Materials Data Science Ontology(MDS-Onto): Unifying Domain Knowledge in Materials and Applied Data Science

Area of Science:

• Materials Science
• Data Science
• Semantic Web Technologies

Background:

• Ontologies are increasingly used to standardize scientific data terminologies.
• Current Materials Science ontologies lack standardization, leading to interoperability issues.
• Existing frameworks offer limited guidance on developing consistent and reusable ontologies.

Purpose of the Study:

• To propose a unified, automated framework (MDS-Onto) for developing interoperable and modular ontologies in Materials Data Science.
• To establish a semantic bridge to the Basic Formal Ontology (BFO) to simplify ontology term matching.
• To provide recommendations on ontology positioning, knowledge representation language, and publication for enhanced findability and interoperability.

Main Methods:

• Developed the MDS-Onto framework with two core components: FAIRmaterials for ontology creation and FAIRLinked for FAIR data creation.
• Established recommendations for semantic web integration, recommended knowledge representation languages, and online publication strategies.
• Created exemplar domain ontologies for Synchrotron X-Ray Diffraction and Photovoltaics using the FAIRmaterials package.

Main Results:

• The MDS-Onto framework offers a standardized approach to Materials Data Science ontology development.
• FAIRmaterials facilitates the creation of bilingual ontologies, improving accessibility and usability.
• The exemplar ontologies demonstrate the framework's practical application and potential for enhancing data interoperability.

Conclusions:

• The proposed framework addresses the need for standardized, interoperable, and modular ontologies in Materials Data Science.
• Implementing MDS-Onto, FAIRmaterials, and FAIRLinked can significantly improve the findability, accessibility, interoperability, and reusability (FAIR) of materials data.
• This work provides a foundation for more consistent and collaborative ontology development within the materials science community.