NeuroLex is a

lexicon A lexicon is the vocabulary of a language or branch of knowledge (such as nautical or medical). In linguistics, a lexicon is a language's inventory of lexemes. The word ''lexicon'' derives from Koine Greek language, Greek word (), neuter of () ...

neuroscience Neuroscience is the scientific study of the nervous system (the brain, spinal cord, and peripheral nervous system), its functions and disorders. It is a multidisciplinary science that combines physiology, anatomy, molecular biology, development ...

concepts. It is a structured as a

semantic wiki A semantic wiki is a wiki that has an underlying model of the knowledge described in its pages. Regular, or syntactic, wikis have structured text and untyped hyperlinks. Semantic wikis, on the other hand, provide the ability to capture or identif ...

, using

Semantic MediaWiki Semantic MediaWiki (SMW) is an extension to MediaWiki that allows for annotating semantic data within wiki pages, thus turning a wiki that incorporates the extension into a semantic wiki. Data that has been encoded can be used in semantic search ...

. NeuroLex is supported by the

Neuroscience Information Framework The Neuroscience Information Framework is a repository of global neuroscience web resources, including experimental, clinical, and translational neuroscience databases, knowledge bases, atlases, and genetic/ genomic resources and provides many aut ...

project.

Overview

The NeuroLex is intended to help improve the way that neuroscientists communicate about their work, so that information systems like the NIF can more easily find and integrate data that occur across distributed resources. One of the big roadblocks to data integration in neuroscience is the inconsistent use of

terminology Terminology is a group of specialized words and respective meanings in a particular field, and also the study of such terms and their use; the latter meaning is also known as terminology science. A ''term'' is a word, compound word, or multi-wor ...

in databases and other

literature Literature is any collection of written work, but it is also used more narrowly for writings specifically considered to be an art form, especially prose fiction, drama, and poetry. In recent centuries, the definition has expanded to include ...

. For example, if three databases have information about what

gene In biology, the word gene (from , ; "...Wilhelm Johannsen coined the word gene to describe the Mendelian units of heredity..." meaning ''generation'' or ''birth'' or ''gender'') can have several different meanings. The Mendelian gene is a ba ...

s are expressed in

cortex Cortex or cortical may refer to: Biology * Cortex (anatomy), the outermost layer of an organ ** Cerebral cortex, the outer layer of the vertebrate cerebrum, part of which is the ''forebrain'' *** Motor cortex, the regions of the cerebral cortex i ...

, but they all use different definitions of

cerebral cortex The cerebral cortex, also known as the cerebral mantle, is the outer layer of neural tissue of the cerebrum of the brain in humans and other mammals. The cerebral cortex mostly consists of the six-layered neocortex, with just 10% consisting of ...

, then one cannot compare them easily.

Utilization within the Neuroscience Information Framework

The NIF enables discovery and access to public research data and tools worldwide through an open source, networked environment. Funded by the

NIH The National Institutes of Health, commonly referred to as NIH (with each letter pronounced individually), is the primary agency of the United States government responsible for biomedical and public health research. It was founded in the late ...

Blueprint for Neuroscience Research,Th
NIH Blueprint for Neuroscience Research
is a cooperative effort among the 16 NIH Institutes, Centers and Offices that support neuroscience research. By pooling resources and expertise, the Blueprint supports the development of new tools, training opportunities, and other resources to assist neuroscientists in both basic and clinical research

. the NIF allows scientists and students to discover global neuroscience web resources that cut across traditional boundaries – from experimental, clinical and translational neuroscience databases, to knowledge bases, atlases, and genetic/genomic resources. NIF provides deeper access to a more focused set of resources that are relevant to neuroscience, search strategies tailored to the field, and access to content that is traditionally “hidden” from

web search engine A search engine is a software system designed to carry out web searches. They search the World Wide Web in a systematic way for particular information specified in a textual web search query. The search results are generally presented in a ...

s. The Framework is an inventory of neuroscience databases, annotated and integrated with a unified system of biomedical terminology (i.e. NeuroLex). NIF supports concept-based queries across multiple scales of biological structure and multiple levels of biological function, making it easier to search for and understand the results. As part of the NIF, a search interface to many different sources of neuroscience information and data is provided. To make this search more effective, the NIF is constructing ontologies to help organize neuroscience concepts into category hierarchies, e.g. stating that a

neuron A neuron, neurone, or nerve cell is an electrically excitable cell that communicates with other cells via specialized connections called synapses. The neuron is the main component of nervous tissue in all animals except sponges and placozoa. N ...

is a

cell Cell most often refers to: * Cell (biology), the functional basic unit of life Cell may also refer to: Locations * Monastic cell, a small room, hut, or cave in which a religious recluse lives, alternatively the small precursor of a monastery w ...

. This allows users to perform more effective searches and also to organize and understand the information that is returned. But an important adjunct to this activity is to clearly define all of the terms that are used to describe data.

Content

The initial entries in the NeuroLex were built from the NIFSTD ontologies which subsumed an earlier vocabulary BIRNLex. It currently contains concepts that span gross anatomy, cells of the

nervous system In biology, the nervous system is the highly complex part of an animal that coordinates its actions and sensory information by transmitting signals to and from different parts of its body. The nervous system detects environmental changes th ...

, subcellular structures,

disease A disease is a particular abnormal condition that negatively affects the structure or function of all or part of an organism, and that is not immediately due to any external injury. Diseases are often known to be medical conditions that a ...

s, functions and techniques. NIF is soliciting community input to add more content and correct what is there.

Notes and references

External links

NeuroLex siteNeuroscience Information Framework (NIF) websiteNational Institutes of Health NIF websiteBioinformatics resources in NeuroLex
{{DEFAULTSORT:Neurolex MediaWiki websites Semantic wikis Neuroscience Ontology (information science) Anatomical terminology Anatomy websites Biological databases

Overview

Utilization within the Neuroscience Information Framework

Content

See also

Notes and references

Further reading

External links