One of the major outputs of ACGT is the ACGT master ontology (MO). Ontologies aim to capture reality in a way that will lead to better semantic integration of data within software systems. Ontologies capture reality by including not only terms or classes of terms of a domain of interest (such as the life sciences), but also representing relations between the classes in this domain.
Currently including over 1000 concepts together with their relations and properties, the ACGT ontology focuses on diseases, patients, treatment opportunities and clinical trials. The MO is being developed with a modular design, integrating existing ontologies such as the Gene Ontology and the Foundational Model of Anatomy.
A useful associated resource is the ACGT Ontology Viewer which is freely accessible by the public and currently serves tree purposes:
To provide a view and entry point to the important concepts in the area of clinico-genomic trials on cancer
To help create electronic health records using well structured and semantically exploitable information
To allow the use of a multitude of databases through the mapping of their data in a semantically correct way
