The Ontology of Medically Related Social Entities
An information artifact is, loosely, a dependent continuant or its bearer that is created as the result of one or more intentional processes. Examples: uniprot, the english language, the contents of this document or a printout of it, the temperature measurements from a weather balloon. For more information, see the project home page at http://code.google.com/p/information-artifact-ontology/
Barry Smith and Pierre Grenon: "The Cornucopia of Formal Ontological Relations"
Barry Smith: "Basic Tools of Formal Ontology"
Barry Smith: "Beyond Concepts: Ontology as Reality Representation"
Institute for Formal Ontology and Medical Information Science (IFOMIS)
Pierre Grenon and Barry Smith: "SNAP and SPAN: Towards Geospatial Dynamics"
Pierre Grenon, Barry Smith and Louis Goldberg: "Biodynamic Ontology: Applying BFO in the Biomedical Domain"
Pierre Grenon: "BFO in a Nutshell: A Bi-categorial Axiomatization of BFO and Comparison with DOLCE"
Pierre Grenon: "Nuts in BFO's Nutshell: Revisions to the Bi-categorial Axiomatization of BFO"
Pierre Grenon: "Spatio-temporality in Basic Formal Ontology: SNAP and SPAN, Upper-Level Ontology, and Framework for Formalization"
obsolete classes from the information artifact ontology. see http://code.google.com/p/information-artifact-ontology/
Anita Burgun
Mark McGilchrist
Shariq Tariq
Swetha Garimalla
The Clinical Data Integration Model serves as a global model in TRANSFoRm's unifiefd strutural/terminological interoperability mediation framework. It focuses on primary care research requirements.
This file is the MIREOT specification file - see http://obi-ontology.org/page/MIREOT
This ontology grew out of efforts to represent the reality underlying the demographic information required by the US federal government's "meaningful use" criteria for electronic medical records and a presentation by Dr. William Hogan at the Electronic Health Record of the Future conference in Buffalo, NY (http://ub2020.buffalo.edu/strategicstrengths/announcements/wp-content/uploads/2010/09/ehr-september-22.pdf)
This ontology is in early development. Expect it to change.
This is an OWL translation of an ontology whose native representational form is .obo. The translation was performed using the oboInOwl xslt library. For details, see http://www.berkeleybop.org/obo-conv.cgi
This ontology contains logical relations to be shared across the different OBO ontologies. Each OBO ontology is free to extend this set with relations specific to the biology within that ontology In the definitions, variables c, d, ..., p, q, ... range over instances of continuants and processes respectively. C, D, ..., P, Q, ... range over the corresponding classes For a discussion of instance-level relations and also of additional axioms needed to infer transitivity and other properties of the relations listed above see http://genomebiology.com/2005/6/5/R46 or the OBO relations page hosted at http://obo.sourceforge.net/relationship
$Revision$
Domain and range constraints for OBO_REL, in terms of BFO
Adrien Barton
The Ontology for General Medical Science (OGMS) is based on the papers Toward an Ontological Treatment of Disease and Diagnosis and On Carcinomas and Other Pathological Entities. The ontology attempts to address some of the issues raised at the Workshop on Ontology of Diseases (Dallas, TX). OGMS was formerly called the clinical phenotype ontology. Terms from OGMS hang from the Basic Formal Ontology. The latest version of OGMS is always available at http://purl.obolibrary.org/obo/ogms.owl This is version 2011-09-20 aka '0.9' http://purl.obolibrary.org/obo/ogms/2011-09-20/ogms.owl The OGMS developer site is http://code.google.com/p/ogms/ The discussion group is http://groups.google.com/group/ogms-discuss If you are interested in participating in the development of OGMS, please send email to albertgoldfain@gmail.com. Be sure to include a google-account username with your request (this will be the username associated with a gmail address).
Jean-Francois Ethier
William Hogan
BFO OWL specification label
Really of interest to developers only
Relates an entity in the ontology to the name of the variable that is used to represent it in the code that generates the BFO OWL file from the lispy specification.
BFO CLIF specification label
Relates an entity in the ontology to the term that is used to represent it in the the CLIF specification of BFO2
editor preferred term
PERSON:Daniel Schober
The concise, meaningful, and human-friendly name for a class or property preferred by the ontology developers. (US-English)
example of usage
A phrase describing how a class name should be used. May also include other kinds of examples that facilitate immediate understanding of a class semantics, such as widely known prototypical subclasses or instances of the class. Although essential for high level terms, examples for low level terms (e.g., Affymetrix HU133 array) are not
example
in branch
An annotation property indicating which module the terms belong to. This is currently experimental and not implemented yet.
has curation status
PERSON:Alan Ruttenberg
PERSON:Bill Bug
PERSON:Melanie Courtot
definition
2012-04-05: Barry Smith The official OBI definition, explaining the meaning of a class or property: 'Shall be Aristotelian, formalized and normalized. Can be augmented with colloquial definitions' is terrible. Can you fix to something like: A statement of necessary and sufficient conditions explaining the meaning of an expression referring to a class or property. Alan Ruttenberg Your proposed definition is a reasonable candidate, except that it is very common that necessary and sufficient conditions are not given. Mostly they are necessary, occasionally they are necessary and sufficient or just sufficient. Often they use terms that are not themselves defined and so they effectively can't be evaluated by those criteria. On the specifics of the proposed definition: We don't have definitions of 'meaning' or 'expression' or 'property'. For 'reference' in the intended sense I think we use the term 'denotation'. For 'expression', I think we you mean symbol, or identifier. For 'meaning' it differs for class and property. For class we want documentation that let's the intended reader determine whether an entity is instance of the class, or not. For property we want documentation that let's the intended reader determine, given a pair of potential relata, whether the assertion that the relation holds is true. The 'intended reader' part suggests that we also specify who, we expect, would be able to understand the definition, and also generalizes over human and computer reader to include textual and logical definition. Personally, I am more comfortable weakening definition to documentation, with instructions as to what is desirable. We also have the outstanding issue of how to aim different definitions to different audiences. A clinical audience reading chebi wants a different sort of definition documentation/definition from a chemistry trained audience, and similarly there is a need for a definition that is adequate for an ontologist to work with.
The official definition, explaining the meaning of a class or property. Shall be Aristotelian, formalized and normalized. Can be augmented with colloquial definitions.
editor note
An administrative note intended for its editor. It may not be included in the publication version of the ontology, so it should contain nothing necessary for end users to understand the ontology.
definition editor
term editor
20110707, MC: label update to term editor and definition modified accordingly. See http://code.google.com/p/information-artifact-ontology/issues/detail?id=115.
Name of editor entering the term in the file. The term editor is a point of contact for information regarding the term. The term editor may be, but is not always, the author of the definition, which may have been worked upon by several people
alternative term
An alternative name for a class or property which means the same thing as the preferred name (semantically equivalent)
definition source
Discussion on obo-discuss mailing-list, see http://bit.ly/hgm99w
formal citation, e.g. identifier in external database to indicate / attribute source(s) for the definition. Free text indicate / attribute source(s) for the definition. EXAMPLE: Author Name, URI, MeSH Term C04, PUBMED ID, Wiki uri on 31.01.2007
has obsolescence reason
Relates an annotation property to an obsolescence reason. The values of obsolescence reasons come from a list of predefined terms, instances of the class obsolescence reason specification.
curator note
An administrative note of use for a curator but of no use for a user
In OWL 2 add AnnotationPropertyRange('is denotator type' 'denotator type')
relates an class defined in an ontology, to the type of it's denotator
is denotator type
imported from
For external terms/classes, the ontology from which the term was imported
expand expression to
A macro expansion tag applied to an object property (or possibly a data property) which can be used by a macro-expansion engine to generate more complex expressions from simpler ones
ObjectProperty: RO_0002104 Label: has plasma membrane part Annotations: IAO_0000424 "http://purl.obolibrary.org/obo/BFO_0000051 some (http://purl.org/obo/owl/GO#GO_0005886 and http://purl.obolibrary.org/obo/BFO_0000051 some ?Y)"
expand assertion to
A macro expansion tag applied to an annotation property which can be expanded into a more detailed axiom.
Chris Mungall
ObjectProperty: RO??? Label: spatially disjoint from Annotations: expand_assertion_to "DisjointClasses: (http://purl.obolibrary.org/obo/BFO_0000051 some ?X) (http://purl.obolibrary.org/obo/BFO_0000051 some ?Y)"
first order logic expression
antisymmetric property
Alan Ruttenberg
part_of antisymmetric property xsd:true
use boolean value xsd:true to indicate that the property is an antisymmetric property
OBO foundry unique label
The intended usage of that property is as follow: OBO foundry unique labels are automatically generated based on regular expressions provided by each ontology, so that SO could specify unique label = 'sequence ' + [label], etc. , MA could specify 'mouse + [label]' etc. Upon importing terms, ontology developers can choose to use the 'OBO foundry unique label' for an imported term or not. The same applies to tools .
An alternative name for a class or property which is unique across the OBO Foundry.
GROUP:OBO Foundry <http://obofoundry.org/>
PERSON:Bjoern Peters
PERSON:Chris Mungall
has ID digit count
Ontology: <http://purl.obolibrary.org/obo/ro/idrange/> Annotations: 'has ID prefix': "http://purl.obolibrary.org/obo/RO_" 'has ID digit count' : 7, rdfs:label "RO id policy" 'has ID policy for': "RO"
Relates an ontology used to record id policy to the number of digits in the URI. The URI is: the 'has ID prefix" annotation property value concatenated with an integer in the id range (left padded with "0"s to make this many digits)
has ID range allocated to
Relates a datatype that encodes a range of integers to the name of the person or organization who can use those ids constructed in that range to define new terms
Datatype: idrange:1 Annotations: 'has ID range allocated to': "Chris Mungall" EquivalentTo: xsd:integer[> 2151 , <= 2300]
Relating an ontology used to record id policy to the ontology namespace whose policy it manages
elucidation
Person:Barry Smith
Primitive terms in a highest-level ontology such as BFO are terms which are so basic to our understanding of reality that there is no way of defining them in a non-circular fashion. For these, therefore, we can provide only elucidations, supplemented by examples and by axioms
person:Alan Ruttenberg
has associated axiom(nl)
An axiom associated with a term expressed using natural language
Person:Alan Ruttenberg
has associated axiom(fol)
An axiom expressed in first order logic using CLIF syntax
is allocated id range
Add as annotation triples in the granting ontology
Relates an ontology IRI to an (inclusive) range of IRIs in an OBO name space. The range is give as, e.g. "IAO_0020000-IAO_0020999"
has axiom label
A URI that is intended to be unique label for an axiom used for tracking change to the ontology. For an axiom expressed in different languages, each expression is given the same URI
has axiom id
term replaced by
Use on obsolete terms, relating the term to another term that can be used as a substitute
has_specified_input
8/17/09: specified inputs of one process are not necessarily specified inputs of a larger process that it is part of. This is in contrast to how 'has participant' works.
A relation between a planned process and a continuant participating in that process that is not created during the process. The presence of the continuant during the process is explicitly specified in the plan specification which the process realizes the concretization of.
PERSON: Alan Ruttenberg
see is_input_of example_of_usage
has_specified_output
A relation between a planned process and a continuant participating in that process. The presence of the continuant at the end of the process is explicitly specified in the objective specification which the process realizes the concretization of.
is_realized_by
Relation between a realizable and a process. Reciprocal relation of realizes [GOC:cjm]
has ID prefix
Relates an ontology used to record id policy to a prefix concatenated with an integer in the id range (left padded with "0"s to make this many digits) to construct an ID for a term being created.
Contributor
An entity responsible for making contributions to the content of the resource.
Examples of a Contributor include a person, an organisation, or a service. Typically, the name of a Contributor should be used to indicate the entity.
Coverage
Coverage will typically include spatial location (a place name or geographic coordinates), temporal period (a period label, date, or date range) or jurisdiction (such as a named administrative entity). Recommended best practice is to select a value from a controlled vocabulary (for example, the Thesaurus of Geographic Names [TGN]) and that, where appropriate, named places or time periods be used in preference to numeric identifiers such as sets of coordinates or date ranges.
The extent or scope of the content of the resource.
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the content of the resource.
Examples of a Creator include a person, an organisation, or a service. Typically, the name of a Creator should be used to indicate the entity.
Date
A date associated with an event in the life cycle of the resource.
Typically, Date will be associated with the creation or availability of the resource. Recommended best practice for encoding the date value is defined in a profile of ISO 8601 [W3CDTF] and follows the YYYY-MM-DD format.
Description
An account of the content of the resource.
Description may include but is not limited to: an abstract, table of contents, reference to a graphical representation of content or a free-text account of the content.
Format
The physical or digital manifestation of the resource.
Typically, Format may include the media-type or dimensions of the resource. Format may be used to determine the software, hardware or other equipment needed to display or operate the resource. Examples of dimensions include size and duration. Recommended best practice is to select a value from a controlled vocabulary (for example, the list of Internet Media Types [MIME] defining computer media formats).
Resource Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context.
Recommended best practice is to identify the resource by means of a string or number conforming to a formal identification system. Example formal identification systems include the Uniform Resource Identifier (URI) (including the Uniform Resource Locator (URL)), the Digital Object Identifier (DOI) and the International Standard Book Number (ISBN).
Language
A language of the intellectual content of the resource.
Recommended best practice is to use RFC 3066 [RFC3066], which, in conjunction with ISO 639 [ISO639], defines two- and three-letter primary language tags with optional subtags. Examples include "en" or "eng" for English, "akk" for Akkadian, and "en-GB" for English used in the United Kingdom.
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
Examples of a Publisher include a person, an organisation, or a service. Typically, the name of a Publisher should be used to indicate the entity.
Relation
Recommended best practice is to reference the resource by means of a string or number conforming to a formal identification system.
A reference to a related resource.
Rights Management
Typically, a Rights element will contain a rights management statement for the resource, or reference a service providing such information. Rights information often encompasses Intellectual Property Rights (IPR), Copyright, and various Property Rights. If the Rights element is absent, no assumptions can be made about the status of these and other rights with respect to the resource.
Information about rights held in and over the resource.
Source
A reference to a resource from which the present resource is derived.
The present resource may be derived from the Source resource in whole or in part. Recommended best practice is to reference the resource by means of a string or number conforming to a formal identification system.
Subject and Keywords
The topic of the content of the resource.
Typically, a Subject will be expressed as keywords, key phrases or classification codes that describe a topic of the resource. Recommended best practice is to select a value from a controlled vocabulary or formal classification scheme.
Title
Typically, a Title will be a name by which the resource is formally known.
A name given to the resource.
Resource Type
The nature or genre of the content of the resource.
Type includes terms describing general categories, functions, genres, or aggregation levels for content. Recommended best practice is to select a value from a controlled vocabulary (for example, the DCMI Type Vocabulary [DCMITYPE]). To describe the physical or digital manifestation of the resource, use the Format element.
This clarifies that only specifically dependent continuants inhere in (specifically) one independent continuant over all time. For GDCs, there in implicitly inherence to all the independent continuants in which the concretizations inhere. Should add a 'cardinality 1' restriction to the definition of specifically dependent continuant.
This relation belongs in BFO/RO, and will be in BFO 2
agent_in
derived_into
derives_from
Derivation as a relation between instances. The temporal relation of derivation is more complex. Transformation, on the instance level, is just the relation of identity: each adult is identical to some child existing at some earlier time. Derivation on the instance-level is a relation holding between non-identicals. More precisely, it holds between distinct material continuants when one succeeds the other across a temporal divide in such a way that at least a biologically significant portion of the matter of the earlier continuant is inherited by the later. Thus we will have axioms to the effect that from c derives_from c1 we can infer that c and c1 are not identical and that there is some instant of time t such that c1 exists only prior to and c only subsequent to t. We will also be able to infer that the spatial region occupied by c as it begins to exist at t overlaps with the spatial region occupied by c1 as it ceases to exist in the same instant.
derived_from
Derivation on the instance level (*derives_from*) holds between distinct material continuants when one succeeds the other across a temporal divide in such a way that at least a biologically significant portion of the matter of the earlier continuant is inherited by the later. We say that one class C derives_from class C' if instances of C are connected to instances of C' via some chain of instance-level derivation relations. Example: osteocyte derives_from osteoblast. Formally: C derives_immediately_from C' if and only if: given any c and any t, if c instantiates C at time t, then there is some c' and some t', such that c' instantiates C' at t' and t' earlier-than t and c *derives_from* c'. C derives_from C' if and only if: there is an chain of immediate derivation relations connecting C to C'.
has_agent
As for has_participant, but with the additional condition that the component instance is causally active in the relevant process
has_participant
Has_participant is a primitive instance-level relation between a process, a continuant, and a time at which the continuant participates in some way in the process. The relation obtains, for example, when this particular process of oxygen exchange across this particular alveolar membrane has_participant this particular sample of hemoglobin at this particular time.
P has_participant C if and only if: given any process p that instantiates P there is some continuant c, and some time t, such that: c instantiates C at t and c participates in p at t
located_in
Location as a relation between instances: The primitive instance-level relation c located_in r at t reflects the fact that each continuant is at any given time associated with exactly one spatial region, namely its exact location. Following we can use this relation to define a further instance-level location relation - not between a continuant and the region which it exactly occupies, but rather between one continuant and another. c is located in c1, in this sense, whenever the spatial region occupied by c is part_of the spatial region occupied by c1. Note that this relation comprehends both the relation of exact location between one continuant and another which obtains when r and r1 are identical (for example, when a portion of fluid exactly fills a cavity), as well as those sorts of inexact location relations which obtain, for example, between brain and head or between ovum and uterus
C located_in C' if and only if: given any c that instantiates C at a time t, there is some c' such that: c' instantiates C' at time t and c *located_in* c'. (Here *located_in* is the instance-level location relation.)
location_of
participates_in
preceded_by
An example is: translation preceded_by transcription; aging preceded_by development (not however death preceded_by aging). Where derives_from links classes of continuants, preceded_by links classes of processes. Clearly, however, these two relations are not independent of each other. Thus if cells of type C1 derive_from cells of type C, then any cell division involving an instance of C1 in a given lineage is preceded_by cellular processes involving an instance of C. The assertion P preceded_by P1 tells us something about Ps in general: that is, it tells us something about what happened earlier, given what we know about what happened later. Thus it does not provide information pointing in the opposite direction, concerning instances of P1 in general; that is, that each is such as to be succeeded by some instance of P. Note that an assertion to the effect that P preceded_by P1 is rather weak; it tells us little about the relations between the underlying instances in virtue of which the preceded_by relation obtains. Typically we will be interested in stronger relations, for example in the relation immediately_preceded_by, or in relations which combine preceded_by with a condition to the effect that the corresponding instances of P and P1 share participants, or that their participants are connected by relations of derivation, or (as a first step along the road to a treatment of causality) that the one process in some way affects (for example, initiates or regulates) the other.
P preceded_by P' if and only if: given any process p that instantiates P at a time t, there is some process p' such that p' instantiates P' at time t', and t' is earlier than t.
precedes
transformation_of
When an embryonic oenocyte (a type of insect cell) is transformed into a larval oenocyte, one and the same continuant entity preserves its identity while instantiating distinct classes at distinct times. The class-level relation transformation_of obtains between continuant classes C and C1 wherever each instance of the class C is such as to have existed at some earlier time as an instance of the distinct class C1 (see Figure 2 in paper). This relation is illustrated first of all at the molecular level of granularity by the relation between mature RNA and the pre-RNA from which it is processed, or between (UV-induced) thymine-dimer and thymine dinucleotide. At coarser levels of granularity it is illustrated by the transformations involved in the creation of red blood cells, for example, from reticulocyte to erythrocyte, and by processes of development, for example, from larva to pupa, or from (post-gastrular) embryo to fetus or from child to adult. It is also manifest in pathological transformations, for example, of normal colon into carcinomatous colon. In each such case, one and the same continuant entity instantiates distinct classes at different times in virtue of phenotypic changes.
Relation between two classes, in which instances retain their identity yet change their classification by virtue of some kind of transformation. Formally: C transformation_of C' if and only if given any c and any t, if c instantiates C at time t, then for some t', c instantiates C' at t' and t' earlier t, and there is no t2 such that c instantiates C at t2 and c instantiates C' at t2.
transformed_into
inheres in
inheres_in
is bearer of
bearer of
bearer_of
is aggregate of
aggregate of
aggregate_of
has temporal part
temporal part of
(iff (temporalPartOf a b) (and (occurrentPartOf a b) (exists (t) (and (TemporalRegion t) (occupiesSpatioTemporalRegion a t))) (forall (c t_1) (if (and (Occurrent c) (occupiesSpatioTemporalRegion c t_1) (occurrentPartOf t_1 r)) (iff (occurrentPartOf c a) (occurrentPartOf c b)))))) // axiom label in BFO2 CLIF: [078-003]
(iff (properTemporalPartOf a b) (and (temporalPartOf a b) (not (= a b)))) // axiom label in BFO2 CLIF: [116-001]
(forall (x y) (if (properTemporalPartOf x y) (exists (z) (and (properTemporalPartOf z y) (not (exists (w) (and (temporalPartOf w x) (temporalPartOf w z)))))))) // axiom label in BFO2 CLIF: [117-002]
b proper_temporal_part_of c =Def. b temporal_part_of c & not (b = c). (axiom label in BFO2 Reference: [116-001])
b temporal_part_of c =Def.b occurrent_part_of c & & for some temporal region t, b occupies_temporal_region t & for all occurrents d, t (if d occupies_temporal_region t & t? occurrent_part_of t then (d occurrent_part_of a iff d occurrent_part_of b)). (axiom label in BFO2 Reference: [078-003])
if b proper_temporal_part_of c, then there is some d which is a proper_temporal_part_of c and which shares no parts with b. (axiom label in BFO2 Reference: [117-002])
the 4th year of your life is a temporal part of your life\. The first quarter of a game of football is a temporal part of the whole game\. The process of your heart beating from 4pm to 5pm today is a temporal part of the entire process of your heart beating.\ The 4th year of your life is a temporal part of your life
the process boundary which separates the 3rd and 4th years of your life.
your heart beating from 4pm to 5pm today is a temporal part of the process of your heart beating
occupies temporal region
p occupies_temporal_region t. This is a primitive relation between an occurrent p and the temporal region t upon which the spatiotemporal region p occupies_spatiotemporal_region projects. (axiom label in BFO2 Reference: [132-001])
has temporal occupant
[copied from inverse property 'occupies temporal region'] p occupies_temporal_region t. This is a primitive relation between an occurrent p and the temporal region t upon which the spatiotemporal region p occupies_spatiotemporal_region projects. (axiom label in BFO2 Reference: [132-001])
has measurement unit label
8/6/2009 Alan Ruttenberg: The suggestions is to deprecate specific and generically denotes in favor of a single denote relationship that corresponds to the generic sense
Smith, Ceusters, Ruttenberg, 2000 years of philosophy
The process of creation is, for example, writing down on paper the name of a friend by deliberately creating a certain pattern using ink. Here the ink + paper is the independent continuant and the carrier is the pattern in the ink. c = pattern in the ink b = paper + ink r = friend
c specifically denotes r =def r is a portion of reality & c is a particular quality & c depends specifically on some independent continuant b & b acquired c as the result of the achievement of an objective to enable pointing to r repeatedly. Marked means there is a changed or additional quality of the bearer - the quality is the information carrier. Case 1 Memory trace as mark created when reading some description of some friend. The trace can denote. Case 2 Pattern of ink arrayed on paper as mark when writing down a friend's name Case 3 Pattern of magnetic domains on scattered pieces of a hard disk platter as mark when saving a file.
see http://code.google.com/p/information-artifact-ontology/issues/detail?id=25&q=denote
is about
7/6/2009 Alan Ruttenberg. Following discussion with Jonathan Rees, and introduction of "mentions" relation. Weaken the is_about relationship to be primitive. We will try to build it back up by elaborating the various subproperties that are more precisely defined. Some currently missing phenomena that should be considered "about" are predications - "The only person who knows the answer is sitting beside me" , Allegory, Satire, and other literary forms that can be topical without explicitly mentioning the topic.
This document is about information artifacts and their representations
is_about is a (currently) primitive relation that relates an information artifact to an entity.
mentions
7/6/2009 Alan Ruttenberg. P4 RC1 munges our GCI so remove it for now: mentions some entity equivalentTo has_part some ('generically denotes' some entity)
7/6/2009 Alan Ruttenberg: Add this relation following conversation with Jonathan Rees that N&S GCI for is_about was too strong. Really it was simply sufficient. To effect this change we introduce this relation, which is subproperty of is_about, and have previous GCI use this relation "mentions" in it's (logical) definition
An information artifact IA mentions an entity E exactly when it has a component/part that denotes E
PERSON: Jonathan Rees
Person: Alan Ruttenberg
denotes
2009-11-10 Alan Ruttenberg. Old definition said the following to emphasize the generic nature of this relation. We no longer have 'specifically denotes', which would have been primitive, so make this relation primitive. g denotes r =def r is a portion of reality there is some c that is a concretization of g every c that is a concretization of g specifically denotes r
A person's name denotes the person. A variable name in a computer program denotes some piece of memory. Lexically equivalent strings can denote different things, for instance "Alan" can denote different people. In each case of use, there is a case of the denotation relation obtaining, between "Alan" and the person that is being named.
Conversations with Barry Smith, Werner Ceusters, Bjoern Peters, Michel Dumontier, Melanie Courtot, James Malone, Bill Hogan
denotes is a primitive, instance-level, relation obtaining between an information content entity and some portion of reality. Denotation is what happens when someone creates an information content entity E in order to specifically refer to something. The only relation between E and the thing is that E can be used to 'pick out' the thing. This relation connects those two together. Freedictionary.com sense 3: To signify directly; refer to specifically
is quality measurement of
8/6/2009 Alan Ruttenberg: The strategy is to be rather specific with this relationship. There are other kinds of measurements that are not of qualities, such as those that measure time. We will add these as separate properties for the moment and see about generalizing later
From the second IAO workshop [Alan Ruttenberg 8/6/2009: not completely current, though bringing in comparison is probably important] This one is the one we are struggling with at the moment. The issue is what a measurement measures. On the one hand saying that it measures the quality would include it "measuring" the bearer = referring to the bearer in the measurement. However this makes comparisons of two different things not possible. On the other hand not having it inhere in the bearer, on the face of it, breaks the audit trail. Werner suggests a solution based on "Magnitudes" a proposal for which we are awaiting details. -- From the second IAO workshop, various comments, [commented on by Alan Ruttenberg 8/6/2009] unit of measure is a quality, e.g. the length of a ruler. [We decided to hedge on what units of measure are, instead talking about measurement unit labels, which are the information content entities that are about whatever measurement units are. For IAO we need that information entity in any case. See the term measurement unit label] [Some struggling with the various subflavors of is_about. We subsequently removed the relation represents, and describes until and only when we have a better theory] a represents b means either a denotes b or a describes describe: a describes b means a is about b and a allows an inference of at least one quality of b We have had a long discussion about denotes versus describes.
From the second IAO workshop: An attempt at tieing the quality to the measurement datum more carefully. a is a magnitude means a is a determinate quality particular inhering in some bearer b existing at a time t that can be represented/denoted by an information content entity e that has parts denoting a unit of measure, a number, and b. The unit of measure is an instance of the determinable quality.
From the second meeting on IAO: An attempt at defining assay using Barry's "reliability" wording assay: process and has_input some material entity and has_output some information content entity and which is such that instances of this process type reliably generate outputs that describes the input.
This one is the one we are struggling with at the moment. The issue is what a measurement measures. On the one hand saying that it measures the quality would include it "measuring" the bearer = referring to the bearer in the measurement. However this makes comparisons of two different things not possible. On the other hand not having it inhere in the bearer, on the face of it, breaks the audit trail. Werner suggests a solution based on "Magnitudes" a proposal for which we are awaiting details.
m is a quality measurement of q at t when q is a quality there is a measurement process p that has specified output m, a measurement datum, that is about q
has coordinate unit label
relating a cartesian spatial coordinate datum to a unit label that together with the values represent a point
is duration of
relates a process to a time-measurement-datum that represents the duration of the process
is quality measured as
2009/10/19 Alan Ruttenberg. Named 'junk' relation useful in restrictions, but not a real instance relationship
inverse of the relation of is quality measurement of
is quality specification of
Person:Bjoern Peters
a relation between a data item and a quality of a material entity where the material entity is the specified output of a material transformation which achieves an objective specification that indicates the intended value of the specified quality.
quality is specified as
inverse of the relation of is quality specification of
has time stamp
relates a time stamped measurement datum to the time measurement datum that denotes the time when the measurement was taken
has measurement datum
relates a time stamped measurement datum to the measurement datum that was measured
is_concretization_of
a relationship between a generically dependent continuant and at least one specifically dependent continuant upon which it existentially depends
is_concretized_as
is_specified_output_of
2009/10/01 Alan Ruttenberg. Barry prefers generic is-member-of. Question of what the range should be. For now organization. Is organization a population? Would the same relation be used to record members of a population
Relating a legal person to an organization in the case where the legal person has a role as member of the organization
has organization member
BFO relation takes precedence.
We anticipate BFO 2.0 including and defining this relation. When it does, we will obsolete this property and declare it equivalent to the BFO 2.0 relation.
true
At the instance level, this relation is the named inverse of is-aggregate-of. At the type level, however, not so. We expect BFO 2.0 to have this relation as well, and we will obsolete this property and declare it equivalent to BFO's version when BFO 2.0 comes out.
starts
starts with
x starts with y if and only if x has part y and the time point at which x starts is equivalent to the time point at which y starts. Formally: a(y) = a(x) ? ?(y) < ?(x), where a is a function that maps a process to a start point, and ? is a function that maps a process to an end point.
Every insulin receptor signaling pathway starts with the binding of a ligand to the insulin receptor
ends
ends with
x ends with y if and only if x has part y and the time point at which x ends is equivalent to the time point at which y ends. Formally: a(y) > a(x) ? ?(y) = ?(x), where a is a function that maps a process to a start point, and ? is a function that maps a process to an end point.
regulates
towards
AG: Currently the only way to handle relational quality?
relation binding a relational quality or disposition to the relevant type of entity
adjacent_to
Note that adjacent_to as thus defined is not a symmetric relation, in contrast to its instance-level counterpart. For it can be the case that Cs are in general such as to be adjacent to instances of C1 while no analogous statement holds for C1s in general in relation to instances of C. Examples are: nuclear membrane adjacent_to cytoplasm; seminal vesicle adjacent_to urinary bladder; ovary adjacent_to parietal pelvic peritoneum
C adjacent to C' if and only if: given any instance c that instantiates C at a time t, there is some c' such that: c' instantiates C' at time t and c and c' are in spatial proximity
contained_in
Containment obtains in each case between material and immaterial continuants, for instance: lung contained_in thoracic cavity; bladder contained_in pelvic cavity. Hence containment is not a transitive relation. If c part_of c1 at t then we have also, by our definition and by the axioms of mereology applied to spatial regions, c located_in c1 at t. Thus, many examples of instance-level location relations for continuants are in fact cases of instance-level parthood. For material continuants location and parthood coincide. Containment is location not involving parthood, and arises only where some immaterial continuant is involved. To understand this relation, we first define overlap for continuants as follows: c1 overlap c2 at t =def for some c, c part_of c1 at t and c part_of c2 at t. The containment relation on the instance level can then be defined (see definition):
C contained_in C' if and only if: given any instance c that instantiates C at a time t, there is some c' such that: c' instantiates C' at time t and c located_in c' at t, and it is not the case that c *overlaps* c' at t. (c' is a conduit or cavity.)
contains
has_improper_part
See reasons for obsoletion of improper_part_of
has_integral_part
has_part
has_proper_part
improper_part_of
OBSOLETE. The definition is "As for part_of, with the additional constraint that subject and object may be identical". However, part_of is already reflexive, therefore improper_part_of is identical to part_of. If read differently, as "improper_part_of is part_of but not proper_part_of",improper_part_of becomes identity. So, improper_part_of is either identical to part_of or to identity, and not an intuitive synonym for either of them. [Robert Hoehndorf]
As for part_of, with the additional constraint that subject and object may be identical
integral_part_of
C integral_part_of C' if and only if: C part_of C' AND C' has_part C
part_of
Parthood as a relation between instances: The primitive instance-level relation p part_of p1 is illustrated in assertions such as: this instance of rhodopsin mediated phototransduction part_of this instance of visual perception. This relation satisfies at least the following standard axioms of mereology: reflexivity (for all p, p part_of p); anti-symmetry (for all p, p1, if p part_of p1 and p1 part_of p then p and p1 are identical); and transitivity (for all p, p1, p2, if p part_of p1 and p1 part_of p2, then p part_of p2). Analogous axioms hold also for parthood as a relation between spatial regions. For parthood as a relation between continuants, these axioms need to be modified to take account of the incorporation of a temporal argument. Thus for example the axiom of transitivity for continuants will assert that if c part_of c1 at t and c1 part_of c2 at t, then also c part_of c2 at t. Parthood as a relation between classes: To define part_of as a relation between classes we again need to distinguish the two cases of continuants and processes, even though the explicit reference to instants of time now falls away. For continuants, we have C part_of C1 if and only if any instance of C at any time is an instance-level part of some instance of C1 at that time, as for example in: cell nucleus part_ of cell.
There is controversy about this relation intended to represent the relation between some arbitrary physical thing that is used as a represention/proxy/pointer to something else
For continuants: C part_of C' if and only if: given any c that instantiates C at a time t, there is some c' such that c' instantiates C' at time t, and c *part_of* c' at t. For processes: P part_of P' if and only if: given any p that instantiates P at a time t, there is some p' such that p' instantiates P' at time t, and p *part_of* p' at t. (Here *part_of* is the instance-level part-relation.)
proper_part_of
As for part_of, with the additional constraint that subject and object are distinct
relationship
this relation was superfluous, so it has been obsoleted
A relationship between two classes (terms). Relationships between classes are expressed in terms of relations on underlying instances.
has measurement numeral
measurement unit label of
has measurement value
has x coordinate value
has z coordinate value
has y coordinate value
geographical location
A reference to a place on the Earth, by its name or by its geographical location.
embryo development ending in birth or egg hatching
The process whose specific outcome is the progression of an embryo over time, from zygote formation until the end of the embryonic life stage. The end of the embryonic life stage is organism-specific and may be somewhat arbitrary; for mammals it is usually considered to be birth, for insects the hatching of the first instar larva from the eggshell.
A permanent cessation of all vital functions: the end of life; can be applied to a whole organism or to a part of an organism.
See also the biological process term 'apoptosis ; GO:0006915'.
conditional specification
OBI branch derived
PlanAndPlannedProcess Branch
a directive information entity that specifies what should happen if the trigger condition is fulfilled
measurement unit label
2009-03-16: provenance: a term measurement unit was proposed for OBI (OBI_0000176) , edited by Chris Stoeckert and Cristian Cocos, and subsequently moved to IAO where the objective for which the original term was defined was satisfied with the definition of this, different, term.
2009-03-16: review of this term done during during the OBI workshop winter 2009 and the current definition was considered acceptable for use in OBI. If there is a need to modify this definition please notify OBI.
A measurement unit label is as a label that is part of a scalar measurement datum and denotes a unit of measure.
Examples of measurement unit labels are liters, inches, weight per volume.
PERSON: Melanie Courtot
objective specification
2009-03-16: original definition when imported from OBI read: "objective is an non realizable information entity which can serve as that proper part of a plan towards which the realization of the plan is directed."
Answers the question, why did you do this experiment?
OBI Plan and Planned Process/Roles Branch
PERSON: Barry Smith
PERSON: Bjoern Peters
PERSON: Jennifer Fostel
a directive information entity that describes an intended process endpoint. When part of a plan specification the concretization is realized in a planned process in which the bearer tries to effect the world so that the process endpoint is achieved.
purpose of a study; support of hypothesis, discovery of new information
narrative object
2009-08-10 Alan Ruttenberg: Larry Hunter suggests that this be obsoleted and replaced by 'textual entity' and 'figure'. Alan restored as there are OBI dependencies and this merits further discussion
A narrative object is an information content entity that is a set of propositions.
Examples of narrative objects are reports, journal articles, and patents submission.
agree - DENRIE. Issue(alan) do we only mean text? What about a story told by mime. Does music count? (no) what about an oral report. Regarding definition, saying it is a set of propositions means we loose the idea that wording matters. Maybe adjust saying a narrative object has some relationshop to a set of propositions
person:Chris Stoeckert
action specification
OBI Plan and Planned Process branch
Pour the contents of flask 1 into flask 2
a directive information entity that describes an action the bearer will take
datum label
9/22/11 BP: changed the rdfs:label for this class from 'label' to 'datum label' to convey that this class is not intended to cover all kinds of labels (stickers, radiolabels, etc.), and not even all kind of textual labels, but rather the kind of labels occuring in a datum.
A label is a symbol that is part of some other datum and is used to either partially define the denotation of that datum or to provide a means for identifying the datum as a member of the set of data with the same label
GROUP: IAO
software
GROUP: OBI
PERSON: Chris Stoeckert
Software is a plan specification composed of a series of instructions that can be interpreted by or directly executed by a processing unit.
see sourceforge tracker discussion at http://sourceforge.net/tracker/index.php?func=detail&aid=1958818&group_id=177891&atid=886178
obsolete2_digital entity
3/22/2009 Alan Ruttenberg, obsoleted per http://groups.google.com/group/information-ontology/browse_thread/thread/789ad4b7708d5cf4 Superclass was 'digitial quality'
A digital entity is an information entity which is a collection of bits that can be interpreted by a computer. Two digital entities are the same if they are bitwise identical.
obsolete_digital entity
journal article
Examples are articles published in the journals, Nature and Science. The content can often be cited by reference to a paper based encoding, e.g. Authors, Title of article, Journal name, date or year of publication, volume and page number.
a report that is published in a journal
information carrier
12/15/09: There is a concern that some ways that carry information may be processes rather than qualities, such as in a 'delayed wave carrier'.
A quality of an information bearer that imparts the information content
The pattern in ink on a page of a paperback novel.
model number
A model number is an information content entity specifically borne by catalogs, design specifications, advertising materials, inventory systems and similar that is about manufactured objects of the same class. The model number is an alternative term for the class. The manufactered objects may or may not also bear the model number. Model numbers can be encoded in a variety of other information objects, such as bar codes, numerals, or patterns of dots.
manufactered items may have more than one model number, sometimes by rebranding, or because companies are sold and the products issued new model numbers
obsolete2_binary digital entity
3/22/2009 Alan Ruttenberg, obsoleted per http://groups.google.com/group/information-ontology/browse_thread/thread/789ad4b7708d5cf4 Superclass was 'digital entity'
A binary digital entity is a digital entity that is encoded in a way that is not easily human readable and that contains other than text characters.
MS Word document, ZIP file, DICOM file, JPEG file
binary digital entity
digital_entity
a unit of measure is the quality of some material entity compared to which another quality is some multiple of.
programming language
A language in which source code is written, intended to executed/run by a software interpreter. Programming languages are ways to write instructions that specify what to do, and sometimes, how to do it.
R, Perl, Java
data item
OBO:imported "http://purl.obolibrary.org/obo/iao.owl"
2/2/2009 Alan and Bjoern discussing FACS run output data. This is a data item because it is about the cell population. Each element records an event and is typically further composed a set of measurment data items that record the fluorescent intensity stimulated by one of the lasers.
2009-03-16: data item deliberatly ambiguous: we merged data set and datum to be one entity, not knowing how to define singular versus plural. So data item is more general than datum.
2009-03-16: removed datum as alternative term as datum specifically refers to singular form, and is thus not an exact synonym.
JAR: datum -- well, this will be very tricky to define, but maybe some information-like stuff that might be put into a computer and that is meant, by someone, to denote and/or to be interpreted by some process... I would include lists, tables, sentences... I think I might defer to Barry, or to Brian Cantwell Smith JAR: A data item is an approximately justified approximately true approximate belief
Data items include counts of things, analyte concentrations, and statistical summaries.
a data item is an information content entity that is intended to be a truthful statement about something (modulo, e.g., measurement precision or other systematic errors) and is constructed/acquired by a method which reliably tends to produce (approximately) truthful statements.
data
symbol
20091104, MC: this needs work and will most probably change
a smallish, word-like datum...
numeral
A symbol that denotes a number.
information content entity
Examples of information content entites include journal articles, data, graphical layouts, and graphs.
an information content entity is an entity that is generically dependent on some artifact and stands in relation of aboutness to some entity
information_content_entity 'is_encoded_in' some digital_entity in obi before split (040907). information_content_entity 'is_encoded_in' some physical_document in obi before split (040907). Previous. An information content entity is a non-realizable information entity that 'is encoded in' some digital or physical entity.
integer numeral
a numeral that denotes an integer
scalar measurement datum
10 feet. 3 ml.
2009-03-16: we decided to keep datum singular in scalar measurement datum, as in this case we explicitly refer to the singular form
Would write this as: has_part some 'measurement unit label' and has_part some numeral and has_part exactly 2, except for the fact that this won't let us take advantage of OWL reasoning over the numbers. Instead use has measurment value property to represent the same. Use has measurement unit label (subproperty of has_part) so we can easily say that there is only one of them.
a scalar measurement datum is a measurement datum that is composed of two parts, numerals and a unit label.
directive information entity
2009-03-16: provenance: a term realizable information entity was proposed for OBI (OBI_0000337) , edited by the PlanAndPlannedProcess branch. Original definition was "is the specification of a process that can be concretized and realized by an actor" with alternative term "instruction".It has been subsequently moved to IAO where the objective for which the original term was defined was satisfied with the definitionof this, different, term.
8/6/2009 Alan Ruttenberg: Changed label from "information entity about a realizable" after discussions at ICBO
An information content entity whose concretizations indicate to their bearer how to realize them in a process.
Werner pushed back on calling it realizable information entity as it isn't realizable. However this name isn't right either. An example would be a recipe. The realizable entity would be a plan, but the information entity isn't about the plan, it, once concretized, *is* the plan. -Alan
time trigger
revisit?
obsolete_study interpretation
2009-03-16: definition was "A conclusion is a narrative object which can be published in a paper summerizing and interpreting a protocol application."
2009-03-16: work has been done on this term during during the OBI workshop winter 2009 and the current definition was considered acceptable for use in OBI. If there is a need to modify this definition please notify OBI.
A study interpretation is a textual entity about the implications of a study result. Examples include discussion of whether a hypothesis is false, whether the study failed to address the hypothesis, and whether the study results have led to new hypotheses
Lawrence Hunter
The obsoleting of narrative object required a modest change in the definition of this term. Circularity with "interpretation... interprets" has been removed, using "about the implications" instead.
dot plot
A dot plot is a report graph which is a graphical representation of data where each data point is represented by a single dot placed on coordinates corresponding to data point values in particular dimensions.
Dot plot of SSC-H and FSC-H.
person:Allyson Lister
graph
A diagram that presents one or more tuples of information by mapping those tuples in to a two dimensional space in a non arbitrary way.
PERSON: Lawrence Hunter
obsolete2_text based digital entity
3/22/2009 Alan Ruttenberg, obsoleted per http://groups.google.com/group/information-ontology/browse_thread/thread/789ad4b7708d5cf4 superclass was 'digital document'
A text based digital entity is a digital entity that is encoded so that it only contains text characters.
XML file, C++ source code file
text based digital entity
rule
MSI
PRS
a rule is an executable which guides, defines, restricts actions
example to be added
contour plot
Contour plot of SSC-H, FSC-H, and FL1-H.
generically_dependent_continuants
group:Flow Cytometry community
obsolete2_report figure
A report figure is a report display element that has some aspect of illustration, but may be a composite of figures, images, and other elements
I prepended the 'report ' to make it clear that we mean parts of reports here. We may want a more generic version of 'figure', in which case this would become a defined class - figure and part_of some report
Replaced by defined version of figure
report figure
algorithm
A plan specification which describes inputs, output of mathematical functions as well as workflow of execution for achieving an predefined objective. Algorithms are realized usually by means of implementation as computer programs for execution by automata.
PMID: 18378114.Genomics. 2008 Mar 28. LINKGEN: A new algorithm to process data in genetic linkage studies.
Philippe Rocca-Serra
adapted from discussion on OBI list (Matthew Pocock, Christian Cocos, Alan Ruttenberg)
software interpreter
A software interpreter is a software application that executes some specified input software.
Do we care? Jennifer: Yes, there was a particular version of R that had a bug and it was fixed later. That would imply that we mean specific version of an interpreter. So an instance of this would be a particular version of the interpreter
R program, Perl interpreter, Java virtual machine
curation status specification
Better to represent curation as a process with parts and then relate labels to that process (in IAO meeting)
The curation status of the term. The allowed values come from an enumerated list of predefined terms. See the specification of these instances for more detailed definitions of each enumerated value.
density plot
A density plot is a report graph which is a graphical representation of data where the tint of a particular pixel corresponds to some kind of function corresponding the the amount of data points relativelly with their distance from the the pixel.
Density plot of SSC-H and FSC-H.
report
2009-03-16: comment from Darren Natale: I am slightly uneasy with the sentence "Topic of the report is on something that has completed." Should it be restricted to those things that are completed? For example, a progress report is (usually) about something that definitely has *not* been completed, or may include (only) projections. I think the definition would not suffer if the whole sentence is deleted.
2009-03-16: this was report of results with definition: A report is a narrative object that is a formal statement of the results of an investigation, or of any matter on which definite information is required, made by some person or body instructed or required to do so.
2009-08-10 Alan Ruttenberg: Larry Hunter suggests that this be obsoleted and replaced by 'document'. Alan restored as there are OBI dependencies and this merits further discussion
Examples of reports are gene lists and investigation reports. These are not published (journal) articles but may be included in a journal article.
PERSON:Chris Stoeckert
a document assembled by an author for the purpose of providing information for the audience. A report is the output of a documenting process and has the objective to be consumed by a specific audience. Topic of the report is on something that has completed. A report is not a single figure. Examples of reports are journal article, patent application, grant progress report, case report (not patient record)
disagreement about where reports go. alan: only some gene lists are reports. Is a report all the content of some document? The example of usage suggests that a report may be part of some article. Term needs clarification
obsolete_report element
2009-03-16: needs some more work (clarify relations).
2009-03-16: was report display element with definition: A report display element is a narrative object that is part of a report. Report display elements are set off from the textual parts of a report and are typically given a label(e.g. Figure 2) which is used to refer to the element from the text. Typically the 2d layout is part of the identity of such elements.
A report element is a narrative object in which information is presented and consumed by a human being, and is part of a report. Examples of report elements are figure (dot plot), table, text portion (may include a movie or audio clip on a web page).
PERSON: Allyson Lister
There will be some issue here about whether these are defined classes. As intended these are meant to denote the parts of the report that are not textual but are typically boxed and set within the text, labelled with some identifier, and referred to in the text
report element
obsolete2_binary executable
3/22/2009 Alan Ruttenberg, obsoleted per http://groups.google.com/group/information-ontology/browse_thread/thread/789ad4b7708d5cf4 superclass was 'digital entity'
Binary executable is a digital entity consisting of the binary representation of machine instructions of a specific processor or they may be binary pseudocode for a virtual machine. A non-source executable file is also called an object program. It is assumed that the binary executable file contains properly-formatted computer instructions. (derived from Wikipedia, Nov 1, 2007)
binary executable
person:Jennifer Fostel
source code module
A source code module is a directive information entity that specifies, using a programming language, some algorithm.
The written source code that implements part of an algorithm. Test - if you know that it was written in a specific language, then it can be source code module. We mean here, roughly, the wording of a document such as a perl script.
obsolete_report table
2009-08-10 Alan Ruttenberg: Larry Hunter suggests that this be obsoleted and replaced by 'textual entity table'. Alan restored as there are OBI dependencies and this merits further discussion
A report table is a report display element consisting of a matrix of cells layed out in a grid, some set of which are filled with some information content
report table
data format specification
2009-03-16: provenance: term imported from OBI_0000187, which had original definition "A data format specification is a plan which organizes information. Example: The ISO document specifying what encompasses an XML document; The instructions in a XSD file"
A data format specification is the information content borne by the document published defining the specification. Example: The ISO document specifying what encompasses an XML document; The instructions in a XSD file
data set
2009/10/23 Alan Ruttenberg. The intention is that this term represent collections of like data. So this isn't for, e.g. the whole contents of a cel file, which includes parameters, metadata etc. This is more like java arrays of a certain rather specific type
A data item that is an aggregate of other data items of the same type that have something in common. Averages and distributions can be determined for data sets.
Intensity values in a CEL file or from multiple CEL files comprise a data set (as opposed to the CEL files themselves).
image
An image is an affine projection to a two dimensional surface, of measurements of some quality of an entity or entities repeated at regular intervals across a spatial range, where the measurements are represented as color and luminosity on the projected on surface.
data about an ontology part
data about an ontology part is a data item about a part of an ontology, for example a term
plan specification
2/3/2009 Comment from OBI review. Action specification not well enough specified. Conditional specification not well enough specified. Question whether all plan specifications have objective specifications. Request that IAO either clarify these or change definitions not to use them
2009-03-16: provenance: a term a plan was proposed for OBI (OBI_0000344) , edited by the PlanAndPlannedProcess branch. Original definition was " a plan is a specification of a process that is realized by an actor to achieve the objective specified as part of the plan". It has been subsequently moved to IAO where the objective for which the original term was defined was satisfied with the definitionof this, different, term.
Alternative previous definition: a plan is a set of instructions that specify how an objective should be achieved
PMID: 18323827.Nat Med. 2008 Mar;14(3):226.New plan proposed to help resolve conflicting medical advice.
a directive information entity that when concretized it is realized in a process in which the bearer tries to achieve the objectives, in part by taking the actions specified. Plan specifications includes parts such as objective specification, action specifications and conditional specifications.
obsolete2_digital document
3/22/2009 Alan Ruttenberg, obsoleted per http://groups.google.com/group/information-ontology/browse_thread/thread/789ad4b7708d5cf4 superclass was 'digial entity'
A digital document is a digital entity consisting of an electronic file which can be rendered into human-readable form by one or more computational applications. The digital document does not refer to the information content of the document but to an instance of the file.
digital document
measurement datum
Examples of measurement data are the recoding of the weight of a mouse as {40,mass,"grams"}, the recording of an observation of the behavior of the mouse {,process,"agitated"}, the recording of the expression level of a gene as measured through the process of microarray experiment {3.4,luminosity,}.
2/2/2009 is_specified_output of some assay?
A measurement datum is an information content entity that is a recording of the output of a measurement such as produced by a device.
_identifier is a container under information content entity for collecting types of terms to indicate a specific instance or clas of what was used or participated in an investigation. Identifiers are borne by a product or its packaging, and can be encoded in a variety of other information objects, such as bar codes, numerals, or patterns of dots. Note: everybody agreed that identifier is probably a too general term. We however felt that it would be appropriate to group "identifiying" terms under some kind of umbrella. We therefore propose to use _identifier for that purpose. As per OBI conventions, the _ prefixing identifier indicates that this is a helper class and shouldn't be considered as final.
version number
A version number is an information content entity which is a sequence of characters borne by part of each of a class of manufactured products or its packaging and indicates its order within a set of other products having the same name.
Note: we feel that at the moment we are happy with a general version number, and that we will subclass as needed in the future. For example, see 7. genome sequence version
serial number
A serial number is an information content entity which is a unique sequence of characters borne by part of manufactured product or its packaging that is assigned to each individual in some class of products, and so can serve as a way to identify an individual product within the class. Serial numbers can be encoded in a variety of other information objects, such as bar codes, numerals, or patterns of dots.
Note: during the call there was some confusion between serial number and model number. We agreed that it would be very helpful for all those terms to have example of usages - please add if you have any :-)
lot number
A lot number is an information content entity which is an identical sequence of character borne by part of manufactured product or its packaging for each instances of a product class in a discrete batch of an item. Lot numbers are usually assigned to each separate production run of an item. Manufacturing as a lot might be due to a variety of reasons, for example, a single process during which many individuals are made from the same portion of source material. Lot numbers can be encoded in a pattern of other information objects, such as bar codes, numerals, or patterns of dots.
batch number
setting datum
2/3/2009 Feedback from OBI This should be a "setting specification". There is a question of whether it is information about a realizable or not. Pro other specification are about realizables. Cons sometimes specifies a quality which is not a realizable.
A settings datum is a datum that denotes some configuration of an instrument.
Alan grouped these in placeholder for the moment. Name by analogy to measurement datum.
Need to rework digital entity. Digital quality was suggested by Barry.
3/22/2009 Alan Ruttenberg, obsoleted per http://groups.google.com/group/information-ontology/browse_thread/thread/789ad4b7708d5cf4
conclusion textual entity
2009/09/28 Alan Ruttenberg. Fucoidan-use-case
2009/10/23 Alan Ruttenberg: We need to work on the definition still
A textual entity that expresses the results of reasoning about a problem, for instance as typically found towards the end of scientific papers.
that fucoidan has a small statistically significant effect on AT3 level but no useful clinical effect as in-vivo anticoagulant, a paraphrase of part of the last paragraph of the discussion section of the paper 'Pilot clinical study to evaluate the anticoagulant activity of fucoidan', by Lowenthal et. al.PMID:19696660
material information bearer
An information bearer is a material_entity in which a concretization of an information content entity inheres.
a hard drive, a piece of paper with writing on it, a brain
histogram
A histogram is a report graph which is a statistical description of a distribution in terms of occurrence frequencies of different event classes.
PERSON:James Malone
heatmap
A heatmap is a report graph which is a graphical representation of data where the values taken by a variable(s) are shown as colors in a two-dimensional map.
Venn diagram
A Venn diagram is a report graph showing all hypothetically possible logical relations between a finite collection of sets.
WEB: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Venn_diagram
obsolete_survival curve
A survival curve is a report graph which is a graphical representation of data where the percentage of survival is plotted as a function of time.
WEB: http://www.graphpad.com/www/book/survive.htm
dendrogram
A dendrogram is a report graph which is a tree diagram frequently used to illustrate the arrangement of the clusters produced by a clustering algorithm.
Dendrograms are often used in computational biology to illustrate the clustering of genes.
WEB: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dendrogram
scatter plot
A scatterplot is a graph which uses Cartesian coordinates to display values for two variables for a set of data. The data is displayed as a collection of points, each having the value of one variable determining the position on the horizontal axis and the value of the other variable determining the position on the vertical axis.
Comparison of gene expression values in two samples can be displayed in a scatter plot
WEB: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scatterplot
scattergraph
photograph
A photograph is created by projecting an image onto a photosensitive surface such as a chemically treated plate or film, CCD receptor, etc.
PERSON:Joanne Luciano
WEB: http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/photograph
photographic print
A photographic print is a material entity upon which a photograph generically depends.
obsolescence reason specification
The creation of this class has been inspired in part by Werner Ceusters' paper, Applying evolutionary terminology auditing to the Gene Ontology.
The reason for which a term has been deprecated. The allowed values come from an enumerated list of predefined terms. See the specification of these instances for more detailed definitions of each enumerated value.
textual entity
A textual entity is a part of a manifestation (FRBR sense), a generically dependent continuant whose concretizations are patterns of glyphs intended to be interpreted as words, formulas, etc.
AR, (IAO call 2009-09-01): a document as a whole is not typically a textual entity, because it has pictures in it - rather there are parts of it that are textual entities. Examples: The title, paragraph 2 sentence 7, etc.
MC, 2009-09-14 (following IAO call 2009-09-01): textual entities live at the FRBR (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Functional_Requirements_for_Bibliographic_Records) manifestation level. Everything is significant: line break, pdf and html versions of same document are different textual entities.
Words, sentences, paragraphs, and the written (non-figure) parts of publications are all textual entities
text
citation
Verspoor, K., Cohen, KB., Hunter, L. Textual characteristics of traditional and Open Access scientific journals are similar, BMC Bioinformatics 2009, 10:183.
a textual entity intended to identify a particular publication
author identification
A textual entity intended to identify a particular author
L. Hunter
institutional identification
A textual entity intended to identify a particular institution
University of Colorado Denver School of Medicine
caption
A textual entity that describes a figure
Figure 1: A system diagram describing the modules of the Hanalyzer. Reading methods (green) take external sources of knowledge (blue) and extract information from them, either by parsing structured data or biomedical language processing to extract information from unstructured data. Reading modules are responsible for tracking the provenance of all knowledge. Reasoning methods (yellow) enrich the knowledge that results from reading by, for example, noting two genes that are annotated to the same ontology term or database entry. All knowledge sources, read or reasoned, are assigned a reliability score, and all are combined using that score into a knowledge network (orange) that represents the integration of all sorts of relationship between a pair of genes and a combined reliability score. A data network (also orange) is created from experimental results to be analyzed. The reporting modules (pink) integrate the data and knowledge networks, producing visualizations that can be queried with the associated drill-down tool.
document title
A textual entity that names a document
Textual characteristics of traditional and Open Access scientific journals are similar
table
A textual entity that contains a two-dimensional arrangement of texts repeated at regular intervals across a spatial range, such that the spatial relationships among the constituent texts expresses propositions
| T F --+----- T | T F F | F F
table of abbreviations
A table where the constituent texts are abbreviations and their expansions
IAO information artifact ontology OBI ontology of biomedical investiations GO gene ontology
figure
An information content entity consisting of a two dimensional arrangement of information content entities such that the arrangement itself is about something.
Any picture, diagram or table
diagram
A figure that expresses one or more propositions
A molecular structure ribbon cartoon showing helices, turns and sheets and their relations to each other in space.
document
A collection of information content entities intended to be understood together as a whole
A journal article, patent application, laboratory notebook, or a book
publication
A document that has been accepted by a publisher
A journal article or book
publication about an investigation
A publication that is about an investigation
Most scientific journal articles
scientific publication
patent
A document that has been accepted by a patent authority
US Patent 6,449,603
document part
An abstract, introduction, method or results section.
an information content entity that is part of a document
abstract
A summary of the entire document that is substantially smaller than the document it summarizes. It is about the document it summarizes.
The profusion of high-throughput instruments and the explosion of new results in the scientific literature, particularly in molecular biomedicine, is both a blessing and a curse to the bench researcher. Even knowledgeable and experienced scientists can benefit from computational tools that help navigate this vast and rapidly evolving terrain. In this paper, we describe a novel computational approach to this challenge, a knowledge-based system that combines reading, reasoning and reporting methods to facilitate analysis of experimental data. Reading methods extract information from external resources, either by parsing structured data or biomedical language processing to extract information from unstructured data, and track knowledge provenance. Reasoning methods enrich the knowledge that results from reading by, for example, noting two genes that are annotated to the same ontology term or database entry. Reasoning is also used to combine all sources into a knowledge network that represents the integration of all sorts of relationships between a pair of genes, and to calculate a combined reliability score. Reporting methods combine the knowledge network with a congruent network constructed from experimental data and visualize the combined network in a tool that facilitates the knowledge-based analysis of that data.
introduction to a publication about an investigation
A part of a publication about an investigation that is about the objective specification (why the investigation is being done)
Section labelled 'introduction' of a typical scientific journal article
introduction
methods section
A part of a publication about an investigation that is about the study design of the investigation
The section labelled 'Methods' or 'Materials and Methods' in a typical scientific journal article.
results section
A part of a publication about an investigation that is about a study design execution
The section labelled 'results' in a typical scientific journal article
discussion section of a publication about an investigation
A part of a publication about an investigation that is about the study interpretation of the investigation
discussion section
references section
A part of a document that has citations as parts
The list of citations found at the end of a scientific publication, grant proposal or patent application, sometimes called "literature cited" or "bibliography"
author list
Lawrence Hunter and Kevin Brettonel Cohen
part of a document that enumerates the authors of the document
institution list
The University of Colorado Denver School of Medicine and the University of Colorado Boulder.
part of a document that has parts that are institution identifications associated with the authors of the document
author contributions section
A part of a publication that is about the specific contributions of each author
LH conceived of the hypothesis, designed the study and contributed to the writing of the manuscript. KBC executed the experiments, analyzed the data, and contributed to the writing of the manuscript.
acknowledgements section
Part of a publication that is about the contributions of people or institutions other than the authors.
The authors wish to thank Alan Ruttenberg for his constructive comments about an earlier draft of this manuscript
footnote
A part of a document that is about a specific other part of the document. Usually footnotes are spatially segregated from the rest of the document.
The referent in the text is usually indicated by a special typographic character such as * or a superscripted number, which is also used to indicate the footnote that refers to that text.
endnote
supplementary material to a document
appendix
part of a document that is segregated from the rest of the document due to its size
supplementary material
table of contents
A table that relates document parts to specific locations in a document (usually page numbers). This is also a document part (subsumption there should be inferred).
table of figures
A table that relates figures in a document to specific locations in that document (usually page numbers). This is also a document part (subsumption there should be inferred).
running title
A shorter version of a document title
copyright section
A document part that describes legal restrictions on making or distributing copies of the document
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 United States License.
cartesian spatial coordinate datum
2009-08-18 Alan Ruttenberg - question to BFO list about whether the BFO sense of the lower dimensional regions is that they are always part of actual space (the three dimensional sort) http://groups.google.com/group/bfo-discuss/browse_thread/thread/9d04e717e39fb617
A cartesian spatial coordinate datum is a representation of a point in a spatial region, in which equal changes in the magnitude of a coordinate value denote length qualities with the same magnitude
one dimensional cartesian spatial coordinate datum
A cartesion spatial coordinate datum that uses one value to specify a position along a one dimensional spatial region
two dimensional cartesian spatial coordinate datum
A cartesion spatial coordinate datum that uses two values to specify a position within a two dimensional spatial region
three dimensional cartesian spatial coordinate datum
A cartesion spatial coordinate datum that uses three values to specify a position within a three dimensional spatial region
length measurement datum
A scalar measurement datum that is the result of measurement of length quality
A denotator type indicates how a term should be interpreted from an ontological perspective.
The Basic Formal Ontology ontology makes a distinction between Universals and defined classes, where the formal are "natural kinds" and the latter arbitrary collections of entities.
mass measurement datum
A scalar measurement datum that is the result of measurement of mass quality
hypothesis textual entity
A textual entity that expresses an assertion that is intended to be tested.
time measurement datum
A scalar measurement datum that is the result of measuring a temporal interval
postal address
A textual entity that is used as directive to deliver something to a person, or organization
2010-05-24 Alan Ruttenberg. Use label for the string representation. See issue http://code.google.com/p/information-artifact-ontology/issues/detail?id=59
email address
Alan Ruttenberg 1/3/2012 - Provisional id, see issue at http://code.google.com/p/information-artifact-ontology/issues/detail?id=130&thanks=130&ts=1325636583
Person:Chris Stoeckart
author role
A role inhering in a person or organization that is realized when the bearer participates in the work which is the basis of the document, in the writing of the document, and signs it with their name.
data item extraction from journal article
a planned process in which journal articles are read or processed and data items are extracted, typically for further analysis or indexing
documenting
6/11/9: Edited at OBI workshop. We need to be able identify a child form of information artifact which corresponds to something enduring (not brain like). This used to be restricted to physical document or digital entity as the output, but that excludes e.g. an audio cassette tape
Bjoern Peters
Recording the current temperature in a laboratory notebook. Writing a journal article. Updating a patient record in a database.
a planned process in which a document is created or added to by including the specified input in it.
wikipedia http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Documenting
line graph
A line graph is a type of graph created by connecting a series of data points together with a line.
WEB: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Line_chart
line chart
assigning a centrally registered identifier
A new pubmed ID being created for a journal article, and the associated pubmed record containing information to the journal article. A license plate number registered at the DMV to be belonging to a specific vehicle and owner. Placing a barcode on a product and entering information in a database that this barcode is assigned.
Person:Melanie Courtot
a planned process in which a new CRID is created, associated with an entity, and stored in the CRID registry thereby registering it as being associated with some entity
associating information with a CRID in the CRID registry
A planned process in which a CRID registry associates an information content entity with a CRID symbol
a planned process with the objective to establish a system that allows to refer to specific entities of a certain kind and store information about them, by establishing a CRID registry and plan specifications for the process of 1) assigning a CRID and 2) looking up a CRID.
MC, 20101124: deprecated following discussion at IAO call 20101124. Term was deemed not necessary - no use case for now.
CRID symbol
A symbol that is part_of a CRID and that is sufficient to look up a record from the CRID's registry.
IAO call, 20101124: 12345 is not a CRID symbol. To be a CRID symbol you need to have some information about the registry within which the CRID is recorded.
Original proposal from Bjoern, discussions at IAO calls
PERSON: Bill Hogan
PMID:12345, 12345 in a database column which has header "pubmedID"
CRID
Alan, IAO call 20101124: potentially the CRID denotes the instance it was associated with during creation.
An information content entity that consists of a CRID symbol and additional information about which CRID registry it belongs.
Entries in a Column of which the header is "Pubmed ID"
Note, IAO call 20101124: URIs are not always CRID, as not centrally registered. We acknowledge that CRID is a subset of a larger identifier class, but this subset fulfills our current needs. OBI PURLs are CRID as they are registered with OCLC. UPCs (Universal Product Codes from AC Nielsen)are not CRID as they are not centrally registered.
The following URL: "http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/19918065"
The following sentence contains a CRID: "The article with Pubmed ID: 19918065".
CRID registry
A CRID registry is a dataset of CRID records, each consisting of a CRID symbol and additional information which was recorded in the dataset through a assigning a centrally registered identifier process.
IAO call, 20101124: PubMed registry is an instance of CRID registry
looking up a CRID
A planned process in which a request to a CRID registry is made to return the information associated with a CRID symbol
time stamped measurement datum
time sampled measurement data set
A data set that is an aggregate of data recording some measurement at a number of time points. The time series data set is an ordered list of pairs of time measurement data and the corresponding measurement data acquired at that time.
experimental time series
pmid:20604925 - time-lapse live cell microscopy
written name
"Bill Clinton"
"The Eiffel Tower"
"United States of America"
A textual entity that denotes a particular in reality.
The qualifier "written" is to set it apart from spoken names. Also, note the restrictions to particulars. We are not naming universals. We could however, be naming, attributive collections which are particulars, so "All people located in the boundaries of the city of Little Rock, AR on June 18, 2011 at 9:50a CDT" would be a name.
software method
A software method (also called subroutine, subprogram, procedure, method, function, or routine) is software designed to execute a specific task.
PERSON: Michel Dumontier
software module
A software module is software composed of a collection of software methods.
PERSON: Melanei Courtot
software library
A software library is software composed of a collection of software modules and/or software methods in a form that can be statically or dynamically linked to some software application.
software application
A software application is software that can be directly executed by some processing unit.
software script
A software script is software whose instructions can be executed using a software interpreter.
Teleostomi
Euteleostomi
Homo/Pan/Gorilla group
Eukaryota
Euarchontoglires
Simiiformes
Hominoidea
Tetrapoda
Amniota
Theria
Fungi/Metazoa group
Metazoa
Bilateria
Coelomata
Deuterostomia
Haplorrhini
Mammalia
Eumetazoa
Chordata
Vertebrata
Gnathostomata
Sarcopterygii
Craniata
Eutheria
Primates
Catarrhini
Hominidae
Homo
Homo sapiens
planned process
A processual entity that realizes a plan which is the concretization of a plan specification.
investigation
a planned process that consists of parts: planning, study design execution, documentation and which produce conclusion(s).
study subject role
study subject role inheres in an entity and realized through the execution of a study design in which the entity participates by being that which the results are about.
GROUP: Role Branch
specimen role
22Jun09. The definition includes whole organisms, and can include a human. The link between specimen role and study subject role has been removed. A specimen taken as part of a case study is not considered to be a population representative, while a specimen taken as representing a population, e.g. person taken from a cohort, blood specimen taken from an animal) would be considered a population representative and would also bear material sample role.
Note: definition is in specimen creation objective which is defined as an objective to obtain and store a material entity for potential use as an input during an investigation.
liver section; a portion of a culture of cells; a nemotode or other animal once no longer a subject (generally killed); portion of blood from a patient.
a role borne by a material entity that is gained during a specimen creation process and that can be realized by use of the specimen in an investigation
organization
An organization is a continuant entity which can play roles, has members, and has a set of organization rules. Members of organizations are either organizations themselves or individual people. Members can bear specific organization member roles that are determined in the organization rules. The organization rules also determine how decisions are made on behalf of the organization by the organization members.
BP: The definition summarizes long email discussions on the OBI developer, roles, biomaterial and denrie branches. It leaves open if an organization is a material entity or a dependent continuant, as no consensus was reached on that. The current placement as material is therefore temporary, in order to move forward with development. Here is the entire email summary, on which the definition is based: 1) there are organization_member_roles (president, treasurer, branch editor), with individual persons as bearers 2) there are organization_roles (employer, owner, vendor, patent holder) 3) an organization has a charter / rules / bylaws, which specify what roles there are, how they should be realized, and how to modify the charter/rules/bylaws themselves. It is debatable what the organization itself is (some kind of dependent continuant or an aggregate of people). This also determines who/what the bearer of organization_roles' are. My personal favorite is still to define organization as a kind of 'legal entity', but thinking it through leads to all kinds of questions that are clearly outside the scope of OBI. Interestingly enough, it does not seem to matter much where we place organization itself, as long as we can subclass it (University, Corporation, Government Agency, Hospital), instantiate it (Affymetrix, NCBI, NIH, ISO, W3C, University of Oklahoma), and have it play roles. This leads to my proposal: We define organization through the statements 1 - 3 above, but without an 'is a' statement for now. We can leave it in its current place in the is_a hierarchy (material entity) or move it up to 'continuant'. We leave further clarifications to BFO, and close this issue for now.
PMID: 16353909.AAPS J. 2005 Sep 22;7(2):E274-80. Review. The joint food and agriculture organization of the United Nations/World Health Organization Expert Committee on Food Additives and its role in the evaluation of the safety of veterinary drug residues in foods.
a planned process that realizes the concretization of a study design
individual organism identifier
MO_169 Individual
a CRID symbol used to distinguish one individual organism from another.
specimen identifier
A CRID symbol denotes a specimen and used to distinguish one specimen from another in an investigation.
Penn Group
Person: Chris Stoeckert, Jie Zheng
specimen ID
organism
10/21/09: This is a placeholder term, that should ideally be imported from the NCBI taxonomy, but the high level hierarchy there does not suit our needs (includes plasmids and 'other organisms')
13-02-2009: OBI doesn't take position as to when an organism starts or ends being an organism - e.g. sperm, foetus. This issue is outside the scope of OBI.
A material entity that is an individual living system, such as animal, plant, bacteria or virus, that is capable of replicating or reproducing, growth and maintenance in the right environment. An organism may be unicellular or made up, like humans, of many billions of cells divided into specialized tissues and organs.
WEB: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Organism
animal
fungus
plant
virus
specimen
Biobanking of blood taken and stored in a freezer for potential future investigations stores specimen.
A material entity that has the specimen role.
GROUP: OBI Biomaterial Branch
study design
A study design is a plan specification comprised of protocols (which may specify how and what kinds of data will be gathered) that are executed as part of an investigation and is realized during a study design execution.
A representation that is either the output of a clinical history taking or a physical examination or an image finding, or some combination thereof.
A series of statements representing health-relevant qualities of a patient and of a patient's family.
A representation of the clinically significant bodily components and/or bodily processes of a human being that is inferred from the totality of relevant clinical findings.
A representation of an image that supports an inference to an assertion about some quality of a patient.
A representation of a quality of a specimen that is the output of a laboratory test and that can support an inference to an assertion about some quality of the patient.
A representation of a quality of a patient that is (1) recorded by a clinician because the quality is hypothesized to be of clinical significance and (2) refers to qualities obtaining in the patient prior to their becoming detectable in a clinical history taking or physical examination.
A quality of a patient that is observed by the patient or a processual entity experienced by the patient, either of which is hypothesized by the patient to be a realization of a disease.
A quality of a patient that is (a) a deviation from clinical normality that exists in virtue of the realization of a disease and (b) is observable.
A (combination of) quality(ies) of an organism determined by the interaction of its genetic make-up and environment that differentiates specific instances of a species from other instances of the same species.
sign
A quality of a patient, a material entity that is part of a patient, or a processual entity that a patient participates in that is observed in a physical examination and is deemed by the clinician to be of clinical significance.
A quality of a patient, a material entity that is part of a patient, or a processual entity that a patient participates in, any one of which is observed in a physical examination and is deemed by the clinician to be of clinical significance.
A manifestation of a disease that is detectable in a clinical history taking or physical examination.
A manifestation of a disease that exists prior to the time at which it would be detected in a clinical history taking or physical examination, if the patient were to present to a clinician. A realization of a disease that exists prior to its becoming detectable in a clinical history taking or physical examination.
A clinically abnormal phenotype.
A clinically abnormal phenotype that is characteristic of a single disease.
vital sign
A physical sign in which a non-zero value is standardly considered to be an indication that the organism is alive.
A disposition in an organism that constitutes an increased risk of the organism's subsequently developing the disease X.
A disposition (i) to undergo pathological processes that (ii) exists in an organism because of one or more disorders in that organism.
genetic predisposition to disease of type X
A predisposition to disease of type X whose physical basis is a constitutional abnormality in an organism's genome. This abnormality is the physical basis for the increased risk of acquiring the disease X.
A disease whose physical basis is an acquired genetic disorder.
A disease whose physical basis is a constitutional genetic disorder.
A disease whose physical basis is an infectious disorder.
Homeostasis that is clinically abnormal for an organism of a given type and age in a given environment.
Homeostasis of a type that is not clinically abnormal.
A quality which is an spatial arrangement or distribution of a(n) independent continuant(s) across a Three Dimensional Region.
A configuration which deviates in some way from a canonical configuration for a particular organism.
A material entity which is clinically abnormal and part of an extended organism. Disorders are the physical basis of disease.
A disorder whose etiology involves (1) a modification to the patient's genomic DNA which leads to alterations in the normal expression pattern of the genome, but is (2) not a change in the nucleotide sequence.
A disorder whose etiology involves an abnormality in the nucleotide sequence of an organism's genome.
A disorder whose etiology includes the presence of a pathogenic organism within a host organism or an abnormal imbalance in the normal resident organismal flora.
A disorder consisting in the presence of a pathogenic organism within a host organism that occurs due to the disposition established by a prior infection with a pathogenic organism of a different kind.
A genetic disorder acquired by a single cell in an organism that leads to a population of cells within the organism bearing the disorder.
A genetic disorder inherited during conception that is part of all cells in the organism.
A fiat process part which involves the execution of a standardized protocol for measuring qualities of a patient.
An interview in which a clinician elicits a clinical history from a patient or from a third party who is reporting on behalf of the patient.
A measurement assay that has as input a patient-derived specimen, and as output a result that represents a quality of the specimen.
A sequence of acts of observing and measuring qualities of a patient performed by a clinician; measurements may occur with and without elicitation.
A process in an organism that leads to a subsequent disorder.
A bodily process that is clinically abnormal.
The totality of all processes through which a given disease instance is realized.
A disease course that (a) does not terminate in a return to normal homeostasis and (b) would, absent intervention, fall within abnormal homeostatic range.
A disease course that (a) does not terminate in a return to normal homeostasis and (b) would, absent intervention, involve an increasing deviation from homeostasis.
A disease course that terminates in a return to normal homeostasis.
The representation of a conclusion of a diagnostic process.
A value for a quality reported in a lab report and asserted by the testing lab or the kit manufacturer to be normal based on a statistical treatment of values from a reference population.
TODO: Define, relate to disorder, and place in the OGMS hierarchy.
An anatomical structure (FMA) is pathological whenever (1) it has come into being as a result of changes in some pre-existing canonical anatomical structure, (2) through processes other than the expression of the normal complement of genes of an organism of the given type, and (3) is predisposed to have health-related consequences for the organism in question manifested by symptoms and signs.
A pathological bodily process in which a canonical anatomical structure becomes a pathological anatomical structure.
A pathological bodily process in which matter is reorganized in such a way as to give rise to new pathological formations which take the place of entities existing earlier.
TODO: Define.
An aggregate of organisms of the same type.
A pattern of signs and symptoms that typically co-occur.
An object aggregate consisting of an organism and all material entities located within the organism, overlapping the organism, or occupying sites formed in part by the organism.
A communication from a patient about something they perceive as being abnormal about their body or life.
A structurally anomalous part of an organism acquired during fetal development and present at birth (but not necessarily hereditary) which is hypothesized to be harmful for the organism.
A processual entity whose completion is hypothesized (by a healthcare provider) to alleviate the signs and symptoms associated with a disorder
A processual entity during which a patient participating in a disease course gradually returns to participating in a canonical life course.
A processual entity which has as parts all the processes in which a given organism is participant.
A hypothesis about the course of a disease.
a disease course with a rapid onset but typical unfolding of signs and symptoms after this rapid onset.
A process which is a response by an organism's tissues that is generally identified by swelling or localized pain
A social process that has at least one human participant and that includes as parts the treatment, diagnosis, or prevention of disease or injury--or the following of instructions of another human for treatment, diagnosis, or prevention--of a participant in the process
A temporally-connected health care process that has as participants an organization or person realizing the health care provider role and a person realizing the patient role. The health care provider role and patient are realized during the health care encounter
TODO
A part of an organism that has undergone a change in structural integrity and has a higher chance of dysfunction or causing dysfunction in another structure.
At the scale of organism (as opposed to the cellular scale or the population scale), an injury is typically the result of a catastrophic event. Consider the implications of making 'injury' a subtype of 'disorder'.
A planned process that has the objective to reduce the risk of acquiring one or more disorders.
Whether or not 'prophylaxis' and 'treatment' classes are disjoint is an open question.
An interpretive process that has as input a clinical picture of a given patient and as output an assertion (diagnostic statement) to the effect that the patient has a disease of such and such a type.
social security number
Social Security Number(SSN) is a Centrally Registered IDentifier that is a nine-digit number issued to U.S. citizens, permanent residents, and temporary (working) residents under section 205(c) of the Social Security Act, codified as 42 U.S.C. § 405(c). The number is issued to an individual by the Social Security Administration, an independent agency of the United States government. Its primary purpose is to track individuals for Social Security purposes.
human social role
A social role inhering in a human being.
Mathias Brochhausen William R. Hogan
party to a legal entity
party to a legal proceeding
party to a legal agreement
party to a marriage contract
party to a power of attorney
gender role
A human social role borne by a human being being realized in behaviour which is considered socially appropriate for individuals of a specific sex in the context of a specific culture.
Mathias Brochhausen
male gender role
A gender role borne by a human being that is realized in behaviour which is considered socially appropriate for individuals of the male sex in the context of the culture in question.
male gender
female gender role
A gender role borne by a human being that is realized in behaviour which is considered socially appropriate for individuals of the female sex in the context of the culture in question.
female gender
human health care role
A human social role that is realized by health care processes such as seeking or providing treatment for disease and injury, diagnosing disease and injury, or undergoing diagnosis.
A role in human social processes that is realized by health care processes such as seeking or providing treatment for disease and injury, diagnosing disease and injury, or undergoing diagnosis.
William R. Hogan Mathias Brochhausen
health care role
patient role
A human health care role that inheres in an organism [human?] as the recipient of a health care service.
A role borne by an organism being as the recipient of a health care service.
Amanda Hicks
patient
health care provider role
A human health care role inhering in an organization or human being that is realized by a process of providing health care services to an organism.
physician role
A health care role borne by a human being and realized by promoting, maintaining or restoring human health through the study, diagnosis, and treatment of disease, injury and other physical and mental impairments.
physician
nurse role
A health care role borne by a human being and realized by the care of individuals, families, and communities so they may attain, maintain, or recover optimal health and quality of life.
based on: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nursing
nurse
health care provider organization role
Definition needed, but the idea is that we want to differentiate between provider and payer organizations. Some organizaitons have both roles (e.g., UPMC has a Hospital Division, a Physician Divison, and an Insurance Division).
person health care provider role
physician practice
hospital role
A role borne by an organization and realized by providing healthcare services by healthcare professionals of multiple different disciplines of medicine and enabling stationary treatment.
hospital
integrated delivery network
collection of organisms
An object aggregate of organisms.
Any arbitrary collection of organisms. They need not be of the same taxonomic class.
collection of humans
An object aggregate all of whose components are human beings.
role in human social processes
A role inhering in an entity realized by social interactions in human society.
Previous definition: A role played by an entity in human social processes.
organization social role
A role in human social processes that inheres in an organization.
Defined class that we will ultimately move to an application ontology. We are leaving here for now until we determine which application ontology: it is likely going to be an ontology that does not currently (2012-06-05) exist. Ditto for its current descendants.
William R. Hogan
organism social role
A role in human social processes that inheres in an organism.
Includes animals as well as humans. For example, pet, assistance animal, animal grown for food, work animal, domesticated animal, K-9, etc. Human roles include gender role, party to legal entities, health care provider roles like doctor, nurse, etc.
Previous definition: A role in human social processes played by an organism.
organization health care role
An organization social role that is realized by a health care process.
Previous definition: An organization social role played by an organization in health care processes.
geopolitical organization
An organization that governs the people living in a particular geographical region or aggregate of geographical regions. The geographical region it governs can change over time (such as the westward expansion of the United States and the addition of Hawaii).
major administrative subdivision
A subnational entity that is the primary organizational member of a nation, is subject to the full set of laws of the nation, enjoys all the privileges established under the laws of the nation, is not a member of any other geopolitical entity, and itself governs a part of the geographical region governed by the nation.
geopolitical dependency
A subnational entity that does not possess full political independence or sovereignty as a sovereign state, but remains politically outside of the controlling state and controls a geographical region that is outside the controlling state's integral region.
Typically, the common feature is that the dependency does not conduct foreign affairs, and relegates this authority to the sovereign state. BUt otherwise, it is largely or completely autonomous relative to the administrative subdivisions. Examples include Puerto Rico (U.S.), Guam (U.S.), Greenland (Denmark), French Polynesia (France), and Falkland Islands (United Kingdom).
aggregate of organizations
An object aggregate that is not itself an organization and whose members are only organizations that have some feature in common
It is often convenient to group organizations together that otherwise might not even interact with one another.
William R. Hogan Amanda Hicks
aggregate of sovereign states
An aggregate of geopoli organizations that is not itself a sovereign state and whose members are only sovereign states that have some feature in common
An aggregate of sovereign states that share some feature in common, but is not an organization nor necessarily the outcome of some treaty among them.
aggregate of geopoli organizations
An object aggregate that is not itself a geopolitical organization and whose members are only geopolitical organizations that have some feature in common
aggregate of dependencies
An aggregate of geopoli organizations that is not itself a geopolitical dependency and whose members are only geopolitical dependencies that have some feature in common.
aggregate of major administrative subdivisions
An aggregate of geopoli organizations that is not itself a major administrative subdivision and whose members are only major administrative subdivisions that have some feature in common
legal person role
Malcolm N. Shaw: International Law. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 2008.
A role borne by a human individual or by a collection of humans regarded as possessing rights and duties enforeable at law.
We are aware of the fact that Wikipedia's definition differs from ours by saying that "Legal personality (...) is the characteristic of a non-living entity regarded by law to have the status of personhood" (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Legal_personality) However, Shaw explicates: "In any legal system, certain entities, whether they be individuals or companies, will be regarded as possessing rights and duties enforceable at law. Thus an individual may prosecute or be prosecuted for assault and a company can sue for breach of contract. They are able to do this because the law recognises them as 'legal persons' possessing the capacity to have and to maintain certain rights, and being subject to perform specific duties. (...) In municipal law individuals, limited companies and public corporations are recognized as each possessing a distinct legal personality, the terms of which are circumscribed by the relevant legislation" (Shaw MN: International Law. Sixth Edition. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 2008). We hold that Shaw's position is ontological more prolific since it not only allows to explain how groups of individuals become recognized as unities at law, but also how different individuals can hold different legal personality roles (always against the context of one legal system). The latter will proof useful when dealing with the representing comatous patients or minorsat law in ontologies.
intergovernmental organization
an intergovernmental organization that has at least three member states, that has activies in at least three states, and that is unified by some formal intergovernmental agreement
"IGOs are organizations whose memebers include at lesat three states, that have activities in several states, and whose members are held together by a formal intergovernmental agreement ... These organizations range in size from three members (North American Free Trade Argreement [NAFTA]) to more than 190 memembers (Universal Postal Union (UPU)]. Memebers may come from primarily one georgraphic regioni (Oragnaization of American States [OAS]) or from all geographic regions (World Bank). although soem IGOs are designed to achieve a single purpose (Organization of Petroleum exporting countries [OPEC]), others have been developed for multiple tasks (United Nations [UN}). ... IGOs are recognized subjects of international law with separate standing fromt heir member states." Karns and Mingst I(2004) p. 7
Katrina Donovan
examples: North American Free Trade Argreement [NAFTA] , Universal Postal Union [UPU], Oragnaization of American States [OAS], World Bank), Organization of Petroleum exporting countries [OPEC] United Nations [UN[, The World Trade Organization [WTO], The World Health Organization [WHO], UNICEF
nongovernmental organizations
Examples: Internaltion Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies, Oxfam, CARE, Doctors Without Borders, World Wildlife Fund, Transparency International, Human Rights Watch, Amnesty International, and Save the Children.
NGOs are private voluntary organizations whose members are individuals or associations that come together to acheive a common purpose. Some organizations are formed to advocate a particular cause such as human rights, peace, or envirnomental projetion. Others are established to provide services such as disaster relief, humantarian aid in war-torn socieities, or development assistance. ... National level groups are often called interest or pressure groups, and many of them are now linked to counterpart groups in other countries through transnational networks or federations. International NGOs, like IGOs, may draw their members from one region or several regions, and they may have very specific functions or be multi-functional. Karns and Mingst (2004) p. 10f.
a geopolitical organization that is voluntary and private, whose members are individual persons or organizations that come together to acheive a common purpose.
private governance organizations
"Although the very meaning of the term is controversial, it involves authoritative decsionmaking in areas that once were part of national legal frameworks, the government, the sovereign state, or the public sector." Karns and Mingst (2004) p. 14.
Examples: private bond-rating agencies such as Moody's Investors Service, International Chamber of Commerce, Worldwide Responsible Apparel Manufacturing Principles, Forest Stewardship
governmental organization
An organization that governs the people living in a particular geographical region or aggregate of geographical regions. The geographical region it governs can change over time (such as the westward expansion of the United States and the addition of Hawaii). Note: this definition was taken over from "geopolitical organization".
IMPORTANT: The label "geopolitical organization" was previously used for OMRSE_00000044 (governmental organization). "geopoli organization" is a label for a new and different class.
sovereign state
A governmental organization with a defined territory on which it exercises internal and external sovereignty, a permanent population, a government, and the capacity to enter into relations with other sovereign states.
Per Wikipedia, the word 'nation' does not always refer to soverign states. For example, the "nation of Islam".
nation
nation state
subnational entity
a governmental organization that has a local, regional, or territorial government that recognizes a sovereign state as its higher political authority
supranational entity
biological sex
An organismal quality inhering in a bearer by virtue of the bearer's ability to undergo sexual reproduction in order to differentiate the individuals or types involved.
auscultatory blood pressure measurement process
auscultatory pulse rate measurement process
axillary temperature
blood pressure
The pressure exerted by circulating blood on the walls of blood vessels.
Unless otherwise specified, a clinical report of a blood pressure is systolic left ventricular pressure over diastolic left ventricular pressure.
blood pressure measurement datum
blood pressure measurement process
body temperature
The temperature of a part of the human body
body temperature measurement datum
body temperature measurement process
brachial pulse rate
cardiac cycle phase
These phases belong in some OBO foundry ontology of cardiac physiology. Should include the subprocesses of systole and diastole as illustrated here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cardiac_cycle .
carotid pulse rate
core body temperature
diastole
The phase of the cardiac cycle in which the heart fills with blood.
diastolic blood pressure
diastolic central venous pressure
The diastolic blood pressure in the thoracic vena cava.
diastolic left ventricular pressure
The left ventricular pressure during diastole.
diastolic pulmonary artery pressure
The pulmonary artery pressure during diastole.
diastolic right ventricular pressure
The right ventricular pressure during diastole.
dorsalis pedis pulse rate
The pulse rate of the dorsalis pedis artery.
facial pulse rate
femoral pulse rate
invasive blood pressure measurement process
noninvasive blood pressure measurement process
oral temperature
oscillometric blood pressure measurement process
popliteal pulse rate
pulse rate
The rate at which an artery pulses (i.e., participates in expansion-contraction cycles) as blood passes through it.
pulse rate measurement datum
pulse rate measurement process
radial pulse rate
rectal temperature
The temperature of the lumen of the rectum.
respiratory rate
respiratory rate measurement datum
respiratory rate measurement process
systole
The phase of the cardiac cycle in which the heart contracts.
systolic blood pressure
systolic central venous pressure
The systolic blood pressure in the thoracic vena cava.
systolic left ventricular pressure
The left ventricular pressure during systole.
systolic pulmonary artery pressure
The pulmonary artery pressure during systole.
systolic right ventricular pressure
The right ventricular pressure during systole.
temporal pulse rate
tibialis posterior pulse rate
The pulse rate of the tibialis posterior artery.
tympanic temperature
The temperature of the external acoustic tube.
ulnar pulse rate
vaginal temperature
The temperature of the lumen of the vagina.
palpatory pulse rate measurement process
researcher role
The role a human plays if he / she is involved in research activities.
Wall of superior vena cava
Wall of inferior vena cava
Lumen of rectum
Wall of pulmonary artery
Lumen of vagina
Oral cavity
Human body
Anatomical structure which is the aggregate material substance of an individual member of the human species.
Brachial artery
Radial artery
Ulnar artery
Common carotid artery
Posterior tibial artery
Dorsalis pedis artery
Facial artery
Superficial temporal artery
Artery
Subdivision of arterial tree (organ) which consists of branching sets of tubes (arterial trunk) that form a tree; together with other arterial trees (organ part), it constitutes an arterial tree (organ).
Axillary fossa
External acoustic tube
Anatomical entity
Organismal continuant entity which is enclose\ d by the bona fide boundary of an organism or is an attribute of its structural\ organization. Examples: cell, heart, head, peritoneal cavity, apex of lung, an\ atomical term, sagittal plane.
Wall of blood vessel
Femoral artery
Popliteal artery
Wall of right ventricle
Wall of ventricle which is continuous with the wall of pulmonary trunk.
Wall of left ventricle
Wall of ventricle which is continuous with the wall of aorta.
Portion of blood
Portion of body substance which consists of plasma and blood cells.
regulation of temperature
A homeostatic process in which an organism modulates its internal body temperature.
regulation of heart rate
Any process that modulates the frequency or rate of heart contraction.
blood circulation
The flow of blood through the body of an animal, enabling the transport of nutrients to the tissues and the removal of waste products.
regulation of blood pressure
Any process that modulates the force with which blood travels through the circulatory system. The process is controlled by a balance of processes that increase pressure and decrease pressure.
regulation of biological quality
Any process that modulates the frequency, rate or extent of a biological quality. A biological quality is a measurable attribute of an organism or part of an organism, such as size, mass, shape, color, etc.
A 1-D extent quality which is equal to the distance between two points.
A physical quality that inheres in a bearer by virtue of the proportion of the bearer's amount of matter.
temperature
A physical quality of the thermal energy of a system.
rate
A quality of a single process inhering in a bearer by virtue of the bearer's occurrence per unit time.
pressure
A physical quality that inheres in a bearer by virtue of the bearer's amount of force per unit area it exerts.
Definition: An entity [bfo:Entity] that exists in full at any time in which it exists at all, persists through time while maintaining its identity and has no temporal parts.
Examples: a heart, a person, the color of a tomato, the mass of a cloud, a symphony orchestra, the disposition of blood to coagulate, the lawn and atmosphere in front of our building
Definition: A continuant [snap:Continuant] that is either dependent on one or other independent continuant [snap:IndependentContinuant] bearers or inheres in or is borne by other entities.
Definition: A realizable entity [snap:RealizableEntity] that essentially causes a specific process or transformation in the object [snap:Object] in which it inheres, under specific circumstances and in conjunction with the laws of nature. A general formula for dispositions is: X (object [snap:Object] has the disposition D to (transform, initiate a process) R under conditions C.
Examples: the disposition of vegetables to decay when not refrigerated, the disposition of a vase to brake if dropped, the disposition of blood to coagulate, the disposition of a patient with a weakened immune system to contract disease, the disposition of metal to conduct electricity.
Definition: A material entity [snap:MaterialEntity] that is part of an object [snap:Object] but is not demarcated by any physical discontinuities.
Examples: upper and lower lobes of the left lung, the dorsal and ventral surfaces of the body, the east side of Saarbruecken, the lower right portion of a human torso
Definition: A realizable entity [snap:RealizableEntity] the manifestation of which is an essentially end-directed activity of a continuant [snap:Continuant] entity in virtue of that continuant [snap:Continuant] entity being a specific kind of entity in the kind or kinds of contexts that it is made for.
Examples: the function of a birth canal to enable transport, the function of the heart in the body: to pump blood, to receive de-oxygenated and oxygenated blood, etc., the function of reproduction in the transmission of genetic material, the digestive function of the stomach to nutriate the body, the function of a hammer to drive in nails, the function of a computer program to compute mathematical equations, the function of an automobile to provide transportation, the function of a judge in a court of law
Definition: A continuant [snap:Continuant] that is dependent on one or other independent continuant [snap:IndependentContinuant] bearers. For every instance of A requires some instance of (an independent continuant [snap:IndependentContinuant] type) B but which instance of B serves can change from time to time.
Examples: a certain PDF file that exists in different and in several hard drives
Definition: A continuant [snap:Continuant] that is a bearer of quality [snap:Quality] and realizable entity [snap:RealizableEntity] entities, in which other entities inhere and which itself cannot inhere in anything.
Examples: an organism, a heart, a leg, a person, a symphony orchestra, a chair, the bottom right portion of a human torso, the lawn and atmosphere in front of our building
Definition: An independent continuant [snap:IndependentContinuant] that is spatially extended whose identity is independent of that of other entities and can be maintained through time. Note: Material entity [snap:MaterialEntity] subsumes object [snap:Object], fiat object part [snap:FiatObjectPart], and object aggregate [snap:ObjectAggregate], which assume a three level theory of granularity, which is inadequate for some domains, such as biology.
Examples: collection of random bacteria, a chair, dorsal surface of the body
Definition: A material entity [snap:MaterialEntity] that is spatially extended, maximally self-connected and self-contained (the parts of a substance are not separated from each other by spatial gaps) and possesses an internal unity. The identity of substantial object [snap:Object] entities is independent of that of other entities and can be maintained through time.
Examples: an organism, a heart, a chair, a lung, an apple
Definition: A material entity [snap:MaterialEntity] that is a mereological sum of separate object [snap:Object] entities and possesses non-connected boundaries.
Examples: a heap of stones, a group of commuters on the subway, a collection of random bacteria, a flock of geese, the patients in a hospital
Comment: Boundaries are theoretically difficult entities to account for, however the intuitive notion of a physical boundary as a surface of some sort (whether inside or outside of a thing) will generally serve as a good guide for the use of this universal.
Definition: An independent continuant [snap:IndependentContinuant] that is a lower dimensional part of a spatial entity, normally a closed two-dimensional surface. Boundaries are those privileged parts of object [snap:Object] entities that exist at exactly the point where the object [snap:Object] is separated off from the rest of the existing entities in the world.
Examples: the surface of the skin, the surface of the earth, the surface of the interior of the stomach, the outer surface of a cell or cell wall
Definition: A spatial region [snap:SpatialRegion] with one dimension.
Examples: the part of space that is a line stretching from one end of absolute space to the other, an edge of a cube-shaped part of space
Definition: A specifically dependent continuant [snap:SpecificallyDependentContinuant] that is exhibited if it inheres in an entity or entities at all (a categorical property).
Examples: the color of a tomato, the ambient temperature of air, the circumference of a waist, the shape of a nose, the mass of a piece of gold, the weight of a chimpanzee
Comment: If a realizable entity [snap:RealizableEntity] inheres in a continuant [snap:Continuant], this does not imply that it is actually realized.
Definition: A specifically dependent continuant [snap:SpecificallyDependentContinuant] that inheres in continuant [snap:Continuant] entities and are not exhibited in full at every time in which it inheres in an entity or group of entities. The exhibition or actualization of a realizable entity is a particular manifestation, functioning or process that occurs under certain circumstances.
Examples: the role of being a doctor, the function of the reproductive organs, the disposition of blood to coagulate, the disposition of metal to conduct electricity
Definition: A realizable entity [snap:RealizableEntity] the manifestation of which brings about some result or end that is not essential to a continuant [snap:Continuant] in virtue of the kind of thing that it is but that can be served or participated in by that kind of continuant [snap:Continuant] in some kinds of natural, social or institutional contexts.
Examples: the role of a person as a surgeon, the role of a chemical compound in an experiment, the role of a patient relative as defined by a hospital administrative form, the role of a woman as a legal mother in the context of system of laws, the role of a biological grandfather as legal guardian in the context of a system of laws, the role of ingested matter in digestion, the role of a student in a university
Comment: An instance of Site [snap:Site] is a mixture of independent continuant [snap:IndependentContinuant] entities which act as surrounding environments for other independent continuant [snap:IndependentContinuant] entities, most importantly for instances of object [snap:Object]. A site [snap:Site] is typically made of object [snap:Object] or fiat object part [snap:FiatObjectPart] entities and a surrounding medium in which is found an object [snap:Object] occupying the site [snap:Site]. Independent continuant [snap:IndependentContinuant] entities may be associated with others (which, then, are site [snap:Site] entities) through a relation of "occupation". That relation is connected to, but distinct from, the relation of spatial location. Site [snap:Site] entities are not to be confused with spatial region [snap:SpatialRegion] entities. In BFO, site [snap:Site] allows for a so-called relational view of space which is different from the view corresponding to the class spatial region [snap:SpatialRegion] (see the comment on this class).
Definition: An independent continuant [snap:IndependentContinuant] consisting of a characteristic spatial shape in relation to some arrangement of other continuant [snap:Continuant] entities and of the medium which is enclosed in whole or in part by this characteristic spatial shape. Site [snap:Site] entities are entities that can be occupied by other continuant [snap:Continuant] entities.
Examples: a particular room in a particular hospital, Maria's nostril or her intestines for a variety of bacteria.
Comment: All instances of continuant [snap:Continuant] are spatial entities, that is, they enter in the relation of (spatial) location with spatial region [snap:SpatialRegion] entities. As a particular case, the exact spatial location of a spatial region [snap:SpatialRegion] is this region itself.
Comment: An instance of spatial region [snap:SpatialRegion] is a part of space. All parts of space are spatial region [snap:SpatialRegion] entities and only spatial region [snap:SpatialRegion] entities are parts of space. Space is the entire extent of the spatial universe, a designated individual, which is thus itself a spatial region [snap:SpatialRegion].
Comment: Space and spatial region [snap:SpatialRegion] entities are entities in their own rights which exist independently of any entities which can be located at them. This view of space is sometimes called "absolutist" or "the container view". In BFO, the class site [snap:Site] allows for a so-called relational view of space, that is to say, a view according to which spatiality is a matter of relative location between entities and not a matter of being tied to space. The bridge between these two views is secured through the fact that while instances of site [snap:Site] are not spatial region [snap:SpatialRegion] entities, they are nevertheless spatial entities.
Definition: A continuant [snap:Continuant] that is neither bearer of quality [snap:Quality] entities nor inheres in any other entities.
Examples: the sum total of all space in the universe, parts of the sum total of all space in the universe
Definition: A continuant [snap:Continuant] that inheres in or is borne by other entities. Every instance of A requires some specific instance of B which must always be the same.
Examples: the mass of a cloud, the smell of mozzarella, the liquidity of blood, the color of a tomato, the disposition of fish to decay, the role of being a doctor, the function of the heart in the body: to pump blood, to receive de-oxygenated and oxygenated blood, etc.
Definition: A spatial region [snap:SpatialRegion] with three dimensions.
Examples: a cube-shaped part of space, a sphere-shaped part of space
Definition: A spatial region [snap:SpatialRegion] with two dimensions.
Examples: the surface of a cube-shaped part of space, the surface of a sphere-shaped part of space, the surface of a rectilinear planar figure-shaped part of space
Definition: A spatial region [snap:SpatialRegion] with no dimensions.
Definition: A spatiotemporal region [span:SpatiotemporalRegion] that has temporal and spatial dimensions such that all points within the spatiotemporal region are mediately or immediately connected to all other points within the same spatiotemporal region [span:SpatiotemporalRegion].
Examples: the spatial and temporal location of an individual organism's life, the spatial and temporal location of the development of a fetus
Definition: A temporal region [span:TemporalRegion] every point of which is mediately or immediately connected with every other point of which.
Examples: the 1970s years, the time from the beginning to the end of a heart attack, the time taken up by cellular meiosis
Definition: A processual entity [span:ProcessualEntity] that is part of a process but that does not have bona fide beginnings and endings corresponding to real discontinuities.
Examples: chewing during a meal, the middle part of a rainstorm, the worst part of a heart-attack, the most interesting part of Van Gogh's life
Definition: An entity [bfo:Entity] that has temporal parts and that happens, unfolds or develops through time. Sometimes also called perdurants.
Examples: the life of an organism, a surgical operation as processual context for a nosocomical infection, the spatiotemporal context occupied by a process of cellular meiosis, the most interesting part of Van Gogh's life, the spatiotemporal region occupied by the development of a cancer tumor
Definition: A processual entity [span:ProcessualEntity] that is a maximally connected spatiotemporal whole and has bona fide beginnings and endings corresponding to real discontinuities.
Examples: the life of an organism, the process of sleeping, the process of cell-division
Definition: A processual entity [span:ProcessualEntity] that is a mereological sum of process [span:Process] entities and possesses non-connected boundaries.
Examples: the beating of the hearts of each of seven individuals in the room, the playing of each of the members of an orchestra, a process of digestion and a process of thinking taken together
Definition: A processual entity [span:ProcessualEntity] that is the fiat or bona fide instantaneous temporal process boundary.
Examples: birth, death, the forming of a synapse, the onset of REM sleep, the detaching of a finger in an industrial accident, the final separation of two cells at the end of cell-division, the incision at the beginning of a surgery
Comment: An instance of a processual context [span:ProcessualContext] is a mixture of processual entity [span:ProcessualEntity] which stand as surrounding environments for other processual entity [span:ProcessualEntity] entities. The class processual context [span:ProcessualContext] is the analogous among occurrent [span:Occurrent] entities to the class site [snap:Site] among continuant [snap:Continuant] entities.
Definition: An occurrent [span:Occurrent] consisting of a characteristic spatial shape inhering in some arrangement of other occurrent [span:Occurrent] entities. Processual context [span:ProcessualContext] entities are characteristically entities at or in which other occurrent [span:Occurrent] entities can be located or occur.
Examples: The processual context for a given manipulation occurring as part of an experiment is made of processual entities which occur in parallel, are not necessarily all parts of the experiment themselves and may involve continuant [snap:Continuant] entities which are in the spatial vicinity of the participants in the experiment.
Definition: An occurrent [span:Occurrent] that exists in time by occurring or happening, has temporal parts and always involves and depends on some entity.
Examples: the life of an organism, the process of meiosis, the course of a disease, the flight of a bird
Definition: A spatiotemporal region [span:SpatiotemporalRegion] that has spatial and temporal dimensions and every spatial and temporal point of which is not connected with every other spatial and temporal point of which.
Examples: the space and time occupied by the individual games of the World Cup, the space and time occupied by the individual liaisons in a romantic affair
Definition: A temporal region [span:TemporalRegion] every point of which is not mediately or immediately connected with every other point of which.
Examples: the time occupied by the individual games of the World Cup, the time occupied by the individual liaisons in a romantic affair
Definition: A connected spatiotemporal region [span:ConnectedSpatiotemporalRegion] at a specific moment.
Examples: the spatiotemporal region occupied by a single instantaneous temporal slice (part) of a process
Definition: A connected spatiotemporal region [span:ConnectedSpatiotemporalRegion] that endures for more than a single moment of time.
Examples: the spatiotemporal region occupied by a process or by a fiat processual part
Comment: All instances of occurrent [span:Occurrent] are spatiotemporal entities, that is, they enter in the relation of (spatiotemporal) location with spatiotemporal region [span:SpatiotemporalRegion] entities. As a particular case, the exact spatiotemporal location of a spatiotemporal region [span:SpatiotemporalRegion] is this region itself.
Comment: An instance of the spatiotemporal region [span:SpatiotemporalRegion] is a part of spacetime. All parts of spacetime are spatiotemporal region [span:SpatiotemporalRegion] entities and only spatiotemporal region [span:SpatiotemporalRegion] entities are parts of spacetime. In particular, neither spatial region [snap:SpatialRegion] entities nor temporal region [span:TemporalRegion] entities are in BFO parts of spacetime. Spacetime is the entire extent of the spatiotemporal universe, a designated individual, which is thus itself a spatiotemporal region [span:SpatiotemporalRegion]. Spacetime is among occurrents the analogous of space among continuant [snap:Continuant] entities.
Comment: Spacetime and spatiotemporal region [span:SpatiotemporalRegion] entities are entities in their own rights which exist independently of any entities which can be located at them. This view of spacetime can be called "absolutist" or "the container view". In BFO, the class processual context [span:ProcessualContext] allows for a so-called relational view of spacetime, that is to say, a view according to which spatiotemporality is a matter of relative location between entities and not a matter of being tied to spacetime. In BFO, the bridge between these two views is secured through the fact that instances of processual context [span:ProcessualContext] are too spatiotemporal entities.
Definition: An occurrent [span:Occurrent] at or in which processual entity [span:ProcessualEntity] entities can be located.
Examples: the spatiotemporal region occupied by a human life, the spatiotemporal region occupied by the development of a cancer tumor, the spatiotemporal context occupied by a process of cellular meiosis
Definition: A connected temporal region [span:ConnectedTemporalRegion] comprising a single moment of time.
Examples: right now, the moment at which a finger is detached in an industrial accident, the moment at which a child is born, the moment of death
Definition: A connected temporal region [span:ConnectedTemporalRegion] lasting for more than a single moment of time.
Examples: any continuous temporal duration during which a process occurs
Comment: All instances of occurrent [span:Occurrent] are temporal entities, that is, they enter in the relation of (temporal) location with temporal region [span:TemporalRegion] entities. As a particular case, the exact spatiotemporal location of a temporal region [span:TemporalRegion] is this region itself. Continuant [snap:Continuant] entities are not temporal entities in the technical sense just explained; they are related to time in a different way, not through temporal location but through a relation of existence at a time or during a period of time (see continuant [snap:Continuant].
Comment: An instance of temporal region [span:TemporalRegion] is a part of time. All parts of time are temporal region [span:TemporalRegion] entities and only temporal region [span:TemporalRegion] entities are parts of time. Time is the entire extent of the temporal universe, a designated individual, which is thus a temporal region itself.
Comment: Time and temporal region [span:TemporalRegion] entities are entities in their own rights which exist independently of any entities which can be located at them. This view of time can be called "absolutist" or "the container view" in analogy to what is traditionally the case with space (see spatial region [snap:SpatialRegion].
Definition: An occurrent [span:Occurrent] that is part of time.
Examples: the time it takes to run a marathon, the duration of a surgical procedure, the moment of death
individual organism CRID
a CRID that denotes an individual organism.
patient CRID symbol
birth
the expulsion of a fetus out of the body of its mother
human intra-uterine life course
a processual entity which has as parts all the processes in which a given human is a participant occurring before its birth
human extra-uterine life course
a processual entity which has as parts all the processes in which a given human is a participant occurring after its birth
human birth instant
human death instant
a health care provider that has a physician role
diagnostic process conclusion
diagnostic process conclusion instant
a moment at which a diagnostic conclusion occurs
health care provider
a human that has a health care provider role
researcher
return to normal homeostasis
the process boundary at which an abnormal homeostasis is replaced by a normal homeostasis for a given organism
return to normal homeostasis instant
a moment at which a return to normal homeostasis occurs
patient CRID
human life course
a life course which has as parts all the processes in which a given human is participant
human study subject
past status diagnostic process
A diagnostic process evaluating if a patient had a hip fracture in the past or not.
a diagnostic process which aims at establishing a diagnosis regarding the presence or absence of disease at a point in time anterior to the diagnostic process
current status diagnostic process
A diagnostic process evaluating if a patient currently has a hip fracture or not.
a diagnostic process which aims at establishing a diagnosis regarding the presence or absence of disease at a point in time during the diagnostic process
disease course instant
Anyone of the instants during which a person has a cancer
a moment at which a disease course occurs
laboratory test ordering instant
a moment at which a laboratory test ordering occurs
laboratory test ordering
A laboratory test ordering is formalized as an instantaneous event that occurs at the end of the process during which all the specifications for the laboratory test are given.
specimen creation confirmation
The confirmation that a blood test tube has been drawn from Mr. Smith
specimen creation confirmation instant
a moment at which a specimen creation confirmation occurs
laboratory test result confirmation
A laboratory test result confirmation is formalized as an instantaneous event that occurs at the end of the process during which the laboratary test result is confirmed by the laboratory team.
The validation of an automatically generated serum sodium measurement by the laboratory team.
the confirmation of a laboratary test result
laboratory test result confirmation instant
a moment at which a laboratory test result confirmation occurs
lower bound of normal value range
the lower bound of a range of normal values for a given quality
upper bound of normal value range
the upper bound of a range of normal values for a given quality
scalar measurement datum laboratory finding
a laboratory finding that is measured by a scalar measurement datum
human birth
A human birth is the process boundary between the intra-uterine life course and the extra-uterine life course of a given human.
human death
unique normal value
The unique normal value for a given quality which has only one normal value.
formulated pharmaceutical data item
a data item that is about a formulated pharmaceutical
strength data item
an atomic formulated pharmaceutical data item that is about a strength
dose form data item
an atomic formulated pharmaceutical data item that is about a dose form
active ingredient data item
an atomic formulated pharmaceutical data item that is about an active ingredient
formulated pharmaceutical category data item
an atomic formulated pharmaceutical data item that is about a formulated pharmaceutical category
health care instruction set
A plan specification composed of health care instruction items that when concretized is realized in a process in which the bearer tries to achieve health care-related objectives
The part of a prescription detailing the pain medications a patient should take and physiotheray he should follow after a hip fracture.
formulated pharmaceutical instruction item
a health care instruction item that describes how to use a formulated pharmaceutical
The part of a prescription detaillling how to take a specific pain medication after a hip fracture.
health care instruction item
The part of a prescription detailling specific physiotherapy a patient should follow after a hip fracture.
an action specification that describes an action related to health care
written creation date
a textual entity denoting a creation date
health care prescription
a document authored by a health care provider that includes health care instructions for a patient
A document authored by Dr Dupont detailling the pain medications Mr Smith. should take and the physiotherapy he should follow after a hip fracture.
health care provider author identification
an author identification denoting a particular health care provider
patient identification
a written name denoting a particular patient
atomic formulated pharmaceutical data item
a data item that is about an atomic formulated pharmaceutical
composite formulated pharmaceutical data item
a data item that is about a composite formulated pharmaceutical
brand name data item
an atomic formulated pharmaceutical data item that is about a brand
posological information item
a directive information entity part that is about the dosage of a formulated pharmaceutical
total dose per administration item
a posological information item that is about the total dose of a formulated pharmaceutical per administration
number of formulated pharmaceutical unit per administration item
a posological information item that is about the number of formulated pharmaceutical unit per administration
mode of administration item
a posological information item that is about the mode of administration of a formulated pharmaceutical
administration frequency item
a posological information item that is about the administration frequency of a formulated pharmaceutical
total of formulated pharmaceutical unit per treatment period item
a posological information item that is about the total of formulated pharmaceutical unit per treatment period
duration of treatment period item
a posological information item that is about the duration of administration of a formulated pharmaceutical
directive information entity part
an information content entity that is a proper part of a directive information entity
vital sign measurement process
vital sign measurement process instant
a moment at which a vital sign measurement process occurs
blood pressure measurement process instant
a moment at which a blood pressure measurement process occurs
body temperature measurement process instant
a moment at which a body temperature measurement process occurs
pulse rate measurement process instant
a moment at which a pulse rate measurement process occurs
respiratory rate measurement process instant
a moment at which a respiratory rate measurement process occurs
human mass measurement process
human mass measurement process instant
a moment at which a human mass measurement process occurs
human mass measurement datum
a mass measurement datum that is the result of measurement of a human mass quality
human height measurement process
a measurement process of a human's height
human height measurement process instant
a moment at which a human height measurement process occurs
human height measurement datum
a length measurement datum that is the result of measurement of human height
systolic blood pressure measurement datum
a blood pressure measurement datum that is about a systolic blood pressure
diastolic blood pressure measurement datum
a blood pressure measurement datum that is about a diastolic blood pressure
human mass
Altough mass and weight formally designate different (yet related) concepts, when clinicans refer to weight, they do refer to the mass of the patient, not its weight in newton.
human height
the length from the bottom of the feet to the top of the head of a human body, standing erect
vital sign measurement datum
a measurement datum that is a recording of the output of a vital sign measurement
reason for health care encounter role
The role played by hip pain in bringing a patient to seek a health care encounter.
the role played by a disorder (or a sign, a symptom etc.) that is realized by an encounter of the organism having the disorder (or the sign, the symptom, etc.) with a health care provider
health care encounter instant
a moment at which a health care encounter occurs
health care episode
Health care process that is composed by one or more healthcare encounters focusing on the same health issue.
laboratory measurement unit label
a measurement unit label that denotes a unit of measure of a laboratory finding
diastolic bp measurement unit label
a measurement unit label that denotes a unit of measure of a diastolic blood pressure
systolic bp measurement unit label
a measurement unit label that denotes a unit of measure of a systolic blood pressure
body temperature measurement unit label
a measurement unit label that denotes a unit of measure of a body temperature
pulse rate measurement label
a measurement unit label that denotes a unit of measure of a pulse rate
respiratory rate measurement label
a measurement unit label that denotes a unit of measure of a respiratory rate
human height measurement label
a measurement unit label that denotes a unit of measure of a human height
formulated pharmaceutical strength unit label
a measurement unit label that denotes a unit of measure of a formulated pharmaceutical strength
reason for health care encounter
An entity playing a role of a reason for encounter.
Given that a sign or a symptom can be a reason for encounter, and given that these two categories are currently classified as direct subclasses of ‘entity’, we had to classify ‘reason for encounter’ as a subclass of ‘entity’.
a cough; a hip pain; a red eye
imaging test
A medical examination that has as specified output an image finding
surgical intervention
A planned process during which operative manual and instrumental techniques are used on a patient to investigate and/or treat a pathological condition, or to help improve bodily function or appearance.
health care encounter conclusion
The end of a health care encounter process
health care encounter beginning
The beginning of a health care encounter process
health care encounter conclusion instant
A moment at which a health care encounter conclusion occurs
health care encounter beginning instant
surgical intervention instant
a moment at which a surgical intervention occurs
imaging test instant
a moment at which an imaging test occurs
This entity has the same label than the OMRSE entity "physician practice". Their entity being a role, it might benefit from being renamed "physician practice role"
human mass measurement label
a measurement unit label that denotes a unit of measure of a human mass
diastolic blood pressure measurement process instant
systolic blood pressure measurement process instant
diastolic blood presure measurement process
systolic blood pressure measurement process
health care prescription date
active ingredient
An active ingredient is a pharmaceutical ingredient that has the disposition to treat a certain disease.
formulated pharmaceutical
A formulated pharmaceutical is a chemical substance whose granular parts include an active ingredient, an excipient, and possibly a stability regulator for the active ingredient.
inactive ingredient
An inactive ingredient is a pharmaceutical ingredient that is part of a pharmaceutical formulation but does not have the disposition to treat a certain disease.
molecular entity
Any constitutionally or isotopically distinct atom, molecule, ion, ion pair, radical, radical ion, complex, conformer etc., identifiable as a separately distinguishable entity.
gene
A gene is a part of DNA that encodes information about other molecular entities.
genotype with SNP
A genotype with a single-nucleotide polymorphism (SNP). A SNP is a variation at a single nucleotide locus in the genomes of members of a species. For a variation to be considered a SNP, it must occur in at least 1% of the population.
genotype with copy number variation
A genotype of which variants with a different number of copies of a sequence identifical region exist.
pharmaceutical ingredient role
A pharmaceutical ingredient role is a role played by a chemical substance that is part of a pharmaceutical formulation.
chemical substance
A chemical substance is a material entity consisting of many chemical entities and typically has connected boundaries.
active ingredient role
An active ingredient role is a role played by a chemical substance which has the disposition to treat a certain disease and is part of a pharmaceutical formulation.
inactive ingredient role
An inactive ingredient role is a role played by a chemical substance which is part of a pharmaceutical formulation but does not have the disposition to treat a certain disease.
pharmaceutical ingredient
A pharmaceutical ingredient is a chemical substance that is part of a formulated pharmaceutical that bears a pharmaceutical ingredient role.
genotype
In this context, a genotype is a material entity made up of two DNA regions on two homologous chromosomes in a diploid cell. One chromosome is derived from the father and one is derived from the mother. The two DNA regions are located at the same genetic locus on each of the two chromosomes.
ethnicity
Ethinicity is the quality of an organism that describes membership in a social group based on a common heritage.
chromosome
dsDNA
molecular complex
DNA region
A DNA region is a part of a DNA molecule that is made up of a continous chain of deoxyribonucleotide residues.
DNA
genotype with indel variation
A genotype of which variants exist that differ though an insertion, deletion or a combination thereof.
genotype with short tandem repeat variation
genotype with multiple nucleotide polymorphism
A genotype with a multiple-nucleotide polymorphism (MNP). An MNP is a variation of several adjacent nucleotides in the genomes of members of a species. For a variation to be considered an MNP, it must occur in at least 1% of the population.
molecular entity part
A part of a molecular entity or a set of molecular entities. It can be made up of several non-connected sub-parts, potentially on separate molecular entities.
genotype with allele
A genotype containing one matching allele on each chromosome (e.g., CYP2C9*1/*3)
example to be eventually removed
failed exploratory term
The term was used used in an attempt to structure part of the ontology but in retrospect failed to do a good job
metadata complete
Class has all its metadata, but is either not guaranteed to be in its final location in the asserted IS_A hierarchy or refers to another class that is not complete.
organizational term
term created to ease viewing/sort terms for development purpose, and will not be included in a release
ready for release
Class has undergone final review, is ready for use, and will be included in the next release. Any class lacking "ready_for_release" should be considered likely to change place in hierarchy, have its definition refined, or be obsoleted in the next release. Those classes deemed "ready_for_release" will also derived from a chain of ancestor classes that are also "ready_for_release."
metadata incomplete
Class is being worked on; however, the metadata (including definition) are not complete or sufficiently clear to the branch editors.
uncurated
Nothing done yet beyond assigning a unique class ID and proposing a preferred term.
pending final vetting
All definitions, placement in the asserted IS_A hierarchy and required minimal metadata are complete. The class is awaiting a final review by someone other than the term editor.
core
Core is an instance of a grouping of terms from an ontology or ontologies. It is used by the ontology to identify main classes.
placeholder removed
terms merged
An editor note should explain what were the merged terms and the reason for the merge.
term imported
This is to be used when the original term has been replaced by a term imported from an other ontology. An editor note should indicate what is the URI of the new term to use.
term split
This is to be used when a term has been split in two or more new terms. An editor note should indicate the reason for the split and indicate the URIs of the new terms created.
other
This is to be used if none of the existing instances cover the reason for obsolescence. An editor note should indicate this new reason.
We expect to be able to mine these new reasons and add instances as required.
A Formal Theory of Substances, Qualities, and Universals, http://ontology.buffalo.edu/bfo/SQU.pdf
Hard to give a definition for. Intuitively a "natural kind" rather than a collection of any old things, which a class is able to be, formally. At the meta level, universals are defined as positives, are disjoint with their siblings, have single asserted parents.
"definitions", in some readings, always are given by necessary and sufficient conditions. So one must be careful (and this is difficult sometimes) to distinguish between defined classes and universal.
A defined class is a class that is defined by a set of logically necessary and sufficient conditions but is not a universal
A named class expression is a logical expression that is given a name. The name can be used in place of the expression.
named class expressions are used in order to have more concise logical definition but their extensions may not be interesting classes on their own. In languages such as OWL, with no provisions for macros, these show up as actuall classes. Tools may with to not show them as such, and to replace uses of the macros with their expansions
to be replaced with external ontology term
Terms with this status should eventually replaced with a term from another ontology.
requires discussion
A term that is metadata complete, has been reviewed, and problems have been identified that require discussion before release. Such a term requires editor note(s) to identify the outstanding issues.