scholarly journals Efficient Concept Induction for Description Logics

Author(s):  
Md Kamruzzaman Sarker ◽  
Pascal Hitzler

Concept Induction refers to the problem of creating complex Description Logic class descriptions (i.e., TBox axioms) from instance examples (i.e., ABox data). In this paper we look particularly at the case where both a set of positive and a set of negative instances are given, and complex class expressions are sought under which the positive but not the negative examples fall. Concept induction has found applications in ontology engineering, but existing algorithms have fundamental performance issues in some scenarios, mainly because a high number of invokations of an external Description Logic reasoner is usually required. In this paper we present a new algorithm for this problem which drastically reduces the number of reasoner invokations needed. While this comes at the expense of a more limited traversal of the search space, we show that our approach improves execution times by up to several orders of magnitude, while output correctness, measured in the amount of correct coverage of the input instances, remains reasonably high in many cases. Our approach thus should provide a strong alternative to existing systems, in particular in settings where other systems are prohibitively slow.

2020 ◽  
Vol 34 (03) ◽  
pp. 3073-3079
Author(s):  
Yizheng Zhao ◽  
Renate Schmidt ◽  
Yuejie Wang ◽  
Xuanming Zhang ◽  
Hao Feng

This paper investigates the problem of forgetting in description logics with nominals. In particular, we develop a practical method for forgetting concept and role names from ontologies specified in the description logic ALCO, extending the basic ALC with nominals. The method always terminates, and is sound in the sense that the forgetting solution computed by the method has the same logical consequences with the original ontology. The method is so far the only approach to deductive forgetting in description logics with nominals. An evaluation of a prototype implementation shows that the method achieves a significant speed-up and notably better success rates than the Lethe tool which performs deductive forgetting for ALC-ontologies. Compared to Fame, a semantic forgetting tool for ALCOIH-ontologies, better success rates are attained. From the perspective of ontology engineering this is very useful, as it provides ontology curators with a powerful tool to produce views of ontologies.


2020 ◽  
Vol 176 (3-4) ◽  
pp. 349-384
Author(s):  
Domenico Cantone ◽  
Marianna Nicolosi-Asmundo ◽  
Daniele Francesco Santamaria

In this paper we consider the most common TBox and ABox reasoning services for the description logic 𝒟ℒ〈4LQSR,x〉(D) ( 𝒟 ℒ D 4,× , for short) and prove their decidability via a reduction to the satisfiability problem for the set-theoretic fragment 4LQSR. 𝒟 ℒ D 4,× is a very expressive description logic. It combines the high scalability and efficiency of rule languages such as the SemanticWeb Rule Language (SWRL) with the expressivity of description logics. In fact, among other features, it supports Boolean operations on concepts and roles, role constructs such as the product of concepts and role chains on the left-hand side of inclusion axioms, role properties such as transitivity, symmetry, reflexivity, and irreflexivity, and data types. We further provide a KE-tableau-based procedure that allows one to reason on the main TBox and ABox reasoning tasks for the description logic 𝒟 ℒ D 4,× . Our algorithm is based on a variant of the KE-tableau system for sets of universally quantified clauses, where the KE-elimination rule is generalized in such a way as to incorporate the γ-rule. The novel system, called KEγ-tableau, turns out to be an improvement of the system introduced in [1] and of standard first-order KE-tableaux [2]. Suitable benchmark test sets executed on C++ implementations of the three mentioned systems show that in several cases the performances of the KEγ-tableau-based reasoner are up to about 400% better than the ones of the other two systems.


2016 ◽  
Vol 13 (1) ◽  
pp. 287-308 ◽  
Author(s):  
Zhang Tingting ◽  
Liu Xiaoming ◽  
Wang Zhixue ◽  
Dong Qingchao

A number of problems may arise from architectural requirements modeling, including alignment of it with business strategy, model integration and handling the uncertain and vague information. The paper introduces a method for modeling architectural requirements in a way of ontology-based and capability-oriented requirements elicitation. The requirements can be modeled within a three-layer framework. The Capability Meta-concept Framework is provided at the top level. The domain experts can capture the domain knowledge within the framework, forming the domain ontology at the second level. The domain concepts can be used for extending the UML to produce a domain-specific modeling language. A fuzzy UML is introduced to model the vague and uncertain features of the capability requirements. An algorithm is provided to transform the fuzzy UML models into the fuzzy Description Logics ontology for model verification. A case study is given to demonstrate the applicability of the method.


1999 ◽  
Vol 11 ◽  
pp. 199-240 ◽  
Author(s):  
D. Calvanese ◽  
M. Lenzerini ◽  
D. Nardi

The notion of class is ubiquitous in computer science and is central in many formalisms for the representation of structured knowledge used both in knowledge representation and in databases. In this paper we study the basic issues underlying such representation formalisms and single out both their common characteristics and their distinguishing features. Such investigation leads us to propose a unifying framework in which we are able to capture the fundamental aspects of several representation languages used in different contexts. The proposed formalism is expressed in the style of description logics, which have been introduced in knowledge representation as a means to provide a semantically well-founded basis for the structural aspects of knowledge representation systems. The description logic considered in this paper is a subset of first order logic with nice computational characteristics. It is quite expressive and features a novel combination of constructs that has not been studied before. The distinguishing constructs are number restrictions, which generalize existence and functional dependencies, inverse roles, which allow one to refer to the inverse of a relationship, and possibly cyclic assertions, which are necessary for capturing real world domains. We are able to show that it is precisely such combination of constructs that makes our logic powerful enough to model the essential set of features for defining class structures that are common to frame systems, object-oriented database languages, and semantic data models. As a consequence of the established correspondences, several significant extensions of each of the above formalisms become available. The high expressiveness of the logic we propose and the need for capturing the reasoning in different contexts forces us to distinguish between unrestricted and finite model reasoning. A notable feature of our proposal is that reasoning in both cases is decidable. We argue that, by virtue of the high expressive power and of the associated reasoning capabilities on both unrestricted and finite models, our logic provides a common core for class-based representation formalisms.


Author(s):  
Nacéra Bennacer ◽  
Guy Vidal-Naquet

This paper proposes an Ontology-driven and Community-based Web Services (OCWS) framework which aims at automating discovery, composition and execution of web services. The purpose is to validate and to execute a user’s request built from the composition of a set of OCWS descriptions and a set of user constraints. The defined framework separates clearly the OCWS external descriptions from internal realistic implementations of e-services. It identifies three levels: the knowledge level, the community level and e-services level and uses different participant agents deployed in a distributed architecture. First, the reasoner agent uses a description logic extended for actions in order to reason about: (i) consistency of the pre-conditions and post-conditions of OCWS descriptions and the user constraints with ontologies semantics, (ii) consistency of the workflow matching assertions and the execution dependency graph. Then the execution plan model is generated automatically to be run by the composer agents using the dynamic execution plan algorithm (DEPA), according to the workflow matching and the established execution order. The community composer agents invoke the appropriate e-services and ensure that the non functional constraints are satisfied. DEPA algorithm works dynamically without a priori information about e-services states and has interesting properties such as taking into account the non-determinism of e-services and reducing the search space.


2011 ◽  
pp. 24-43
Author(s):  
J. Bruijn

This chapter introduces a number of formal logical languages which form the backbone of the Semantic Web. They are used for the representation of both ontologies and rules. The basis for all languages presented in this chapter is the classical first-order logic. Description logics is a family of languages which represent subsets of first-order logic. Expressive description logic languages form the basis for popular ontology languages on the Semantic Web. Logic programming is based on a subset of first-order logic, namely Horn logic, but uses a slightly different semantics and can be extended with non-monotonic negation. Many Semantic Web reasoners are based on logic programming principles and rule languages for the Semantic Web based on logic programming are an ongoing discussion. Frame Logic allows object-oriented style (frame-based) modeling in a logical language. RuleML is an XML-based syntax consisting of different sublanguages for the exchange of specifications in different logical languages over the Web.


Author(s):  
Nicola Fanizzi

This paper presents an approach to ontology construction pursued through the induction of concept descriptions expressed in Description Logics. The author surveys the theoretical foundations of the standard representations for formal ontologies in the Semantic Web. After stating the learning problem in this peculiar context, a FOIL-like algorithm is presented that can be applied to learn DL concept descriptions. The algorithm performs a search through a space of candidate concept definitions by means of refinement operators. This process is guided by heuristics that are based on the available examples. The author discusses related theoretical aspects of learning with the inherent incompleteness underlying the semantics of this representation. The experimental evaluation of the system DL-Foil, which implements the learning algorithm, was carried out in two series of sessions on real ontologies from standard repositories for different domains expressed in diverse description logics.


Author(s):  
Kaibo Xu ◽  
Junkang Feng ◽  
Malcolm Crowe ◽  
Lin Liu

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to show how description logics (DLs) can be applied to formalizing the information bearing capability (IBC) of paths in entity-relationship (ER) schemata. Design/methodology/approach – The approach follows and extends the idea presented in Xu and Feng (2004), which applies DLs to classifying paths in an ER schema. To verify whether the information content of a data construct (e.g. a path) covers a semantic relation (which formulates a piece of information requirement), the principle of IBC under the source-bearer-receiver framework is presented. It is observed that the IBC principle can be formalized by constructing DL expressions and examining constructors (e.g. quantifiers). Findings – Description logic can be used as a tool to describe the meanings represented by paths in an ER schema and formalize their IBC. The criteria for identifying data construct distinguishability are also discovered by examining quantifiers in DL expressions of paths of an ER schema. Originality/value – This paper focuses on classifying paths in data schemas and verifying their formalized IBC by using DLs and the IBC principle. It is a new point of view for evaluation of data representation, which looks at the information borne by data but not data dependencies.


2011 ◽  
Vol 181-182 ◽  
pp. 236-241
Author(s):  
Xian Yi Cheng ◽  
Chen Cheng ◽  
Qian Zhu

As a sort of formalizing tool of knowledge representation, Description Logics have been successfully applied in Information System, Software Engineering and Natural Language processing and so on. Description Logics also play a key role in text representation, Natural Language semantic interpretation and language ontology description. Description Logics have been logical basis of OWL which is an ontology language that is recommended by W3C. This paper discusses the description logic basic ideas under vocabulary semantic, context meaning, domain knowledge and background knowledge.


2008 ◽  
Vol 31 ◽  
pp. 157-204 ◽  
Author(s):  
B. Glimm ◽  
C. Lutz ◽  
I. Horrocks ◽  
U. Sattler

Conjunctive queries play an important role as an expressive query language for Description Logics (DLs). Although modern DLs usually provide for transitive roles, conjunctive query answering over DL knowledge bases is only poorly understood if transitive roles are admitted in the query. In this paper, we consider unions of conjunctive queries over knowledge bases formulated in the prominent DL SHIQ and allow transitive roles in both the query and the knowledge base. We show decidability of query answering in this setting and establish two tight complexity bounds: regarding combined complexity, we prove that there is a deterministic algorithm for query answering that needs time single exponential in the size of the KB and double exponential in the size of the query, which is optimal. Regarding data complexity, we prove containment in co-NP.


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