Ontologies are formal knowledge models that describe concepts and relationships and enable data integration, information search, and reasoning. Ontology Design Patterns (ODPs) are reusable solutions intended to simplify ontology development and support the use of semantic technologies by ontology engineers. ODPs document and package good modelling practices for reuse, ideally enabling inexperienced ontologists to construct high-quality ontologies. Although ODPs are already used for development, there are still remaining challenges that have not been addressed in the literature. These research gaps include a lack of knowledge about (1) which ODP features are important for ontology engineering, (2) less experienced developers' preferences and barriers for employing ODP tooling, and (3) the suitability of the eXtreme Design (XD) ODP usage methodology in non-academic contexts. This dissertation aims to close these gaps by combining quantitative and qualitative methods, primarily based on five ontology engineering projects involving inexperienced ontologists. A series of ontology engineering workshops and surveys provided data about developer preferences regarding ODP features, ODP usage methodology, and ODP tooling needs. Other data sources are ontologies and ODPs published on the web, which have been studied in detail. To evaluate tooling improvements, experimental approaches provide data from comparison of new tools and techniques against established alternatives. The analysis of the gathered data resulted in a set of measurable quality indicators that cover aspects of ODP documentation, formal representation or axiomatisation, and usage by ontologists. These indicators highlight quality trade-offs: for instance, between ODP Learnability and Reusability, or between Functional Suitability and Performance Efficiency. Furthermore, the results demonstrate a need for ODP tools that support three novel property specialisation strategies, and highlight the preference of inexperienced developers for template-based ODP instantiation---neither of which are supported in prior tooling. The studies also resulted in improvements to ODP search engines based on ODP-specific attributes. Finally, the analysis shows that XD should include guidance for the developer roles and responsibilities in ontology engineering projects, suggestions on how to reuse existing ontology resources, and approaches for adapting XD to project-specific contexts.

Ontologies are formal knowledge models that describe concepts and relationships and enable data integration, information search, and reasoning. Ontology Design Patterns (ODPs) are reusable solutions intended to simplify ontology development and support the use of semantic technologies by ontology engineers. ODPs document and package good modelling practices for reuse, ideally enabling inexperienced ontologists to construct high-quality ontologies. Although ODPs are already used for development, there are still remaining challenges that have not been addressed in the literature. These research gaps include a lack of knowledge about (1) which ODP features are important for ontology engineering, (2) less experienced developers' preferences and barriers for employing ODP tooling, and (3) the suitability of the eXtreme Design (XD) ODP usage methodology in non-academic contexts. This dissertation aims to close these gaps by combining quantitative and qualitative methods, primarily based on five ontology engineering projects involving inexperienced ontologists. A series of ontology engineering workshops and surveys provided data about developer preferences regarding ODP features, ODP usage methodology, and ODP tooling needs. Other data sources are ontologies and ODPs published on the web, which have been studied in detail. To evaluate tooling improvements, experimental approaches provide data from comparison of new tools and techniques against established alternatives. The analysis of the gathered data resulted in a set of measurable quality indicators that cover aspects of ODP documentation, formal representation or axiomatisation, and usage by ontologists. These indicators highlight quality trade-offs: for instance, between ODP Learnability and Reusability, or between Functional Suitability and Performance Efficiency. Furthermore, the results demonstrate a need for ODP tools that support three novel property specialisation strategies, and highlight the preference of inexperienced developers for template-based ODP instantiation---neither of which are supported in prior tooling. The studies also resulted in improvements to ODP search engines based on ODP-specific attributes. Finally, the analysis shows that XD should include guidance for the developer roles and responsibilities in ontology engineering projects, suggestions on how to reuse existing ontology resources, and approaches for adapting XD to project-specific contexts.

The debate concerning the legitimacy of artistic research that has taken place over the last two decades is notable for the way in which it has drawn attention to rival 'representational' and 'performative' conceptions of thought. In the early stages of the debate, critics such as Durling, Friedman, Elkins and Biggs employed broadly representational arguments in a quasi-legal context of judgment to suggest that processes of artistic research were in some sense unrecognisable when attempts were made to see them through the conceptual lens of 'research'. In contrast to this, advocates of artistic research, such as Haseman, Bolt, Sullivan and Slager proposed that research arising out of artistic practice possessed distinctive qualities - conjoining interests in the experimental, the experiential, and the non-representational, with a set of predominantly transformative aims. Haseman et al have likewise suggested that the concerns of the practitioner-researcher, at least in the context of the arts, are mainly ontological as opposed to epistemological in character - seeking to explore, reframe, or contest existing states of affairs in a broadly performative fashion. Whilst supporters of artistic research often stress the requirement for new ways of thinking to accommodate the specificities of practice-led research, many of the concepts that are employed in an attempt to understand the aims and concerns of artistic research have a long 'process-philosophical' lineage. Process philosophy has been present as a minor current in Western philosophy since as early as 540 BC and through the influence of luminaries such as Dewey and Langer, it has long been associated with education in the arts. Process philosophers typically emphasise both the ontological priority of change and the relational constitution of entities. From the perspective of process philosophy, the world of stable and enduring things arises out of a differential play of interacting forces that admit of multiple and contingent patterns of relation. With this in mind, the contemporary anti-essentialist arguments that are often utilised in the defense of artistic research are positioned in this thesis as examples of process-philosophical thinking, paving the way for an application of the post-structuralist, process-philosophical thought of Gilles Deleuze to the debate concerning the legitimacy of practice-led research. An interesting and long running feature of the legitimacy debate has been the failing of participants on both sides of the discussion to critically engage with their opposition - preferring instead to construct rather idealised, ghostly positions, which ultimately sidestep the specificities of the situation. In an attempt to address the lack of sustained critical confrontation between oppositional voices in the discussion, this thesis attempts a close qualitative engagement with a prominent skeptical position. To this end, the work of Michael Biggs and Daniela Büchler is interrogated from a conceptual, aesthetic and relational perspective, revealing its Wittgensteinian and Kantian roots, and subjecting them to critical scrutiny from the perspective of Deleuzian thought. Biggs and Büchler, have developed a markedly critical voice in the legitimacy debate, importing the early hostility towards practice-led research that arose out of a predominantly North American design community into the context of UK, Dutch and Australian discussion. Biggs and Büchler are much cited within the literature on artistic and practice-led modes of research and they have been influential in the framing of policy. The critique of Biggs and Büchler that is developed in this thesis begins from the observation that their work embodies a broadly conservative emphasis upon representation and recognition, and that it is expressive of what Deleuze describes as the 'dogmatic image of thought'. It is argued here that Biggs and Büchler's resistance to the affective and the performative is pervasive, serving to colour their approach to philosophy, art and aesthetics and to place them at odds with the largely material-experiential, and transdisciplinary interests of many artistic researchers. With this in mind, a series of aesthetico-conceptual strategies are employed in order to problematise Biggs and Büchler's position and to stage an encounter between a process-pragmatism of the left (as typified by the philosophy of Deleuze), and a linguistic-pragmatism of the right (as typified by the philosophy of Wittgenstein). This thesis makes a number of claims to knowledge. Primarily it aims to demonstrate that the justification of artistic research need not be separatist or isolationist in character, but that in demonstrating the overlap between traditional and non-traditional forms of research we need not dispense with artistry or neglect the artefact's performative work. In this sense it aims to show how characteristics sometimes considered specific to practice-led research have a more generalised, if somewhat understated presence in the context of more traditional modes of enquiry. In a similar vein, it aims to demonstrate how a broadly traditional, written thesis might be explored in the spirit of practice-led enquiry - drawing attention to a range of textual, imaginative, conceptual and speculative devices that might enable us to explore the intensities of a problem space, and to investigate the ways in which aesthetic devices might also perform active work in the context of an argument. Ultimately this results in a questioning of the separation of artefact and argument that is characteristic of much discussion of practice-led research. Methodologically the thesis is distinctive in its sustained critical engagement with a single oppositional voice, which is also intended, through a process of extrapolation, to problematise a more generalised positivistic current of thought emanating primarily from the discipline of design. Lastly, the philosophical critique of the Wittgensteinian underpinnings of Biggs and Büchler's position also facilitates a contribution to Deleuze studies - addressing the breadth of Deleuze's concept of relation and critically interrogating the thought of Ludwig Wittgenstein - the philosopher for whom Deleuze seemed to harbour the strongest antipathy, but of whom he was also the most reticent to speak. Whilst it is clear that there has been much interest in the potential application of Deleuze since the inception of the legitimacy debate, and whilst it is clear that the employment of Deleuze as primary theorist in practice-based-research projects is in the ascent, to date there has been little work that is explicitly focused upon the resonance of Deleuzian thought with respect to the productive context, or the legitimacy of the practice-based PhD.

Understanding Design Impact: A new framework for understanding the potential of design and enhancing future professional practice. Design is widely recognised as an important driver for economic performance. However, the value of design has proved resistant to quantification despite research attention since the early 1980s. Correlation between design investment and impact has been demonstrated, but not causation. There is considerable interest from policy and professional bodies in what is described here as ‘Design Impact’. Impact can be measured, for example, by return on investment, increases in profitability or cost reductions. However this only crudely captures the economic impact of a design ingredient. Increasingly, social and environmental impacts are also of interest. The design profession sees the potential for better articulation of design impact as a means to increase their influence. The context has been explored through a series of descriptive and prescriptive studies including analysis of 45 DBA Design Effectiveness Award case studies, 304 undergraduate design projects from two institutions over a three year period together with interviews and workshops with senior design professionals and design academics. A new Understanding Design Impact framework is the overall outcome and contribution to knowledge from the work. This bridges between theory and practice and is a powerful basis for placing consideration of design impact at the heart of design activity. A design impact ontology has been developed as a robust foundation to the framework which resolves issues with underlying concepts. An initial version of this ontology is published in The Design Journal and is claimed as a supporting contribution to new knowledge. So too are new ontological classifications of factors which have considerable influence on design impact: Design Influences and Authority and Motivation and Path. These provide fresh perspectives and are worthy of further research consideration. A number of routes are identified for the further development and dissemination of the framework.

The use of semantic technologies and Semantic Web ontologies in particular have enabled many recent developments in information integration, search engines, and reasoning over formalised knowledge. Ontology Design Patterns have been proposed to be useful in simplifying the development of Semantic Web ontologies by codifying and reusing modelling best practices. This thesis investigates the quality of Ontology Design Patterns. The main contribution of the thesis is a theoretically grounded and partially empirically evaluated quality model for such patterns including a set of quality characteristics, indicators, measurement methods and recommendations. The quality model is based on established theory on information system quality, conceptual model quality, and ontology evaluation. It has been tested in a case study setting and in two experiments. The main findings of this thesis are that the quality of Ontology Design Patterns can be identified, formalised and measured, and furthermore, that these qualities interact in such a way that ontology engineers using patterns need to make tradeoffs regarding which qualities they wish to prioritise. The developed model may aid them in making these choices. This work has been supported by Jönköing University.

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Ontology design patterns are used for creating quality modeling solutions for ontologies. The presentation of ontology design patterns is concerned with reusability of ontologies from a user perspective. The purpose of this research is to identify improvement areas in the presentation of content ontology design patterns. The objective is to analyze different content ontology design patterns and provide suggestions for possible changes in current templates and pattern presentation. The ontology design pattern templates were compared with existing templates of other patterns to identify improvement areas. After this, two surveys were conducted with novice users and expert ontology engineers to improve the readability and usability of content ontology design patterns from the user perspective and to discover differences in opinion while using the patterns. Based on the findings of comparison and survey results, we proposed suggestions to improve the current template and presentation of content ontology design patterns.

Modern logistics is strongly influenced by ongoing outsourcing. Numerous logistics service providers as stakeholders, as well as fragmented logistics networks and supply chains, result from this outsourcing and specialization on distinct core competencies. These stakeholders have to collaborate in order to enable complex supply chains. The collaboration is difficult with the inherent heterogeneity between stakeholders in terms of differing naming conventions and differing IT systems. An inadequate integration and poor communication as well as incorrect information lead to mistakes and inefficiency. One promising approach to solve these problems is the interdisciplinary paradigm of Cloud Logistics. Several parallels can be drawn between services of cloud computing and services of logistics. The paradigm of Cloud Logistics is based on these parallels and focuses on the adoption of the basic principles from cloud computing to logistics. These principles comprise the virtualization of all resources and their encapsulation within reusable modules, the so called cloud logistics services. The essential aspect of the cloud logistics paradigm is to bridge the logistics service providers' heterogeneity and differing naming conventions and IT systems with a semantic approach. The systematic literature review contained in the thesis reveals existing research gaps in the field of cloud logistics. Shortcomings are, next to others, basic aspects such as a definition and a conceptual framework to set the field of cloud logistics in context to both affecting disciplines - cloud computing and logistics. Essential explicit artifacts describing concepts and semantics of cloud logistics services are missing as well. Following a design oriented information systems research approach, the contribution of the cumulative thesis comprises the development of these mentioned essential artifacts. Especially the reusable generic ontology design patterns that semantically describe the cloud logistics services and their structuring are important contributions. Summarizing, the thesis contains a basic set of artifacts to enable the paradigm of cloud logistics. The development of a first prototype and the elaboration of an application example in the context of systematic engineering and evaluation of logistics process alternatives complement the course of the thesis.:Contents List of Figures III List of Tables V List of Abbreviations VI 1 Introduction 1 1.1 Background and Problem Statement . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2 1.2 Objective and Research Questions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 18 1.3 Reflections on Research in IS and Logistics . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 20 1.4 Outline and Structure of the Thesis’ Contributions - Included Publications 25 2 Landscape - Conceptual 33 2.1 'Go with the Flow - Design of Cloud Logistics Service Blueprints' . . . 33 2.2 Executive Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 44 3 Landscape - Technical 46 3.1 'LoSe ODP - An Ontology Design Pattern for Logistics Services' . . . . 46 3.2 Executive Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 60 4 Map - Conceptual 62 4.1 'Metamodel of a Logistics Service Map' . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 62 4.2 Executive Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 75 5 Map - Technical 77 5.1 'Ontological Structuring of Logistics Services' . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 77 5.2 Executive Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 86 6 Service Granularity Framework 88 6.1 'How Low Should You Go? - Conceptualization of the Service Granu- larity Framework' . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 88 6.2 Executive Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 106 7 Prototype 108 7.1 'Logistics Service Map Prototype' . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 108 7.2 Executive Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 114 8 Application 116 8.1 'Planning of Composite Logistics Services: Model-Driven Engineering and Evaluation' . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 116 8.2 Executive Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 138 9 Consolidation and Research Roadmap 140 9.1 'Towards the Conception of Cloud Logistics - Engineering and Manage- ment of Modular Cloud Logistics Services in the Context of Flexible Future Supply Chains' . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 140 9.2 Executive Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 187 10 Conclusion and Future Work 189 10.1 Developed Artifacts . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 189 10.2 Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 191 10.3 Implications . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 194 10.4 Limitations and Threats to Validity . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 196 10.5 Outlook and Subsequent Research Perspectives . . . . . . . . . . . . . 197 Bibliography VIII Curriculum Vitae XXVIII Selbständigkeitserklärung XXIX / Logistik ist heutzutage durch eine wachsende Arbeitsteilung und von einem Outsourcing-Trend geprägt. Daraus resultieren fragmentierte Logistiknetzwerke und Supply Chains, welche durch eine Vielzahl von Logistikdienstleistern als Stakeholder geprägt sind. Diese Stakeholder müssen miteinander kollaborieren, um innerhalb der Supply Chains zusammen zuwirken. Die Kollaboration geht mit Herausforderungen einher, welche aus der inhärenten Heterogenität zwischen den Stakeholdern sowie abweichenden Namenkonventionen und IT-Systemen der beteiligten Stakeholder resultiert. Unzureichende Integration, mangelhafte Kommunikation sowie Fehlinformation führen zu Fehlern und Ineffizienzen. Ein vielversprechender Ansatz, um diese Probleme zu lösen, ist das interdisziplinäre Paradigma Cloud Logistics. Zwischen Diensten des Cloud Computing und Diensten der Logistik können diverse Parallelen gezogen werden. Das Cloud Logistics Paradigma basiert auf diesen Parallelen und überträgt die Grundprinzipien des Cloud Computing auf die Logistik. Zu diesen Grundprinzipien gehören unter anderem Aspekte wie die Ressourcenvirtualisierung und -kapselung in wiederverwendbaren Modulen, den so genannten Cloud Logistics Services. Essentieller Aspekt des Cloud Logistics Paradigmas ist die Überbrückung der Heterogenität der Logistikdienstleister und ihrer abweichenden Namenskonventionen und IT-Systeme mittels eines semantischen Ansatzes. Die vorliegende Dissertation deckt mit Hilfe einer systematischen Literaturrecherche bestehende Lücken innerhalb des Forschungsfeldes Cloud Logistics auf. Defizite bestehen, neben anderen Aspekten, vorallem in essentiellen Artefakten des Forschungsfeldes, wie bspw. einer angemessenen wissenschaftlichen Definition, und eines konzeptuellen Frameworks, um das Forschungsfeld in den Kontext der beiden tangierenden Disziplinen - Cloud Computing und Logistik - einzuordnen. Weiterhin mangelt es an essentiellen und explizit beschriebenen Artefakten, welche Konzepte und die Semantik des Engineering und Managements der Cloud Logistics Services beschreiben. Der Methodologie der gestaltungsorinetierten Wirtschaftsinformatik folgend, besteht der Beitrag dieser Dissertation in der Entwicklung der vorgenannten Artefakte. Besonders die wiederverwendbaren generischen Ontology Design Pattern zur semantischen Beschreibung der Cloud Logistics Services und ihrer Strukturierung stellen einen wichtigen Beitrag dar. Zusammenfassend enthält die Dissertation ein notwendiges Grundset an Artefakten für die Umsetzung des Cloud Logistics Paradigmas. Die Entwicklung eines ersten Prototypen, sowie die Erarbeitung eines Anwendungsbeispiels im Kontext systematischer Entwicklung und Evaluation von Prozessvarianten in der Logistik runden die Arbeit ab.:Contents List of Figures III List of Tables V List of Abbreviations VI 1 Introduction 1 1.1 Background and Problem Statement . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2 1.2 Objective and Research Questions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 18 1.3 Reflections on Research in IS and Logistics . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 20 1.4 Outline and Structure of the Thesis’ Contributions - Included Publications 25 2 Landscape - Conceptual 33 2.1 'Go with the Flow - Design of Cloud Logistics Service Blueprints' . . . 33 2.2 Executive Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 44 3 Landscape - Technical 46 3.1 'LoSe ODP - An Ontology Design Pattern for Logistics Services' . . . . 46 3.2 Executive Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 60 4 Map - Conceptual 62 4.1 'Metamodel of a Logistics Service Map' . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 62 4.2 Executive Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 75 5 Map - Technical 77 5.1 'Ontological Structuring of Logistics Services' . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 77 5.2 Executive Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 86 6 Service Granularity Framework 88 6.1 'How Low Should You Go? - Conceptualization of the Service Granu- larity Framework' . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 88 6.2 Executive Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 106 7 Prototype 108 7.1 'Logistics Service Map Prototype' . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 108 7.2 Executive Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 114 8 Application 116 8.1 'Planning of Composite Logistics Services: Model-Driven Engineering and Evaluation' . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 116 8.2 Executive Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 138 9 Consolidation and Research Roadmap 140 9.1 'Towards the Conception of Cloud Logistics - Engineering and Manage- ment of Modular Cloud Logistics Services in the Context of Flexible Future Supply Chains' . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 140 9.2 Executive Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 187 10 Conclusion and Future Work 189 10.1 Developed Artifacts . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 189 10.2 Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 191 10.3 Implications . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 194 10.4 Limitations and Threats to Validity . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 196 10.5 Outlook and Subsequent Research Perspectives . . . . . . . . . . . . . 197 Bibliography VIII Curriculum Vitae XXVIII Selbständigkeitserklärung XXIX

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Introduction : Établir un diagnostic médical fiable requiert l’identification de la maladie d’un patient sur la base de l’observation de ses signes et symptômes. Par ailleurs, les ontologies constituent un formalisme adéquat et performant de représentation des connaissances biomédicales. Cependant, les ontologies classiques ne permettent pas de représenter les connaissances liées au processus du diagnostic médical : connaissances probabilistes et connaissances imprécises et vagues. Matériel et méthodes : Nous proposons des méthodes générales de représentation des connaissances afin de construire des ontologies adaptées au diagnostic médical. Ces méthodes permettent de représenter : (a) Les connaissances imprécises et vagues par la discrétisation des concepts (définition de plusieurs catégories distinctes à l’aide de valeurs seuils ou en représentant les différentes modalités possibles). (b) Les connaissances probabilistes (les sensibilités et les spécificités des signes pour les maladies, et les prévalences des maladies pour une population donnée) par la réification des relations ayant des arités supérieures à 2. (c) Les signes absents par des relations et (d) les connaissances liées au processus du diagnostic médical par des règles SWRL. Un moteur d’inférences abductif et probabiliste a été conçu et développé. Ces méthodes ont été testées à l’aide de dossiers patients réels. Résultats : Ces méthodes ont été appliquées à trois domaines (les maladies plasmocytaires, les urgences odontologiques et les lésions traumatiques du genou) pour lesquels des modèles ontologiques ont été élaborés. L’évaluation a permis de mesurer un taux moyen de 89,34% de résultats corrects. Discussion-Conclusion : Ces méthodes permettent d’avoir un modèle unique utilisable dans le cadre des raisonnements abductif et probabiliste, contrairement aux modèles proposés par : (a) Fenz qui n’intègre que le mode de raisonnement probabiliste et (b) García-crespo qui exprime les probabilités hors du modèle ontologique. L’utilisation d’un tel système nécessitera au préalable son intégration dans le système d’information hospitalier pour exploiter automatiquement les informations du dossier patient électronique. Cette intégration pourrait être facilitée par l’utilisation de l’ontologie du système. / Introduction: Making a reliable medical diagnosis requires the identification of the patient’s disease based on the observation of signs. Moreover, ontologies provide an adequate and efficient formalism for medical knowledge representation. However, classical ontologies do not allow representing knowledge associated with medical reasoning such as probabilistic, imprecise, or vague knowledge. Material and methods: In the current work, general knowledge representation methods are proposed. They aim at building ontologies fitting to medical diagnosis. They allow to represent: (a) imprecise or vague knowledge by discretizing concepts (definition of several distinct categories thanks to threshold values or by representing the various possible modalities), (b) probabilistic knowledge (sensitivity, specificity and prevalence) by reification of relations of arity greater than 2, (c) absent signs by relations and (d) medical reasoning and reasoning on the absent signs by SWRL rules. An abductive reasoning engine and a probabilistic reasoning engine were designed and implemented. The methods were evaluated by use of real patient records. Results: These methods were applied to three domains (the plasma cell diseases, the dental emergencies and traumatic knee injuries) for which the ontological models were developed. The average rate of correct diagnosis was 89.34 %. Discussion-Conclusion: In contrast with other methods proposed by Fenz and García-crespo, the proposed methods allow to have a unique model which can be used both for abductive and probabilistic reasoning. The use of such a system will require beforehand its integration in the hospital information system for the automatic exploitation of the electronic patient record. This integration might be made easier by the use of the ontology on which the system is based.