An Active Rule-Based Approach for Constraint Management of Biological Data in XML Documents

XML is becoming one of the most common means to exchange data throughout the internet. Biological research is advancing at very high rates as a result of the large amounts of information that can be passed to researchers throughout the world, thereby increasing collaboration and reducing redundancy. There are limitations to the use of this data if there is no ability to verify it. This paper presents our BioRule system that uses active rules to verify the integrity of XML data. This system consists of a language named BioRL and an execution environment that supports event detection and rule processing. The paper discusses the language, architecture, and implementation to enforce constraints over XML documents being manipulated within a native XML database.