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Encyclopedia of Database Systems pp 1263–1266Cite as

Graph Database

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Synonyms

Network database; Link database; Semi-structured database

Definition

A graph database is a database whose data model conforms to some form of graph (or network or link) structure. The graph data model usually consists of nodes (or vertices) and (directed) edges (or arcs or links), where the nodes represent concepts (or objects) and the edges represent relationships (or connections) between these concepts (objects). Therefore the nodes are typically labeled with the names of concepts or objects, while the edges are labeled with types of relationships. More elaborate labeling might involve sets of attribute-value pairs being associated with nodes and/or edges. In addition, more complex structures, such as nested graphs or hypergraphs, may also be permitted. On the other hand, the graph model may be restricted to allow only certain types of graph structures, for example, only acyclic graphs or those that have a distinguished root node.

Similar to relational databases, users can...

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Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Birkbeck, University of London, London, UK

    Peter T. Wood

Authors
  1. Peter T. Wood
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Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. College of Computing, Georgia Institute of Technology, 266 Ferst Drive, 30332-0765, Atlanta, GA, USA

    LING LIU (Professor) (Professor)

  2. Database Research Group David R. Cheriton School of Computer Science, University of Waterloo, 200 University Avenue West, N2L 3G1, Waterloo, ON, Canada

    M. TAMER ÖZSU (Professor and Director, University Research Chair) (Professor and Director, University Research Chair)

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© 2009 Springer Science+Business Media, LLC

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Wood, P.T. (2009). Graph Database. In: LIU, L., ÖZSU, M.T. (eds) Encyclopedia of Database Systems. Springer, Boston, MA. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-0-387-39940-9_183

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