caBIG Participation and Activities

In 2003, the National Cancer Institute began work on the Cancer Biomedical Informatics Grid (caBIG^TM), an effort to build a biomedical informatics network that connects elements of data, tools, individuals, and organizations related to cancer research. This network leverages the strengths and resources of individual researchers and institutions, which allows greater collaboration, enables the sharing of data and research findings, and strengthens and streamlines cancer research.

NCI chose the UPCI and DBMI to be one of the participating developer institutions in this effort. Dr. Michael Becich oversees the institution's involvement. DBMI faculty and staff are involved with six of the nine caBIG Workspaces, which are the multi-institutional groups which will develop and implement applications. We participate in the following:

• The Clinical Trial Management Systems Workspace is involved with the deployment and development of caBIG compliant tools to support data capture and analysis, including the management of clinical trials.
• The Tissue Banks and Pathology Tools Workspace is developing a set of tools to inventory, track, mine, and visualize tissue samples and related information from a geographically dispersed repository.
• The goals of the Vocabularies and Common Data Elements Workspace are to create and maintain software systems for content development and content delivery, and to provide assessment of, and recommendations on, vocabularies and common data elements.
• The Architecture Workspace is building architecture/infrastructure frameworks and standards to support caBIG tools and data access. Topics in this workspace include: middleware, application and data access APIs, data transmission formats, web services components, grid computing services, and security architecture.
• The Documentation & Training Workspace supports the creation and distribution of documentation and training materials for caBIG applications and resources.
• Data Sharing & Intellectual Capital is a strategic-level workspace whose mission is to facilitate data sharing among caBIG participants by addressing legal, regulatory, proprietary and contractual barriers to data sharing.

In March 2007, the project completed a pilot phase during which a small number of developers worked to create tools and systems that encourage collaboration across institutions, and a small number of adopters implemented them. The caBIG program is now in its enterprise phase. Participants continue to develop software applications and standards, and a support network is available to facilitate wider adoption.

To date DBMI faculty and staff have contributed to caBIG as software developers (caTIES, Clinical Annotation Engine), adopters (caTissue Suite), mentors, and policy experts. For additional information, contact Linda Schmandt (lms@pitt.edu), 412-623-7868).