Towards an Ontology for Tertiary Bioinformatics Research Process

Next-generation sequencing techniques made possible enormous steps in the sequencing of genomic material. These advancements were not supported by similar progress in developing of tools for extracting knowledge from these data: interfaces used to analyze genomic data require high Computer Science expertise, being not suitable for most researchers with a biological or clinical background. As a consequence, these tools impose cognitive barriers to bioinformatics research. An ontology of the research process has to be used as a reference during the development of new tools to overcome these barriers. In this work, we run a user study to elicit a hierarchical task tree of the tertiary bioinformatics research process. Then, we show how such a model can be exploited to design interfaces that are not only focused on the data treated but keep in consideration both the research workflow and the researchers’ requirements. Our work has profound implications on designing new, accessible bioinformatics tools that can enhance genomic research.