Logic-based assessment of the compatibility of UMLS ontology sources.
Logic-based assessment of the compatibility of UMLS ontology sources.
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DOI：
10.1186/2041-1480-2-s1-s2
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发表时间：
2011-03-07
影响因子：
1.9
通讯作者：
Berlanga R
中科院分区：
文献类型：
--
作者：
Jiménez-Ruiz E;Grau BC;Horrocks I;Berlanga R
UMLS-Meta（UMLS-MetaThesaurus）是目前整合独立开发的医学主题词表和本体论的最全面的努力。UMLS-Meta被用于许多应用程序，包括PubMed和ClinicalTrials.gov。新资源的集成结合了自动技术、专家评估和审计协议。然而，目前使用的自动化技术大多基于词法算法，并且经常忽略被集成的源的语义。在本文中，我们认为，UMLS-Meta的当前设计和审计方法可以显着提高考虑到基于逻辑的语义的本体源。我们提供的经验证据表明，UMLS-Meta在其2009 AA版本包含大量的错误，这些错误变得立即明显，如果考虑到丰富的语义的本体源，表现为意想不到的逻辑后果，从本体源连同UMLS-Meta中的信息。然后，我们提出了一般原则和具体的基于逻辑的技术，以有效地检测和修复此类错误。我们的研究结果表明，在UMLS-Meta的设计中采用的方法不仅是非常昂贵的人力，但也容易出错。这里提出的技术可以减少在设计和维护UMLS-Meta的人力和提高其内容的质量是有用的。
The UMLS Metathesaurus (UMLS-Meta) is currently the most comprehensive effort for integrating independently-developed medical thesauri and ontologies. UMLS-Meta is being used in many applications, including PubMed and ClinicalTrials.gov. The integration of new sources combines automatic techniques, expert assessment, and auditing protocols. The automatic techniques currently in use, however, are mostly based on lexical algorithms and often disregard the semantics of the sources being integrated. In this paper, we argue that UMLS-Meta’s current design and auditing methodologies could be significantly enhanced by taking into account the logic-based semantics of the ontology sources. We provide empirical evidence suggesting that UMLS-Meta in its 2009AA version contains a significant number of errors; these errors become immediately apparent if the rich semantics of the ontology sources is taken into account, manifesting themselves as unintended logical consequences that follow from the ontology sources together with the information in UMLS-Meta. We then propose general principles and specific logic-based techniques to effectively detect and repair such errors. Our results suggest that the methodologies employed in the design of UMLS-Meta are not only very costly in terms of human effort, but also error-prone. The techniques presented here can be useful for both reducing human effort in the design and maintenance of UMLS-Meta and improving the quality of its contents.