caBIG® DSIC Knowledge Center Official Launch September 8, 2008

Following the successful launch of the first five cancer Biomedical Informatics Grid® (caBIG®) Knowledge Centers on August 11, 2008, caBIG announces the official launch on September 8, 2008 of the Data Sharing and Intellectual Capital (DSIC) Knowledge Center, hosted by the University of Michigan. caBIG is an NCI-sponsored program that enables data exchange between researchers and clinicians.

The caBIG Knowledge Centers are part of the Enterprise Support Network (ESN), a major expansion of support resources for caBIG, launched earlier this year to serve the needs of the growing caBIG community. Each Knowledge Center serves as a hub in an expanding community employing caBIG tools, standards, and infrastructure in a specific domain. For the first time since the caBIG program began in 2004, significant program support resources and knowledge about caBIG tools, standards, and technologies are available outside the NCI caBIG Program staff and Workspaces to meet the needs of the expanding caBIG community. The Knowledge Center staff can provide expert guidance to end-users, IT staff and senior decision makers implementing caBIG tools and infrastructure.

Unlike the other five Knowledge Centers, which are focused on supporting caBIG software and infrastructure, the DSIC Knowledge Center provides a centralized, authoritative repository of processes, model agreements, and other resources to encourage and facilitate data sharing to advance scientific discovery consistent with applicable legal, regulatory, ethical, and contractual requirements. The Center also provides a forum for discussion of issues. Key services provided by the DSIC Knowledge Center include:

• Domain expertise for other caBIG Knowledge Centers, Workspaces, end users and others in the caBIG community
• Analysis and summary of relevant laws, regulations, policies and standards and their potential impact on data sharing
• Development of decision support and analytic tools, model documents and best practices
• Authorship, publication and dissemination of white papers
• Collaboration with the caBIG community and external groups on data sharing initiatives

The DSIC Knowledge Center joins the previously launched Knowledge Centers, listed below. Information about the specific caBIG applications managed by the other Knowledge Centers can be found on that Knowledge Center’s page.

The DSIC and other Knowledge Centers, based at research institutions and organizations across the country, provide caBIG community members with clear and easily accessible information about all parts of caBIG. The set of Knowledge Centers include the:

caBIG® caGrid Knowledge Center: Led by The Ohio State University and The Ohio State Comprehensive Cancer Center, with University of Chicago and the Argonne National Laboratory.

caBIG® Clinical Trials Management Systems Knowledge Center: Led by Duke University Comprehensive Cancer Center, with Northwestern University, Cancer and Leukemia Group B – Information Systems (CALGB-IS), and SemanticBits.

caBIG® Molecular Analysis Tools Knowledge Center: Led by Columbia University Herbert Irving Comprehensive Cancer Center with the Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard.

caBIG® Tissue/Biospecimen Banking and Technology Tools Knowledge Center: Led by Siteman Cancer Center, Washington University at St. Louis.

caBIG® Vocabulary Knowledge Center: Led by Mayo Clinic, with SemanticBits.

caBIG® DSIC Knowledge Center: Led by the University of Michigan.

A second component of the ESN is the group of Support Service Providers. These are third-party organizations that will deliver comprehensive technical and end-user support. Each Support Service Provider applicant has been evaluated based on its biomedical domain expertise and technical capabilities. Service contracts will be negotiated between Support Service Providers and their clients. The NCI negotiations with eligible applicants regarding licenses to use the caBIG® Trademarks are in progress. Specific services offered by Support Service Providers will include:

• Help Desk Support
• Adaptation and Improvement of caBIG-Compatible Software Applications
• Deployment Support for caBIG Software Applications
• Documentation and Training Materials and Services

For more information about the Enterprise Support Network and the resources that it can provide, please visit: https://cabig.nci.nih.gov/esn.

About caBIG®

The caBIG initiative was launched in 2004 by the National Cancer Institute Center for Biomedical Informatics and Information Technology (NCICBIIT) to address the critical needs of researchers and clinicians to speed and enhance basic and clinical cancer research. By providing a comprehensive collection of interoperable software tools, data standards, and computing infrastructure, caBIG promotes data and knowledge exchange, simplifies collaboration, and ultimately helps realize the potential of Personalized Medicine.