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This paper describes the step-by-step processes towards the formalization of a core ontology for missions and capabilities in systems of systems, and the development of a specific system of systems domain ontology from the formalized ontology. The study traces the ontology development process through the SABIOx methodology's requirements, setup, capture, design, and implementation phases. In this process, we demonstrate the core ontology's usability and reusability. Usability refers to the ontology's adequacy for specific use as a reference point for SoS knowledge exploration for development and operational purposes, and reusability refers to the ontology's adequacy for several uses, such as facilitating the understanding of different domain-specific systems of systems. This demonstration is done in three steps: formalization of the core ontology, exploration of the usefulness of this formalization, and development of a domain ontology from the core ontology. These result in: the incorporation of systematic ontology development processes; the application of ontology tools for machine readability; coherence and consistency checking of the ontology artifact; querying support for the ontology knowledge base; and testing of the core knowledge with a domain-specific system of systems. An alignment of these aspects provides different points of view of how a system of systems can be formulated, how the concepts collectively describe the development of an SoS emergent behavior, and how the ontology knowledge base can be explored to support decision frameworks guiding a system of systems.

This study proposes a mapping of a core ontology for missions and capabilities in Systems of Systems to a foundational ontology. It gives a brief overview of the core ontology, compares various foundation ontologies, outlines suitability characteristics, and maps the two ontologies. The mapping process is based on a superclasssubclass mapping. To ensure that the mapping is to the highest level of granularity, this process goes beyond the selected foundation ontology and includes extensions provided by common core ontologies. The outcome of the mapping provides insights into the richness of ontology realism, the connectedness of concepts and ontologies, the consistency this mapping adds to systems engineering efforts by supporting the methodological approach of Model-Based Systems Engineering, and the necessity of conformance in ontological research and implementation. This mapping supports the alignment in knowledge representation by explicitly highlighting the kind of expected input of each core ontology concept. © 2026, Science and Technology Publications, Lda. All rights reserved.

Dealing with Systems of Systems (SoS) translates to handling various cross-cutting concerns. These include autonomy of Constituent Systems (CS), acceptable abstraction levels for different stakeholders and views, meanwhile observing adaptability and traceability of capabilities, as well as attaining satisfactory outcome of the SoS. Applying systems thinking in this context is an interesting research challenge due to the multi-dimensionality of the capability concerns involved. What if the wholesomeness of the system were examined from capability aspects? In this study, we focus on understanding the problem domain of SoS by looking at the capability viewpoint of SoS. We look at how to gauge capability-related concerns by treating capability as a system. The main contribution of this paper is a mapping of capability concerns to specific SoS dimensions, and a broader reflection on the impact of autonomy, interdependence, and evolution of capability associated concerns in SoS.

This study explores how a core ontology for missions and capabilities in systems of systems supports basic and fundamental decisions related to development and operations of systems of systems. The study is based on a previously developed core ontology for mission and capability in the context of systems of systems. From the relationships in the core ontology concepts, this study extracts fundamental design and operational decisions. These decisions are compiled into a preliminary guideline aimed at assessing the feasibility of systems of systems. This compilation uses Kipling's six honest serving men's reasoning to support clustering of decisions based on their intended outcome. The study identifies categories of generic constraints that affect these decisions. The overall aim is that the clustered decisions and the constraint categories should trigger different points of views for designers and operators as they envision their systems of systems and constituent systems. The preliminary guideline developed is then used to illustrate a road paving system, and different ways of using the guideline are discussed. The tool demonstrates flexibility, therefore setting a good starting point for brainstorming and exploration of systems of systems design and operations.

This study is exploratory research aimed at evaluating a core ontology for missions and capabilities in systems of systems (SoS). The core ontology is an artifact that relates capabilities and missions into a holistic view of the SoS. This ontology is an effort towards improving the conceptual understanding of SoS, and how the desired outcome of the SoS is achieved through purposeful allocation of capabilities in mission contexts. The purpose of this evaluation study is to check the coherence of the core ontology artifact. Therefore, the study is designed to generate insight, understand the patterns of ideas and associations in the ontology artifact. It employs a survey research method and the use of questionnaire and interview tools for data collection. This study covers some aspects of the FOCA methodology for ontology evaluation. The FOCA methodology implements a goal-questionmetric process where the goals reflect the objective of knowledge representation, the questions justify the knowledge representation roles, and the metrics are the quality criteria of the respective goals. The paper also reflects on the experiences of ontology evaluation in general. The outcome of this study will provide a foundation for improvements and further research on ontologies and related artifacts that support the exploration of SoS.

This study presents a core ontology for missions and capabilities in systems of systems. The aim of the study is to create artifacts that facilitate precise understanding of fundamental concepts of SoS. An ontological approach proposes and develops taxonomic homogeneity and structural knowledge of SoS. The ontology development process involved workshop sessions with industry experts and meta modelling of the different concepts and their relationships. The ontology includes thirteen concepts of types physical things, people, information and mixed. These concepts are defined and their relations are briefly described. The developed ontology is further illustrated using a wildfire scenario case study.