RDF2Graph a tool to recover, understand and validate the ontology of an RDF resource

BACKGROUND: Semantic web technologies have a tremendous potential for the integration of heterogeneous data sets. Therefore, an increasing number of widely used biological resources are becoming available in the RDF data model. There are however, no tools available that provide structural overviews of these resources. Such structural overviews are essential to efficiently query these resources and to assess their structural integrity and design, thereby strengthening their use and potential. RESULTS: Here we present RDF2Graph, a tool that automatically recovers the structure of an RDF resource. The generated overview allows to create complex queries on these resources and to structurally validate newly created resources. CONCLUSION: RDF2Graph facilitates the creation of complex queries thereby enabling access to knowledge stored across multiple RDF resources. RDF2Graph facilitates creation of high quality resources and resource descriptions, which in turn increases usability of the semantic web technologies. ELECTRONIC SUPPLEMENTARY MATERIAL: The online version of this article (doi:10.1186/s13326-015-0038-9) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.