The NESTOR Model: Properties and Applications in the Context of Digital Archives

We present and describe the NEsted SeTs for Object hi- eRarchies (NESTOR) Model that allows us to model, manage, access and exchange hierarchically structured resources. The NESTOR Model is based on two set data models which can be put in relation with the tree data structure.We present these models highlighting their properties and the relationships with the tree. We present a concrete use case based on archives that are fundamental and challenging entities in the digital libraries panorama. Within the archives we show how an archive can be represented through set data models, and how their properties can be used in this context; in partic- ular, we focus of the problem of nding the lowest common ancestor.