Automata-based axiom pinpointing

Abstract. Axiom pinpointing has been introduced in description logics (DL) to help the user understand the reasons why consequences hold by computing minimal subsets of the knowledge base that have the conse-quence in question (MinA). Most of the pinpointing algorithms described in the DL literature are obtained as extensions of tableau-based reason-ing algorithms for computing consequences from DL knowledge bases. In this paper, we show that automata-based algorithms for reasoning in DLs can also be extended to pinpointing algorithms. The idea is that the tree automaton constructed by the automata-based approach can be trans-formed into a weighted tree automaton whose so-called behaviour yields a pinpointing formula, i.e., a monotone Boolean formula whose minimal valuations correspond to the MinAs. We also develop an approach for computing the behaviour of a given weighted tree automaton.