The University of Southampton

RKBExplorer.com - A Linked Data system for more effective research

Published: 1 July 2009
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A new infrastructure that enables more effective scientific research by linking data in an accessible way has been developed in ECS.

According to Hugh Glaser of the School of Electronics and Computer Science (ECS), who developed the system – RKBExplorer, it is an important step towards achieving Sir Tim Berners-Lee’s vision of the Semantic Web.

‘We have built a knowledge-based infrastructure that provides new ways of linking and presenting scientific information,’ he said.

‘It will be of particular interest to scientists developing systems that require exceptional resilience, where, for example, faults could cause loss of life, or impact disastrously on business or the economy.’

RKB (Resilience Knowledge Base) Explorer uses the Semantic Web to discover scientific activities concerned with building resilient systems, and at the same time identifies links and relationships between them. RKBExplorer then uses this Linked Data to provide access to the information in a user-friendly way, helping the user to build their own resilient systems.

‘Our system has the advantage over others in that it can identify indirect but potentially significant inter-relationships not only between people, publications and projects, but also between these and information about tools, components and training materials, and present them in an unambiguous way,’ comments Hugh Glaser.

‘Sir Tim Berners-Lee said that “Linked Data is the Semantic Web done right, and the World Wide Web done rightâ€?,’ he added. ‘We see RKBExplorer as a step towards realizing this vision.’

RKBExplorer was built as part of a Network of Excellence project, funded by the European Union under the Sixth Framework Information Society Technologies Programme. It provides a unified view of the Linked Data in many bibliographic sources as well as European-funded research projects and those funded by the National Science Foundation.

For further information contact Joyce Lewis; tel. +44(0)23 8059 5453

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