Standardization of assay representation in the Ontology for Biomedical Investigations
Randi Vita, Jie Zheng, Rebecca Jackson, Damion Dooley, James A. Overton, Mark A. Miller, Daniel C. Berrios, Richard H. Scheuermann, Yongqun He, Hande Küçük McGinty, Mathias Brochhausen, Aisyah Yu Lin, Sagar B Jain, Marcus C. Chibucos, J. Judkins, Michelle Giglio, Irene Y Feng, Gully Burns, Matthew Brush, Bjoern Peters, Christian J. Stoeckert
Abstract
The Ontology for Biomedical Investigations (OBI) underwent a focused review of assay term annotations, logic and hierarchy with a goal to improve and standardize these terms. As a result, inconsistencies in W3C Web Ontology Language (OWL) expressions were identified and corrected, and additionally, standardized design patterns and a formalized template to maintain them were developed. We describe here this informative and productive process to describe the specific benefits and obstacles for OBI and the universal lessons for similar projects.