Approach to Reasoning about Uncertain Temporal Data in OWL 2

Abstract

Abstract In this paper, we propose an ontology-based approach for representing and reasoning about certain and uncertain temporal data. It handles temporal data in terms of quantitative time intervals and points and the qualitative relations between them (e.g., “before”). It includes three parts. (1) We extend the 4D-fluents approach with certain ontological components to represent the handled temporal data in OWL 2. (2) We extend the Allen’s interval algebra to reason about certain and uncertain time intervals. We adapt these relations to allow relating a time interval and a time point, and two time points. All relations can be used for temporal reasoning by means of transitivity tables. (3) The extended Allen’s algebra instantiates the 4D-fluents-based representation. Inferences are based on SWRL rules. Based on this ontology, a prototype is implemented and integrated into an ontology-based memory prosthesis for Alzheimer’s patients to handle certain and uncertain temporal data inputs.