Submission Types

The Bio-Ontologies and Knowledge Representation (BOKR) COSI (renamed from the "Bio-Ontologies" COSI, http://www.bio-ontologies.org.uk/) is an International Society for Computational Biology (ISCB) Community of Special Interest (COSI) focused on research related to building and using structured knowledge in bioinformatics. Topics include ontologies, knowledge graphs, knowledge-enhanced learning, knowledge extraction, and, in general, any aspect related to the organisation, presentation, dissemination, and use of knowledge in biology, biomedicine, and the life sciences. Bio-Ontologies and Knowledge Representation (BOKR) continues the tradition of the Bio-Ontologies COSI and will be in its 29th year at ISMB 2026 (https://www.iscb.org/ismb2026). ISMB 2026 will be held in-person between July 12-16, 2026 and will feature two days of exciting keynotes and cutting-edge research in the BOKR sessions. BOKR will share one session on 14 July with the Bioinformatics Open Source Conference (https://www.open-bio.org/events/bosc-2026/) and another with the Function COSI (https://www.biofunctionprediction.org/).

Submissions

We invite the submissions of proceedings papers (9 pages), abstracts (1 page) which will be reviewed and selected abstracts invited for oral or poster presentation.

The COSI covers these topics:

• New knowledge bases, knowledge graphs, and ontologies

• Methods that use knowledge bases, knowledge graphs, and ontologies

• Applications using knowledge bases, knowledge graphs, and ontologies

• Methods to improve knowledge bases, knowledge graphs, and ontologies

in bioinformatics, biomedical/life science research, health informatics, and healthcare

Examples include (but are not limited to):

• Novel knowledge bases, knowledge graphs, and ontologies in bioinformatics

• Ontologies and knowledge graphs in annotations, mapping applications, and metadata standards

• FAIR data systems and application of ontologies and other linked open data

• Bio-curation platforms

• Evaluation of knowledge graphs, ontologies, and knowledge bases

• Ontologies, knowledge representation, and reasoning

• Machine learning/artificial intelligence and knowledge representation

• Neuro-symbolic methods in bioinformatics

• Semantic Web-enabled applications

• Ontologies for biomedical/life science research, health informatics, and healthcare

Submissions can be made on the ISMB site (https://www.iscb.org/ismb2026/home). For proceedings, please follow the instructions provided on the ISMB site. For all other submissions, please prepare your submission using the Bio-Ontologies and Knowledge Representation templates (https://www.bio-ontologies.org.uk/2026-meeting).

All submissions are reviewed (review criteria provided on the Bio-Ontologies and Knowledge Representation website). Based on the review process, abstracts will be selected for oral or poster presentation at the Bio-Ontologies and Knowledge Representation COSI.

Accepted submissions require that one author register for the conference and present the work. The presenter should identify themselves as the corresponding author during the submission process.

If you have any questions please feel free to send us an email (bioontologies@gmail.com), direct message us on Slack (bioontologies.slack.com), or post a message on Twitter (@bioontologies) or our LinkedIn Group (https://www.linkedin.com/groups/13998260/).

Bio-Ontologies has been running since 1998, please use the ISMB Annual Meetings drop-down menu above to access content from prior meetings.