NDAR Wins at HHSinnovates Posted By: David Kennedy - Oct 6, 2011Tool/Resource: NITRC Community The National Database for Autism Research (NDAR) is a winner in the HHSinnovates program. See http://www.hhs.gov/open/initiatives/hhsi... The HHSinnovates program was created as part of our Open Government efforts to celebrate innovation by employees of HHS. The program is aimed at building a culture of innovation at HHS through facilitating the exchange of innovative ideas throughout the Department. This contest seeks not only to recognize and reward good ideas but also to help promote them across the Department. Prompted by the need to accelerate progress in autism spectrum disorders (ASD) research, the National Institutes of Health developed the National Database for Autism Research (NDAR). NDAR is a data repository and portal to many other research repositories. Using NDAR, a researcher can query data from multiple repositories at the same time. This allows for re-aggregation, re-use, re-analysis, and rigorous comparison of results. Currently, NDAR shares detailed clinical, genomic, imaging and other rich data from 17,000 research subjects. Data from another 45,000 subjects is expected. Compared to only 8% of data which is typically shared by any other major research communities, NDAR is poised to meet the Interagency Autism Strategic Plan goal of making 90% of all autism research data available. Fostering transparency, the NDAR website provides summary information about funded research to scientists and the general public. Pooling data across labs transforms research from a traditional, single-lab, single-project approach to a collaborative approach with unprecedented potential for discoveries. The technology and policy regimes developed for NADR may be useful beyond the biomedicine and public health fields. NDAR is a versatile platform that can replicated across many other areas of research. By re-using this technology, millions of dollars in acquisition or development costs could be saved. It is a model program supporting the needs of 21st century science. Visit the National Database for Autism Research website (http://ndar.nih.gov/ndarreports/faces/re...) or contact Dr. Gregory K. Farber (301-435-0778 | farberg@mail.nih.gov) or Dan Hall (301-443-7156 | halldan@mail.nih.gov) for more information. |
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