The World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) today announced the formation of a new group that seeks to bring life scientists and Semantic Web experts together to help improve the way data is accessed, shared, and analyzed.
Specifically, the Semantic Web Health Care and Life Sciences Interest Group (HCLSIG) aims to help life scientists tap the potential benefits of using Semantic Web technology by developing use cases and applying standard Semantic Web specifications to healthcare and life sciences problems.
This application of standards to a specific community is a W3C first. The W3C sees it as a way to help push the adoption of Semantic Web technology in general.
“This new venture puts W3C specifications through the paces of a dynamic, multifaceted, and interdependent set of communities,” said Tim Berners-Lee, W3C director. “We have a remarkable opportunity to listen to the area experts, to see how our work meets their needs, and to serve their future requirements.”
Overseeing the HCLSIG for the W3C will be Eric Miller, Semantic Web activity lead, W3C, who will look to industry to provide the oversight needed to bring in the subject matter expertise. To that end, he has recruited co-chairs Eric Neumann (an independent consultant and former global head of knowledge management at Aventis, which was acquired by Sanofi and became Sanofi-Aventis) from the life sciences and Tonya Hongsermeier, corporate manager, clinical knowledge management and decision support at Partners HealthCare System from healthcare.
Miller notes the origin of the group goes back to a gathering about a year ago. “When we brought together people in the Semantic Web Life Sciences Workshop it was exciting to see the benefits [that Semantic Web might bring to] the problems and issues they were dealing with,” said Miller. That workshop included researchers and IT professionals from many pharmaceutical companies, academic labs, and other life science organizations. (For a summary of that workshop go here.)
At that point it became clear to both the W3C and life scientists that it made sense for the two groups to work together.
The HCLSIG will operate within the W3C as an active group where vendors, users, and industry professionals will come together in vendor-independent way to address issues facing the industry.
One role of the HCLSIG will be to develop use cases that illustrate the value of adopting Semantic Web technology, core vocabularies, and ontologies. To accomplish this, Miller sees the group providing a forum that supports communication, education, and collaboration. “The W3C has a strong track record of sharing use cases,” said Miller.
While the HCLSIG will focus on specific issues related to the life sciences and healthcare, related W3C work in broader applications areas (such as security) will also be taken into account. Additionally, the group will work with other Semantic Web groups.
One area where the group will likely apply its efforts is to finding ways to make existing life science and healthcare vocabularies and ontologies work within a Semantic Web context. Making existing data Semantic Web-aware will make it easier to access, find, and share that information. And once the information is in a Semantic Web format, “people will start seeing the benefits as they will be able to stitch together data,” said Miller.
The group’s website already has a collection of several well known and some lesser known life sciences Semantic Web examples. Examples include BioDash, active semantic electronic medical records, and Partners’ Health Care Knowledge Management Portal. More will be added over time.
To coincide with the group’s announcement, the HCLSIG also put out a call for participation in its first formal meeting. The event will be held January 25th and 26th in Boston. Details about the meeting can be found here. “We hope to have people fly in from all over the world,” said Miller.
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