What is a semantic search?

Semantic search technique

As opposed to a lexical search engine which looks for literal text matches with the search terms, a semantic search engine recognizes the meaning of the search terms irrespective of the lexicon. Because the search technique determines the intent and contextual meaning of the words, a semantic search will provide more refined and precise search results.

Ontologies

In DISQOVER, the semantic layer is generated using ontologies. These ontologies bring logic in a variety of data, using formal naming conventions, unique identifiers (URIs) and meta descriptions to identify different entities, their categories and (inter)relationships. As a result, information is categorized, standardized, and organized into different DISQOVER concepts (e.g., Disease, Gene, Active Substance, etc.).