Ontology-based information management system and method

• US 20030177112A1
• Filed: 01/28/2003
• Published: 09/18/2003
• Est. Priority Date: 01/28/2002
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Samsung Electronics Co. Ltd.
• Original Assignee: IPXL, Inc.
• Inventors: Gardner, Steve
• Granted Patent: US 7,225,183 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 707/3
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 18/231 Hierarchical techniques, i.e. dividing or merging pattern sets so as to obtain a dendrogram
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 18/24137 Distances to cluster centroïds
• CPC Class Codes: G16B 45/00 ICT specially adapted for bioinformatics-related data visualisation, e.g. displaying of maps or networks
• CPC Class Codes: G16B 5/00 ICT specially adapted for modelling or simulations in systems biology, e.g. gene-regulatory networks, protein interaction networks or metabolic networks
• CPC Class Codes: G16B 5/20 Probabilistic models
• CPC Class Codes: G16B 50/00 ICT programming tools or database systems specially adapted for bioinformatics
• CPC Class Codes: G16B 50/10 Ontologies; Annotations
• CPC Class Codes: G16B 50/20 Heterogeneous data integration
• CPC Class Codes: Y10S 707/99932 Access augmentation or optimizing
• CPC Class Codes: Y10S 707/99933 Query processing, i.e. searching
• CPC Class Codes: Y10S 707/99945 Object-oriented database structure processing

Abstract

An information management system and method is provided for integrating structured and unstructured data using an ontological approach, and further comprises processes for creating, validating, augmenting, and combining ontologies for life science informatics and other disciplines.

Claims

1. An ontology-based information management system, comprising:

a first storage means for storing structured data;

a second storage means for storing unstructured data;

mapping means for mapping structured data entries stored in the first storage means and concepts in unstructured data stored in the second storage means into one or more ontologies;

searching means for accepting one or more search strings for searching against the one or more ontologies; and

display means for displaying returned search results.

2. The system of claim 1, wherein the returned search results are displayed on a navigable, hierarchical map.

3. The system of claim 1, wherein the first storage means for storing structured data comprises one or more proprietary databases.

4. The system of claim 1, wherein the first storage means for storing structured data comprises one or more public databases.

5. The system of claim 1, wherein the structured data comprises genetic data.

6. The system of claim 1, wherein the structured data comprises information from at least one of a genomic, proteomic, or chemical database.

7. The system of claim 1, wherein the second storage means for storing unstructured data comprises an intellectual property database.

8. The system of claim 1, wherein the second storage means for storing unstructured data comprises a scientific literature database.

9. The system of claim 1, wherein the unstructured data comprises textual data.

10. A method for managing ontology-based information, the method comprising the steps of:

mapping structured data entries stored in a first data source and concepts in unstructured data stored in a second data source into one or more ontologies;

accepting one or more search strings for searching against the one or more ontologies; and

displaying returned search results.

11. The method of claim 10, wherein the step of displaying further comprises the step of displayed returned search results on a navigable, hierarchical map.

12. The method of claim 10, wherein the first data source comprises one or more proprietary databases.

13. The method of claim 10, wherein the first data source comprises one or more public databases.

14. The method of claim 10, wherein the structured data comprises genetic data.

15. The method of claim 10, wherein the structured data comprises information from at least one of a genomic, proteomic, or chemical database.

16. The method of claim 10, wherein the second data source comprises an intellectual property database.

17. The method of claim 10, wherein the second data source comprises a scientific literature database.

18. The method of claim 10, wherein the unstructured data comprises textual data.