Generating interactive visual maps of anatomical connectivity from SPARC connectivity knowledge

The December 2022 release of the SPARC Portal ( https://sparc.science ) included the first significant update to the anatomical connectivity flatmaps since the portal first launched. These flatmaps provide an interactive and visual map for the display and exploration of the autonomic nervous system of Human, rat, mouse, pig, and cat ( https://sparc.science/maps ). In addition to improved anatomical ‘cartoons’ for all species and adding a female Human map, these maps, for the first time, automatically render the connectivity knowledge directly retrieved from the SPARC Connectivity Knowledge Base of the Autonomic Nervous System (SCKAN; https://sparc.science/resources/6eg3VpJbwQR4B84CjrvmyD ). SCKAN contains explicit knowledge about CNS-ANS-end organ circuitry derived from SPARC data and scientific literature, in a form that supports computational reasoning. Each flatmap consists of a manually drawn base layer for the species-specific anatomical cartoon and a layer of manually drawn tracts for the large nerves. By annotating these drawings with standard reference SPARC vocabularies consistent with SCKAN usage, software tools are then able to semantically map connectivity circuits retrieved from SCKAN to the visual representation on each species’ flatmap. Beyond the interactive visual rendering of the circuitry on the SPARC Portal, the semantic consistency between flatmaps and SCKAN powers further user interface components on the SPARC Portal to surface additional knowledge for each rendered connection. For example, comprehensive links to the literature and/or data supporting a connectivity statement can be retrieved from SCKAN and provided to Portal users. Now that tools are in place to support this automated workflow to generate the flatmaps from SCKAN knowledge, we are continuing to improve the SPARC Portal to visualise new knowledge as it becomes available. NIH Common Fund, NIH Office of the Director, Awards OT3OD025349 and OT2 OD030541 This is the full abstract presented at the American Physiology Summit 2023 meeting and is only available in HTML format. There are no additional versions or additional content available for this abstract. Physiology was not involved in the peer review process.