What are the advantages of using an ontology vs. a controlled vocabulary to describe sequence data?
A controlled vocabulary is a list of terms and sometimes synonyms used to describe the concepts. An ontology not only provides a unified vocabulary of terms to describe the concepts but also relates the concepts together into hierarchies and networks, that provide the basis for inference and automated reasoning. Some advantages of using SO over a controlled vocabulary are: • Specifying the relationships between the features means that SO-compliant software need only be aware of the defined relationships and be provided with an up to date ontology. Software need not hard code the facts since that knowledge is in the ontology; it need only be able to navigate the relationships. When a new term is added to the ontology, the software will know what kind of “thing” it is, and what relationships and properties it can have. • The added depth of knowledge in the ontology improves the searching and querying capabilities of software that utilizes it. An analysis that requires the non-coding RNA
