A port ontology for automated model composition

We study the concept of ports and we define an ontology for representing them. Ports define the locations of interaction at the boundaries of components or sub-systems; they can be used across different disciplines for both product modeling and simulation. They are therefore a convenient abstraction that allows simulation modelers to modularize and encapsulate their system descriptions such that configurations of port-based product models can be used to generate multiple simulation models at different levels of abstraction. However, to combine system models effectively across different disciplines, the representation of the ports needs to be unambiguous yet flexible, so that it can accommodate the differences in vocabulary and approach of all the disciplines. We provide an overview of how a port ontology, defined in the Web ontology language, OWL, can capture both syntactic and semantic information such that automated modelers can reason about the system configuration and corresponding simulation models.