[go] Sensu

[Jennifer Deegan (nee Clark)]

Hi,

Several of GO's ontology developers -- mainly David Hill, Jane Lomax, and
Jen Deegan -- have been working for the last few months to improve the
terms with "sensu" in the names. We've made good progress, and we've now
asked specific people within the GOC to help finish the last few remaining
terms.

Our goal is to rename these terms to avoid using "sensu" (because it's
been very confusing for us and our users); the new names and definitions
should explicitly and accurately describe the features that distinguish
the formerly-"sensu" terms from their siblings.

For example:

larval development (sensu Insecta)
  def: The process whose specific outcome is the progression of the
  larva over time, from its formation to the mature structure. (As in, 
but not restricted to Insecta).

  becomes:

  instar larval development
  def: The process whose specific outcome is the progression of the
  larva over time, from its formation to the mature structure. This
  begins with the newly hatched first-instar larva, through its
  maturation to the end of the last larval stage.

We hope these changes will
clarify exactly how the is_a children of a parent term differ from each
other.

We have listed the terms on the internal wiki, along with the people we've
identified as experts in the field:

   http://gocwiki.geneontology.org/index.php/Meeting_Notes_3

We have asked our experts to look at the terms and the questions that have
to be addressed to rename them, and to note their proposed solutions.
We'll arrange  conference calls and/or Webex sessions as needed, if any
turn out to be complicated.

Of course, we welcome comments, suggestions and questions from anyone in
GO. Please take a look at the wiki page, and let us know what you think.


Thanks,

The Sensu Working Group.


-- 
Jennifer Deegan (nee Clark)
EMBL-European Bioinformatics Institute
Gene Ontology Consortium