The Units Ontology: a tool for integrating units of measurement in science by Georgios V. Gkoutos, Paul N. Schofield, and Robert Hoehndorf. ( Database (2012) 2012 : bas033 doi: 10.1093/database/bas03)
Abstract:
Units are basic scientific tools that render meaning to numerical data. Their standardization and formalization caters for the report, exchange, process, reproducibility and integration of quantitative measurements. Ontologies are means that facilitate the integration of data and knowledge allowing interoperability and semantic information processing between diverse biomedical resources and domains. Here, we present the Units Ontology (UO), an ontology currently being used in many scientific resources for the standardized description of units of measurements.
As the paper acknowledges, there are many measurement systems in use today.
Leaves me puzzled as to what happens to data that follows some other drummer? Other than this one?
I assume any coherent system has no difficulty integrating data written in that system.
So how does adding another coherent system assist in that integration?
Unless everyone universally moves to the new system. Unlikely don’t you think?