Reducing the frustrations of research data movement
Researchers' problems inform everything BioCommons does. We seek out researchers, institutions and research consortia willing to share their roadblocks, annoyances and limitations. Designing solutions to these challenges that enable researchers to do their best work without impediments requires connecting the right people across Australia’s digital life science research landscape with the best international efforts.
Collaborating locally
As the bioinformatics capability of Bioplatforms Australia, we regularly collaborate with other BPA-funded facilities. When the national Biomolecular Resource Facility (BRF) expressed an urgent need for faster data transfer to their research customers and collaborators, we listened very carefully to their sources of frustration. The sheer size of their data movements had seen their team even resorting to delivering physical hard drives in the past!
After understanding the requirements, we identified AARNet, the operator of Australia’s national research and education network dedicated to moving research data, as being well placed to solve this problem. AARNet’s Digital Research Product Manager Greg D’Arcy collaborated with BioCommons to create a solution.
Making the right connections between people, facilities and services can lead to wonderful efficiencies in data movement, and AARNet recently described how BRF is now efficiently and safely transferring vast amounts of data overseas, and without any risk of data loss: Data Without Borders: the role of Globus in international genome research. As Globus’ partner for universities and research institutes in Australia, AARNet was key to implementing this data management tool into an elegant workflow. Data that is transferred directly from BRF instruments to the National Computational Infrastructure (NCI) for processing and storage can now be seamlessly transferred to recipients with their own Globus endpoints.
Collaborating internationally
Another example of seeking out researchers’ opinions is our ongoing call out for individuals with an interest in data submission to international repositories. Our community consultations have already teased out some of the challenges faced by Australian-based researchers in the data submission process and we have published a set of recommendations to address them.
As part of a range of activities around interfacing with international omics data repositories, BioCommons is investigating the value of bringing European Bioinformatics Institute (EMBL-EBI) / European Nucleotide Archive (ENA) team members to Australia. To facilitate improvements by connecting the right people, we are exploring various opportunities, with training workshops for data submission to ENA, sessions to provide feedback on existing ENA documentation, and collaborations around documentation all up for consideration.
We’d love to know what you think of these opportunities to interact with the ENA team and if you’d like to participate! Please complete our survey by 14 June 2024.
To contribute to the conversations in your area of interest, join one of our research domain focused mailing groups to hear about future consultations and events.