A framework for semantic checking of information systems

Dissertação para obtenção do Grau de Mestre em Engenharia Electrotécnica e de Computadores

Validating Ontologies with OOPS!

Ontology quality can be affected by the difficulties involved in on-tology modelling which may imply the appearance of anomalies in ontologies. This situation leads to the need of validating ontologies, that is, assessing their quality and correctness. Ontology validation is a key activity in different ontol-ogy engineering scenarios such as development and selection. This paper con-tributes to the ontology validation activity by proposing a web-based tool, called OOPS!, independent of any ontology development environment, for de-tecting anomalies in ontologies. This tool will help developers to improve on-tology quality by automatically detecting potential errors.

An ontology to automated learning scenarios? an approach to its knowledge domain

Automation or semi-automation of learning scenariospecifications is one of the least exploredsubjects in the e-learning research area. There isa need for a catalogue of learning scenarios and atechnique to facilitate automated retrieval of stored specifications. This requires constructing anontology with this goal and is justified inthis paper. This ontology must mainlysupport a specification technique for learning scenarios. This ontology should also be useful in the creation and validation of new scenarios as well as in the personalization of learning scenarios or their monitoring. Thus, after justifying the need for this ontology, a first approach of a possible knowledge domain is presented. An example of a concrete learning scenario illustrates some relevant concepts supported by this ontology in order to define the scenario in such a way that it could be easy to automate.

Consistency of UML based designs using ontology reasoners

Software plays an important role in our society and economy. Software development is an intricate process, and it comprises many different tasks: gathering requirements, designing new solutions that fulfill these requirements, as well as implementing these designs using a programming language into a working system. As a consequence, the development of high quality software is a core problem in software engineering. This thesis focuses on the validation of software designs. The issue of the analysis of designs is of great importance, since errors originating from designs may appear in the final system. It is considered economical to rectify the problems as early in the software development process as possible. Practitioners often create and visualize designs using modeling languages, one of the more popular being the Uni ed Modeling Language (UML). The analysis of the designs can be done manually, but in case of large systems, the need of mechanisms that automatically analyze these designs arises. In this thesis, we propose an automatic approach to analyze UML based designs using logic reasoners. This approach firstly proposes the translations of the UML based designs into a language understandable by reasoners in the form of logic facts, and secondly shows how to use the logic reasoners to infer the logical consequences of these logic facts. We have implemented the proposed translations in the form of a tool that can be used with any standard compliant UML modeling tool. Moreover, we authenticate the proposed approach by automatically validating hundreds of UML based designs that consist of thousands of model elements available in an online model repository. The proposed approach is limited in scope, but is fully automatic and does not require any expertise of logic languages from the user. We exemplify the proposed approach with two applications, which include the validation of domain specific languages and the validation of web service interfaces.

Design and validation of stateful composite RESTful web services

A web service is a software system that provides a machine-processable interface to the other machines over the network using different Internet protocols. They are being increasingly used in the industry in order to automate different tasks and offer services to a wider audience. The REST architectural style aims at producing scalable and extensible web services using technologies that play well with the existing tools and infrastructure of the web. It provides a uniform set of operation that can be used to invoke a CRUD interface (create, retrieve, update and delete) of a web service. The stateless behavior of the service interface requires that every request to a resource is independent of the previous ones facilitating scalability. Automated systems, e.g., hotel reservation systems, provide advanced scenarios for stateful services that require a certain sequence of requests that must be followed in order to fulfill the service goals. Designing and developing such services for advanced scenarios with REST constraints require rigorous approaches that are capable of creating web services that can be trusted for their behavior. Systems that can be trusted for their behavior can be termed as dependable systems. This thesis presents an integrated design, analysis and validation approach that facilitates the service developer to create dependable and stateful REST web services. The main contribution of this thesis is that we provide a novel model-driven methodology to design behavioral REST web service interfaces and their compositions. The behavioral interfaces provide information on what methods can be invoked on a service and the pre- and post-conditions of these methods. The methodology uses Unified Modeling Language (UML), as the modeling language, which has a wide user base and has mature tools that are continuously evolving. We have used UML class diagram and UML state machine diagram with additional design constraints to provide resource and behavioral models, respectively, for designing REST web service interfaces. These service design models serve as a specification document and the information presented in them have manifold applications. The service design models also contain information about the time and domain requirements of the service that can help in requirement traceability which is an important part of our approach. Requirement traceability helps in capturing faults in the design models and other elements of software development environment by tracing back and forth the unfulfilled requirements of the service. The information about service actors is also included in the design models which is required for authenticating the service requests by authorized actors since not all types of users have access to all the resources. In addition, following our design approach, the service developer can ensure that the designed web service interfaces will be REST compliant. The second contribution of this thesis is consistency analysis of the behavioral REST interfaces. To overcome the inconsistency problem and design errors in our service models, we have used semantic technologies. The REST interfaces are represented in web ontology language, OWL2, that can be part of the semantic web. These interfaces are used with OWL 2 reasoners to check unsatisfiable concepts which result in implementations that fail. This work is fully automated thanks to the implemented translation tool and the existing OWL 2 reasoners. The third contribution of this thesis is the verification and validation of REST web services. We have used model checking techniques with UPPAAL model checker for this purpose. The timed automata of UML based service design models are generated with our transformation tool that are verified for their basic characteristics like deadlock freedom, liveness, reachability and safety. The implementation of a web service is tested using a black-box testing approach. Test cases are generated from the UPPAAL timed automata and using the online testing tool, UPPAAL TRON, the service implementation is validated at runtime against its specifications. Requirement traceability is also addressed in our validation approach with which we can see what service goals are met and trace back the unfulfilled service goals to detect the faults in the design models. A final contribution of the thesis is an implementation of behavioral REST interfaces and service monitors from the service design models. The partial code generation tool creates code skeletons of REST web services with method pre and post-conditions. The preconditions of methods constrain the user to invoke the stateful REST service under the right conditions and the post condition constraint the service developer to implement the right functionality. The details of the methods can be manually inserted by the developer as required. We do not target complete automation because we focus only on the interface aspects of the web service. The applicability of the approach is demonstrated with a pedagogical example of a hotel room booking service and a relatively complex worked example of holiday booking service taken from the industrial context. The former example presents a simple explanation of the approach and the later worked example shows how stateful and timed web services offering complex scenarios and involving other web services can be constructed using our approach.

Construcción y validación de un instrumento diagnóstico para la representación cognitiva de la Orientación Psicopedagógica en Galicia. 'Construction and validation of a diagnostic instrument for the cognitive representation of the Guidance in Galicia'.

Resumen tomado de la publicación. Con el apoyo económico del departamento MIDE de la UNED

Identification and validation of candidate genes associated with domesticated and improved traits in soybean

Soybean, an important source of vegetable oils and proteins for humans, has undergone significant phenotypic changes during domestication and improvement. However, there is limited knowledge about genes related to these domesticated and improved traits, such as flowering time, seed development, alkaline-salt tolerance, and seed oil content (SOC). In this study, more than 106,000 single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) were identified by restriction site associated DNA sequencing of 14 wild, 153 landrace, and 119 bred soybean accessions, and 198 candidate domestication regions (CDRs) were identified via multiple genetic diversity analyses. Of the 1489 candidate domestication genes (CDGs) within these CDRs, a total of 330 CDGs were related to the above four traits in the domestication, gene ontology (GO) enrichment, gene expression, and pathway analyses. Eighteen, 60, 66, and 10 of the 330 CDGs were significantly associated with the above four traits, respectively. Of 134 traitassociated CDGs, 29 overlapped with previous CDGs, 11 were consistent with candidate genes in previous trait association studies, and 66 were covered by the domesticated and improved quantitative trait loci or their adjacent regions, having six common CDGs, such as one functionally characterized gene Glyma15 g17480 (GmZTL3). Of the 68 seed size (SS) and SOC CDGs, 37 were further confirmed by gene expression analysis. In addition, eight genes were found to be related to artificial selection during modern breeding. Therefore, this study provides an integrated method for efficiently identifying CDGs and valuable information for domestication and genetic research.

Desing and Validation of a Light Inference System to Support Embedded Context Reasoning

Embedded context management in resource-constrained devices (e.g. mobile phones, autonomous sensors or smart objects) imposes special requirements in terms of lightness for data modelling and reasoning. In this paper, we explore the state-of-the-art on data representation and reasoning tools for embedded mobile reasoning and propose a light inference system (LIS) aiming at simplifying embedded inference processes offering a set of functionalities to avoid redundancy in context management operations. The system is part of a service-oriented mobile software framework, conceived to facilitate the creation of context-aware applications—it decouples sensor data acquisition and context processing from the application logic. LIS, composed of several modules, encapsulates existing lightweight tools for ontology data management and rule-based reasoning, and it is ready to run on Java-enabled handheld devices. Data management and reasoning processes are designed to handle a general ontology that enables communication among framework components. Both the applications running on top of the framework and the framework components themselves can configure the rule and query sets in order to retrieve the information they need from LIS. In order to test LIS features in a real application scenario, an ‘Activity Monitor’ has been designed and implemented: a personal health-persuasive application that provides feedback on the user’s lifestyle, combining data from physical and virtual sensors. In this case of use, LIS is used to timely evaluate the user’s activity level, to decide on the convenience of triggering notifications and to determine the best interface or channel to deliver these context-aware alerts.d

Design and Validation of a Light Inference System to Support Embedded Context Reasoning

Embedded context management in resource-constrained devices (e.g. mobile phones, autonomous sensors or smart objects) imposes special requirements in terms of lightness for data modelling and reasoning. In this paper, we explore the state-of-the-art on data representation and reasoning tools for embedded mobile reasoning and propose a light inference system (LIS) aiming at simplifying embedded inference processes offering a set of functionalities to avoid redundancy in context management operations. The system is part of a service-oriented mobile software framework, conceived to facilitate the creation of context-aware applications?it decouples sensor data acquisition and context processing from the application logic. LIS, composed of several modules, encapsulates existing lightweight tools for ontology data management and rule-based reasoning, and it is ready to run on Java-enabled handheld devices. Data management and reasoning processes are designed to handle a general ontology that enables communication among framework components. Both the applications running on top of the framework and the framework components themselves can configure the rule and query sets in order to retrieve the information they need from LIS. In order to test LIS features in a real application scenario, an ?Activity Monitor? has been designed and implemented: a personal health-persuasive application that provides feedback on the user?s lifestyle, combining data from physical and virtual sensors. In this case of use, LIS is used to timely evaluate the user?s activity level, to decide on the convenience of triggering notifications and to determine the best interface or channel to deliver these context-aware alerts.

Validation tool for smart screening of language disorders in pediatrics care

Primary-care pediatricians could play a key role in early detection of development disorders as quick as they might have enough time and knowledge for suitable screenings at clinical routine. This research paper focuses on the development and validation of a knowledge-based web tool whose aim is to support a smart detection of developmental disorders in early childhood. Thus, the use of the system can trigger the necessary preventive and therapeutic actions from birth until the age of six. The platform was designed on the basis of an analysis of significant 21 cases of children with language disorders that supported the creation of a specific knowledge base, its ontology and a set of description logic relations. The resulting system is being validated in a scalable approach with a team of seven experts from the fields of neonathology, pediatrics, neurology and language therapy.

Selection And Validation Of Reference Genes For Functional Studies In The Calliphoridae Family.

The genera Cochliomyia and Chrysomya contain both obligate and saprophagous flies, which allows the comparison of different feeding habits between closely related species. Among the different strategies for comparing these habits is the use of qPCR to investigate the expression levels of candidate genes involved in feeding behavior. To ensure an accurate measure of the levels of gene expression, it is necessary to normalize the amount of the target gene with the amount of a reference gene having a stable expression across the compared species. Since there is no universal gene that can be used as a reference in functional studies, candidate genes for qPCR data normalization were selected and validated in three Calliphoridae (Diptera) species, Cochliomyia hominivorax Coquerel, Cochliomyia macellaria Fabricius, and Chrysomya albiceps Wiedemann . The expression stability of six genes ( Actin, Gapdh, Rp49, Rps17, α -tubulin, and GstD1) was evaluated among species within the same life stage and between life stages within each species. The expression levels of Actin, Gapdh, and Rp49 were the most stable among the selected genes. These genes can be used as reliable reference genes for functional studies in Calliphoridae using similar experimental settings.

Preclinical Target Validation Using Patient-derived Cells.

The Structural Genomics Consortium (SGC) and its clinical, industry and disease-foundation partners are launching open-source preclinical translational medicine studies.

Tradução, adaptação cultural e validação da escala Moorong Self-Efficacy Scale (MSES) para o português no Brasil = : Translation, cultural adaptation and validation of Moorong Self-Efficacy Scale (MSES) into Brazilian Portuguese

Universidade Estadual de Campinas . Faculdade de Educação Física

Validation of an experimental polyurethane model for biomechanical studies on implant supported prosthesis - tension tests

OBJECTIVES: The complexity and heterogeneity of human bone, as well as ethical issues, frequently hinder the development of clinical trials. The purpose of this in vitro study was to determine the modulus of elasticity of a polyurethane isotropic experimental model via tension tests, comparing the results to those reported in the literature for mandibular bone, in order to validate the use of such a model in lieu of mandibular bone in biomechanical studies. MATERIAL AND METHODS: Forty-five polyurethane test specimens were divided into 3 groups of 15 specimens each, according to the ratio (A/B) of polyurethane reagents (PU-1: 1/0.5, PU-2: 1/1, PU-3: 1/1.5). RESULTS: Tension tests were performed in each experimental group and the modulus of elasticity values found were 192.98 MPa (SD=57.20) for PU-1, 347.90 MPa (SD=109.54) for PU-2 and 304.64 MPa (SD=25.48) for PU-3. CONCLUSION: The concentration of choice for building the experimental model was 1/1.