Kinetic Human Movement Ontology: a semantic terminology model to symbolically represent physiological movement

Area of Science:

• Biomedical Informatics
• Human Movement Science
• Ontology Engineering

Background:

• Standardizing anatomical and physiological terminologies is crucial for understanding human movement and its relation to morbidity.
• Existing terminologies lack comprehensive integration for analyzing the complex interplay of musculoskeletal components in movement.

Purpose of the Study:

• To introduce the Kinetic Human Movement Ontology (KHMO), a formalized model for anatomical and physiological entities involved in human movement.
• To establish a robust framework for representing and integrating diverse terminologies related to human locomotion.

Main Methods:

• Developed a formalized ontology model using OWL2 to represent human movement and link postures.
• Integrated open-sourced controlled terminologies, including anatomical entities and physiological terms.
• Assessed the ontology's logical consistency and satisfiability through rigorous testing.

Main Results:

• The Kinetic Human Movement Ontology (KHMO) comprises 1954 classes, 42 properties, and 1921 logical axioms.
• KHMO demonstrated high semiotic quality and domain coverage compared to existing physical activity-related ontologies.
• The ontology passed logical satisfiability and consistency tests, confirming its structural integrity.

Conclusions:

• KHMO provides a foundational resource for standardizing human movement-related terminologies.
• The ontology offers superior domain coverage and semiotic quality for biomedical informatics and movement science.
• KHMO is available as an open-source resource, facilitating data curation, harmonization, and interoperability in human movement research.