences researchers are working with large amount of data from different domains that frequently overlap. Overlapping information can be utilized at the moment the domains are integrated. A typical case is the drug discovery process in which the information from different domains, e.g. diseases, proteins, pathways, drugs, etc. need to be integrated in order to connect a disease with genes, pathways and find a potential chemical compound that can be active as a drug. However, information from different domains is often available in different ontologies. In order to combine these data an ontology integration approach is required.In this paper we demonstrate an approach in which a new integrated ontology is created from modules that are extracted from different ontologies. Module extraction is based on well defined notions of modularity, locality and conservative extensions. The signature of the modules is based on symbols of the user interest. Subsequently, the mappings between the similar concepts are generated. Finally, on the basis of these mappings we integrate modules in one ontology.