Evolution Management for Interconnected Ontologies

Abstract

Mappings between ontologies are easily harmed bychanges in the ontologies. In this paper we explain amechanism to define modular ontologies and mappings ina way that allows for local containment ofterminological reasoning. We have also developed achange detection and analysis method that predicts theeffect of changes on the concept hierarchy. This methoddetermines whether the changes in one ontology affectthe reasoning inside other ontologies or not. Together,these mechanisms allow ontologies to evolve withoutunpredictable effects on other ontologies. In thispaper, we also apply these methods in a case study thatis undertaken in a EU IST project.