Training and hackathon on building biodiversity knowledge graphs

Sachs, J., Page, R. D.M. , Baskauf, S. J., Pender, J., Lujan-Toro, B., Macklin, J. and Comspon, Z. (2019) Training and hackathon on building biodiversity knowledge graphs. Research Ideas and Outcomes, 5, e36152. (doi: 10.3897/rio.5.e36152)

Abstract

Knowledge graphs have the potential to unite disconnected digitized biodiversity data, and there are a number of efforts underway to build biodiversity knowledge graphs. More generally, the recent popularity of knowledge graphs, driven in part by the advent and success of the Google Knowledge Graph, has breathed life into the ongoing development of semantic web infrastructure and prototypes in the biodiversity informatics community. We describe a one week training event and hackathon that focused on applying three specific knowledge graph technologies – the Neptune graph database; Metaphactory; and Wikidata - to a diverse set of biodiversity use cases. We give an overview of the training, the projects that were advanced throughout the week, and the critical discussions that emerged. We believe that the main barriers towards adoption of biodiversity knowledge graphs are the lack of understanding of knowledge graphs and the lack of adoption of shared unique identifiers. Furthermore, we believe an important advancement in the outlook of knowledge graph development is the emergence of Wikidata as an identifier broker and as a scoping tool. To remedy the current barriers towards biodiversity knowledge graph development, we recommend continued discussions at workshops and at conferences, which we expect to increase awareness and adoption of knowledge graph technologies.

• Item Type: Articles
• Keywords: Biodiversity knowledge graph, linked open data, biodiversity informatics, Neptune, Metaphactory, Wikidata, graph database, RDF, SPARQL.
• Status: Published
• Refereed: No
• Glasgow Author(s) Enlighten ID: Page, Professor Roderic
• Authors: Sachs, J., Page, R. D.M., Baskauf, S. J., Pender, J., Lujan-Toro, B., Macklin, J., and Comspon, Z.
• College/School: College of Medical Veterinary and Life Sciences > School of Biodiversity, One Health & Veterinary Medicine
• Journal Name: Research Ideas and Outcomes
• Publisher: Pensoft Publishers
• ISSN: 2367-7163
• ISSN (Online): 2367-7163
• Copyright Holders: This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the CC0 Public Domain Dedication
• First Published: First published in Research Ideas and Outcomes 5: e36152
• Publisher Policy: Reproduced under a Creative Commons License