Research
Poster ( RPI CS Department Poster Session)
Related Work and References
We derived most of the concepts found in the Food Provenance Ontology from the following USDA website links:
General Information and Resources for Food Labeling
Food Composition
References
1. Solomon GL., "Extra ingredients: hormones in food", Environmental Health Perspectives, vol. 102(8), pp.632-635, Aug. 1942. [Online] Available: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1567313/
2. EurekaAlert, "New research reveals food ingredients most prone to fraudulent economically motivated adulteration", Apr 2012. [Online] Available: https://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2012-04/up-nrr040512.php
3. "Food labelling: giving food information to consumers", Apr 2015. [Online] Available: https://www.gov.uk/guidance/food-labelling-giving-food-information-to-consumers
4. Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, "Glossary on Organic Agriculture", Rome, Italy, 2009. [Online] Available: http://www.fao.org/docrep/012/k4987t/k4987t00.htm
5. labelGMO.org, "What Are We Eating?" [Online]. Available: http://www.labelgmos.org/the_science_genetically_modified_foods_gmo
6. Organic.org, "Glossary", 15 February 2017. [Online]. Available: http://www.organic.org/articles/showarticle/article-215
7. The Non-GMO Project, "Non-GMO Project Standard", Bellingham, WA, USA, 2016. [Online] Available: https://www.nongmoproject.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/Non-GMO-Project-Standard.pdf
8. W. O'Neil, Techniques of food production, 1st ed. Chandni Chowk, Delhi: Global Media, 2009. [Online] Available: http://site.ebrary.com.libproxy.rpi.edu/lib/rpi/reader.action?ppg=2&docID=10285908&tm=1487274182589
9. M. Boulos, A. Yassine, S. Shirmohammadi, C. Namahoot and M. Brückner, "Towards an “Internet of Food”: Food Ontologies for the Internet of Things", Future Internet, vol. 7, no. 4, pp. 372-392, 2015 [Online]. Available: http://www.mdpi.com/1999-5903/7/4/372/htm . [Accessed: 16- Feb- 2017]
10. M. Aung and Y. Chang, "Traceability in a food supply chain: Safety and quality perspectives", Food Control, vol. 39, pp. 172-184, 2014 [Online]. Available: http://libproxy.rpi.edu/login?url=http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=edselp&AN=S0956713513005811&site=eds-live&scope=site. [Accessed: 16- Feb- 2017]
11. "Where does our food come from? Consumer Focused Review," in safe food, 2009. [Online]. Available: http://www.safefood.eu/SafeFood/media/SafeFoodLibrary/Documents/Publications/Market%20Research/Safefood_Food-Origin_CFR.pdf . Accessed: Feb. 16, 2017.
12. C. Khoury et al, "Origins of food crops connect countries worldwide", Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences, vol. 283, no. 1832, p. 20160792, 2016 [Online]. Available: http://rspb.royalsocietypublishing.org/content/283/1832/20160792. [Accessed: 16- Feb- 2017]
13. Public Health Analysis, “50 Jawdroppingly Toxic Food Ingredients & Artificial Additives to Avoid”, 2017. [Online] Available: http://mphprogramslist.com/50-jawdroppingly-toxic-food-additives-to-avoid/
14. Elizabeth Bruno, “10 Processed Foods to Never Feed Your Kids”, February 9, 2015. [Online] Available: http://mamavation.com/2015/02/10-processed-foods-never-feed-kids.html
15. U.S. Food and Drug Administration., "Overview of Food Ingredients, Additives & Colors", April 2010. [Online] Available: https://www.fda.gov/Food/IngredientsPackagingLabeling/FoodAdditivesIngredients/ucm094211.htm#types
16. Belly Bytes, "Types of Food Additives", 2017. [Online] Available: http://www.bellybytes.com/foodfacts/additive_types.html
17. U.S. Food and Drug Administration., "Overview of Food Ingredients, Additives & Colors", April 2010. [Online] Available: https://www.fda.gov/Food/IngredientsPackagingLabeling/FoodAdditivesIngredients/ucm094211.htm
18. American cancer Society, "Known and Probable Human Carcinogens", 2017. [Online] Available: https://www.cancer.org/cancer/cancer-causes/general-info/known-and-probable-human-carcinogens.html
19. “Colors To Die For: The Dangerous Impact of Food Coloring” [Online] Available: http://www.special-education-degree.net/food-dyes/
20. Wikipedia, “List of food additives”, [Online] Available: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_food_additives
21. [Online] Available: http://www.chemistryindustry.biz/thickeners.html
22. My VirtualMedicalCentre, “Food Additives”. [Online] Available: https://www.myvmc.com/lifestyles/food-additives/#c3
Design
Overview of the Problem
We're trying to tackle the problem of not knowing about the possible Health Threats due to the food ingredients mentioned/not mentioned on the packaged food label by developing the Food Provenance Ontology. It also touches the area of Food Allergens by covering only the major allergens such as Milk, Soy, Peanut, Corn Fish, Soy Lecithin, Whey, ShellFish.
Overview of the Ontology Diagram
The conceptual model for this project will be discussed with respect to the following main diagrams which are based on the concepts: Edible Item, Certification, Health hazard and User in the Food Provenance Ontology. Please note that, currently, not all individuals are shown in the diagrams below and only a few are present to represent the main purpose of the ontology and the competency questions.
Main Ontology Diagram
Food Definition
Edible Item is the main class with three subclasses: Edible item with Allergen, Food Product and Ingredient.
Edible item with Allergen has further classes: food with allergen, ingredient with Allergen
Food Product is further classified as hazardous food, healthy food alternative
Ingredient has four subclasses: additive, harmful ingrdient, improving agent, sweetener
FoodProduct has datatype properties: hasEAN, hasBrand, hasProductName
Ingredient Composition Definition
This is further sub classing and focusing on Ingredient Composition Class and its sub classes such as Major Ingredient, Minor Ingredient, Direct Ingredient, Indirect Ingredient and the use property constitutes.
Ingredient Definition
Ingredient class is further subclassed as additive, harmful ingredient, improving agent, sweetener, direct ingredient, indirect ingredient, emulsifier, fat replacer, dough strengthener, nutrient, preservative, saturated fat, thickener, yeast nutrient.
The detailed description of each of these classes is given below.
This is the most important class in ontology since the focus is to find the potential health threats due to the ingredients mentioned on the packaged food label and also find the implied ingredients by using the power of semantics.
Food Additives Definition
This diagram helps in understanding the food additives and its subclasses: Color Additive and Flavor Additive.
Color Additive has two subclasses: Certified Color and Non Certified Color
Flavor Additive has three subclasses: Artificial Flavor, Natural Flavor, and Flavor Enhancer.
It shows Red40 as an instance of the Certified Color and MonoSodiumGlutamate(MSG) as an instance of Flavor Enhancer in the diagram.
Improving Agent Definition
This diagram shows Improving Agent which is sub class of Food Additives.
It is further classified as anti caking agent, anti foaming agent, crisping agent, firming agent, foaming agent, gas, glazing agent, leaveing agent, and PH control Agent.
Crisping Agent is equivalent to Firming Agent.
Certification Definition
The Certification class describes what food have what certification.
It has subclasses: Certification Body and Standard
It has object properties: hasCertification, hasStandard, certifiesFoodProduct.
Harmful Ingredient Definition
This class has two sub classes and the ingredients are classified as either Carcinogenic or Toxic based on the properties it has.
Example Query 4 on the Demonstration shows the use of this class.
Health Hazards Definition
This is another important class in this ontology since it the target of the use case and e tried to cover the most prevalent Health threats which might cause because of the commonly consumed packaged foods. If the ingredients are classified as having Health Hazards, then the food having those ingredients can be categorized as NOT safe to consume. As seen in the diagram below it is linked to Edible Item and its subclasses. The individuals of this class include Asthma, Brain Tumor, Burning Sensation of hands, Upset Stomach, Aggressive Behavior and a few others which can be found in the ontology Individuals' file.
Main Ontology
Latest version is importable directly in Protege from http://archive.tw.rpi.edu/Courses/Ontologies/2017/FoodProvenance/FoodProvenance/
"Food Provenance Ontology - Assignment 13"
Individuals Ontology
"Food Provenance Ontology Individuals - Assignment 13"
Magic Draw Files
"Food Provenance MagicDraw File - Assignment 13"
Demonstration of Queries
Intended Use
The aim of the following SPARQL queries is to answer different competency questions asked to the ontology. The idea is to understand ho reasoning happens and the inferred results can be obtained by running the queries.
You can find all the queries in text files here
Getting Involved
We think that this topic is of utmost importance as it affects our health in some way and that we should be aware of what we eat unknowingly. Different people have different views, there are lots articles in the web ocean and lots more. So, your suggestions to our project Food Provenance are welcome so that we can try to incorporate as many concepts, relations, rules, data and facts as possible and try to make it exhaustive.. You may also contact us directly at mcnelk@rpi.edu, rawtev@rpi.edu, encart@rpi.edu. Our goal is to find out if the food we consume is safe or not based on the ingredients it contains.
Thanks for your interest.
-The Food Provenance Team
Food Provenance Ontology Annotation Policy
Annotation is the process of assigning Food Provenance terms to food products. The annotation data in the Food Provenance database is currently contributed by the developing team members. We would like to encourage new groups of users interested in using this ontology to contribute annotation. For this purpose, we have developed certain annotation guidelines: To include new food items in the Food Provenance Ontology, annotations should be attributed to a source and each annotation should include complete information regarding major and minor ingredients, as well as associated allergen and health information.
Ontology Maintenance
In order to ensure system availability, we have developed a maintenance policy for each of Food Provenance Artifacts. In this sense, all changes to the ontology will be generated using version control, new versions will be made available on the project website and all documentation will be kept up to date.
A strict hierarchy for changes will be enforced with the following order, with any changes made to artifacts higher in the hierarchy the change will cascade to all lower artifacts:
- Use Case
- Concept Map
- Ontology
- SPARQL queries
Any changes to the main ontology on this site should be made by members of the ontology team. Suggestions are most welcome and can be sent to
- Kiana McNellis, mcnelk@rpi.edu
- Vipula Rawte, rawtev@rpi.edu
- Trilce Encarnacion, encart@rpi.edu
Class Content
Assignments