Morphster: Image-Based Ontology Editor
Background Ontologies are maps of deep interconnected relationships between objects. In the sciences, they are used pervasively to map relationships between a wide variety of objects, from animal species to natural languages. Ontologies are complex to build and maintain, typically requiring artificial intelligence expertise. On the "semantic web," the primary goal of ontologies is to give machines a better understanding of data on the web. The OWL Web Ontology Language is the main ontology format for this effort.Invention Description Morphster is an editor for image-driven ontology creation that is relatively easy to use yet can create powerful, image-based ontologies. Existing ontology software associates images with text only as an auxiliary means of describing the subjects in the ontology. In Morphster, images serve as first-class ontological entities and have a separate set of inheritance rules from normal ontology subjects, which lets users build a richer graphical representation.
Morphster users can create ontologies or import an existing ontology. Users are able to import all kinds of images that are related to their ontology and assign images to the terms of the ontology which exemplify it, and likewise add terms of the ontologies to the images to represent parts of the image that exemplify the terms. Users can also use Morphster to search their ontology for terms, and get additional information from outside web services
Ontologies are complex structures, so, traditionally, ontology building requires collaboration with artificial intelligence (AI) experts. Morphster hides much of the underlying details of the ontology from the user. By removing the requirement of understanding the underpinnings of ontological structures, Morphster allows domain experts to create their own ontologies without help from AI experts.
Benefits
Ontologies can be created by unskilled domain experts. Ontologies can be created based on image relationships instead of just text.
Features
Operates on a superset of OWL for "semantic web" readiness Available as Portable Java implementation
Market Potential/Applications This technology can be used for information management, by biologists and taxonomists. It also finds application in the medical radiology business.
Development Stage Lab/bench prototype
UT Researcher Daniel P. Miranker, Ph.D., Computer Sciences, The University of Texas at Austin Timothy Rowe, Geological Sciences, The University of Texas at Austin Julian M. Humphries, Geological Sciences, The University of Texas at Austin
Type of Offer: Licensing
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