Philosophers + Engineers

Professionals working at Epistematica are:

• Data & Knowledge Modellers – experts in Logic and Semantic Technology (philosophers);
• System Designers – experts in Computing and AI (engineers).

They team up with each other to transform data into computable knowledge and then to develop:

• Knowledge-driven Systems based on Knowledgebases – systems relying on semantically enriched Databases and enhanced by Automated Reasoning;
• BigData Systems based on NoSQL Database and concurrent programming for performing processes in a multi-node Cloud Computing environment.

We build neither Knowledge Management Systems that manage texts via NLP nor Business Intelligence Systems based on Data Warehousing.

 

Knowledgebases modelling

We design ontologies to build Knowledgebase for our customers.

Starting from Databases and using the customers’ knowledge, our Data and Knowledge Modellers formalize the Knowledge representation of data and services  – Semantics – using Description Logics and Semantic Technologies like OWL, SKOS, RDF, etc.

Those Knowledge Representations are ontologies. When an ontology is well instanced with data, it becomes a Knowledgebase.  The task of our Data and Knowledge Modellers is completed when all data migrated into the ontology.

Examples of simple instanced ontologies:

• Ur_Namma: An OWL Ontology of a Sumerian Grammar
• Esperanto Ontology:
  • Esperanto Grammar Analisys OWL Ontology
  • Esperanto Logical Syntagmatic Analysis OWL Ontology
  • Esperanto Period Analysis OWL Ontology

For more information look at our Blog:

• Ur_Namma, an OWL Ontology of a Sumerian Grammar
• Ontology of Esperanto

 

Tools development

We develop tools and ad-hoc software to build Knowledge-driven Systems for our customers.

Our Software Developers design and develop software applications based on Knowledgebases. The look and feel of this class of applications is the same as the others. The difference is inside.

A traditional software application uses data retrieved from Database according to semantics that is “cabled” into the programs and the users’ minds.

Thanks to the Semantic Technologies, it is instead possible to specify the relations and the properties of data and applications within an ontology. This enables the application of the Automated Reasoning (inferential processes carried out by reasoners) to automatically use the relations and the properties of data.

For those reasons, Knowledge-driven Systems offer greater advantages to the users than the traditional software applications. Users can indeed benefit from the Knowledge of builders, which are much more expert on the data, and on their use, than the users themselves

Examples:

• ESA – European Space Agency – GMES Space Component Data Access
  • Fast Domain Navigator
  • Semantic Search

For more information look at our Blog:

• ESA Project OTEG for the GMES Space Component Data Access
• ESA Project RARE, Rapid Response Support Server

 

Training

Epistematica periodically organizes training courses in order to transfer competences concerning methods and technologies for Knowledge representation; and for designing and implementing Knowledgebase.

Currently we offer the following course:

‘Data & Knowledge Modelling’

This course provides participants with the basic concepts and technological tools necessary for modelling and managing knowledge in a business context.

We pay special attention to:

• Formalisms for Knowledge representation: Description Logics
• Software tools: Racer, Protégé
• Design of ontologies: methodology and practical examples