A Framework for Enhancing Big Data Integration in Biological Domain Using Distributed Processing

• Main Authors: Ameera Almasoud, Hend Al-Khalifa, AbdulMalik Al-salman, Miltiadis Lytras
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Published: MDPI AG 2020-10-01
• Series: Applied Sciences
• Subjects: big data; big data integration; biological big data; ontology integration; distributed integration
• Online Access: https://www.mdpi.com/2076-3417/10/20/7092

Massive heterogeneous big data residing at different sites with various types and formats need to be integrated into a single unified view before starting data mining processes. Furthermore, in most of applications and research, a single big data source is not enough to complete the analysis and achieve goals. Unfortunately, there is no general or standardized integration process; the nature of an integration process depends on the data type, domain, and integration purpose. Based on these parameters, we proposed, implemented, and tested a big data integration framework that integrates big data in the biology domain, based on the domain ontology and using distributed processing. The integration resulted in the same result as that obtained from the local integration. The results are equivalent in terms of the ontology size before the integration; in the number of added items, skipped items, and overlapped items; in the ontology size after the integration; and in the number of edges, vertices, and roots. The results also do not violate any logical consistency rules, passing all the logical consistency tests, such as Jena Ontology API, HermiT, and Pellet reasoners. The integration result is a new big data source that combines big data from several critical sources in the biology domain and transforms it into one unified format to help researchers and specialists use it for further research and analysis.