A Spatial Relation Ontology for Deep-Water Depositional System Description in Geology

In the construction of geological models, it is crucial to specify the spatial relations between the represented entities, which support the understanding of the 3D distribution of the rock bodies. In this paper, we propose an ontological model, based on the GeoCore ontology and the Basic Formal Ontology (BFO), which defines a set of spatial relations between geological objects, amounts of earth materials, sites, boundaries, and other geological entities. We discuss a modeling case study of a deep-water channel-levee occurrence of the Karoo basin data from South Africa. The result of this work is an ontology that supports software applications in the determination of the physically possible spatial distribution of reservoir geological bodies.