Ontology Pattern Modeling for Cross-Repository Data Integration in the Ocean Sciences: The Oceanographic Cruise Example

Abstract

EarthCube is a major effort of the National Science Foundation to establish a next-generation knowledge architecture for the broader geosciences. Data storage, retrieval, access, and reuse are central parts of this new effort. Currently, EarthCube is organized around several building blocks and research coordination networks. OceanLink is a semantics-enabled building block that aims at improving data retrieval and reuse via ontologies, Semantic Web technologies, and Linked Data for the ocean sciences. Cruises, in the sense of research expeditions, are central events for ocean scientists. Consequently, information about these cruises and the involved vessels is of primary interest for oceanographers, and thus, needs to be shared and made retrievable. In this paper, we report the use of a design pattern-centric strategy to model Cruise for OceanLink data integration. We provide a formal axiomatization of the introduced pattern using the Web Ontology Language, explain design choices and discuss the planned deployment and application scenarios of our model.