h(odor): Interactive Discovery of Hypotheses on the Structure-Odor Relationship in Neuroscience

Abstract : From a molecule to the brain perception, olfaction is a complex phenomenon that remains to be fully understood in neuroscience. Latest studies reveal that the physico-chemical properties of volatile molecules can partly explain the odor perception. Neuroscientists are then looking for new hypotheses to guide their research: physico-chemical descriptors distinguishing a subset of perceived odors. To answer this problem, we present the platform h(odor) that implements descriptive rule discovery algorithms suited for this task. Most importantly, the ol-faction experts can interact with the discovery algorithm to guide the search in a huge description space w.r.t their non-formalized background knowledge thanks to an ergonomic user interface.