How can numerous, heterogeneous, and sometimes imperfect scientific data be exploited to inform decisions? A new book, coordinated by three INRAE scientists, Patrice Buche, Pierre Bisquert, and Rallou Thomopoulos, presents methods developed notably in Montpellier to transform data and knowledge into decision-support tools.
Published in 2026 by Éditions Quæ, "Knowledge Engineering for Decision Support in the Food and Bioproduct Industry – Integration of Heterogeneous Data Through AI Techniques" compiles these works. The 214-page volume is dedicated to knowledge engineering applied to the food and bioproduct sectors.
Research in these fields utilizes data from diverse disciplines such as biochemistry, microbiology, chemistry, physics, process engineering, nutrition, and socio-economic sciences. This data is multidimensional, comes from various sources and formats, and can be incomplete or imprecise. Knowledge engineering, a branch of artificial intelligence, provides methods and tools to formalize expertise, perform automated reasoning, and support decision-making by relating this information.
The book presents processing chains, or workflows, for collecting, organizing, sharing, linking, and updating different information sources, including experimental data, expert knowledge, and stakeholder preferences. The goal is to make this information reusable for learning, prediction, and decision support. These methods are illustrated with concrete applications such as designing biodegradable composite packaging materials, selecting food packaging, and formulating technological recommendations to improve cheese quality.
Part of the book also addresses collective decision-making, exploring how to simultaneously consider the preferences of stakeholders in a sector, their often contradictory arguments, and how to construct prospective scenarios or evaluate the impact of participatory approaches.
These works are based on research from the ICO team at the IATE unit in Montpellier and the INRAE CATI DIISCICO network. This research was recognized with the 2023 Open Science Prize for Research Data from the Ministry of Research.
