Progetti di ricerca

Since its creation, the Biobanking and BioMolecular resources Research Infrastructure - European Research Infrastructure Consortium (BBMRI-ERIC) has made a remarkable contribution to European and international cutting-edge research, as one of the largest RI for health research and in life sciences in Europe.… Leggi tutto 2023 marking its 10-year anniversary, BBMRI-ERIC is facing a unique moment to look into the long-term future and to develop its strategy for the next decade to ensure long-term sustainability. The EvolveBBMRI project aims to further develop BBMRI-ERIC for the benefit of its scientific communities and users, increase its capacity to serve EU policy priorities and further deepen its collaboration with industry. The project is structured in four thematic pillars: 1) Acceleration of datafication of biobanks and biomolecular resources to enable reproducible advanced medical research in support of EU health priorities ; 2) Teaming with industry towards greener biobanking; 3) Long-term sustainability measures for BBMRI addressing also RI landscape gaps; and 4) Strengthened approach for career paths, training and outreach activities to maximise impact. The project will ensure the implementation of specific results on 6 key target groups: a) Scientific community (Universities, Hospitals, Research Institutes); b) BBMRI-ERIC National Nodes, Biobanks in Europe and beyond; c) Industry and private foundations; d) Policy- and decision-makers at national and European levels; e) European and International networks and f) Donors, Patients and Citizens. EvolveBBMRI activities and outputs within its four Pillars will increase the long-term sustainability of BBMRI-ERIC and will thus contribute to a better structured and strengthened European research infrastructure landscape. Ultimately, the project will contribute to increase the scientific excellence to better tackle scientific and societal challenges and to expand and secure global competitiveness of the European Research Area

Beyond-COVID (BY-COVID) aims to provide comprehensive open data on SARS-CoV-2, and other infectious diseases across scientific, medical, public health and policy domains. The project will have a strong emphasis on mobilising raw viral sequences, helping to identify and monitor the spread of… Leggi tutto SARS-CoV-2 variants. It will further accelerate access to and linking of data and metadata on SARS-CoV-2 and COVID-19, enable federated data analysis conform with data protection regulations, and harmonisation and management of meta-data and sample- identifiers, as well as long-term cataloguing to ensure interoperability of national and global efforts. BY-COVID will align with the One-Health approach building on the latest technological advances, exploiting and contributing to the European Open Science Cloud capabilities for data access and federation as well as relevant standards and policies for managing, sharing and reusing research data, and work closely with the proposal funded through the sibling-topic from the emergency call (HORIZON-INFRA-2021- EMERGENCY-02). BY-COVID will integrate established national and European infrastructures including ELIXIR, BBMRI, ECRIN, PHIRI and CESSDA. It will build on existing efforts, such as the COVID-19 Data Platform and the Versatile emerging infectious disease observatory project (VEO), thereby maximising efficiency. Synergies with the European Health Data Space will be developed. BY-COVID is a truly interdisciplinary (55 partners from 19 countries) project bringing together stakeholders from the biomedical field, hospitals, public health, social sciences and humanities in an unprecedented and unique effort and will increase European readiness for future pandemics enhance genomic surveillance and rapid-response capabilities. The outputs of the project will allow scientists across multiple domains, including SMEs and industry, to access a range of data that will generate new knowledge on infectious disease.

Skills4EOSC brings together leading experiences of national, regional, institutional and thematic Open Science (OS) and Data Competence Centres from 18 European countries with the goal of unifying the current training landscape into a common and trusted pan-European ecosystem, in order… Leggi tutto to accelerate the upskilling of European researchers and data professionals in the field of FAIR and Open Data, intensive-data science and Scientific Data Management. Competence Centres (CC) are seen as centres of gravity of OS and EOSC activities in their countries. These entities can either be established national initiatives (as is the case of ICDI in Italy) or initiatives under establishment (e.g. Austria, Greece and the Nordic countries) or organizations which have the leading or mandated contribution to the OS activities nationally. CCs pool the expertise available within research institutions, universities and thematic and cross-discipline research infrastructures. They offer training and support, empowerment, lifelong learning, professionalization and resources to a variety of stakeholders, including not only researchers and data stewards, but also funders, decision makers, civil servants, and industry. Thanks to their position at the heart of the above described multi-stakeholder landscape, the CCs represented by the Skills4EOSC partners play a pivotal role in national plans for Open Science and in the interaction with scientific communities. They also have close access to policy makers and the related funding streams. The Skills4EOSC project will leverage this reference role to establish a pan-European network of CCs on OS and data, coordinating the work done at the national level to upskill professionals in this field. The Skills4EOSC CC network will drive the co-creation of harmonised trainer accreditation pathways, academic and professional curricula and skills quality assurance, recognition frameworks, and learning material creation methodologies.

BIGPICTURE, a pathology-led consortium, has the vision to become the catalyst in digital transformation in Pathology. Our mission is to create the first European GDPR compliant platform, in which both quality-controlled Whole Slide Imaging (WSI) data and advanced Artificial intelligence (AI) algorithms… Leggi tutto will exist. The BIGPICTURE platform will be built on existing assets of ELIXIR EU data infrastructure, including the federated European Genome-phenome Archive (EGA) technology for managing the exchange of confidential information between contributors and users. The consortium will use Cytomine, an established open-source, cross-platform framework to develop unique tools for access to WSI, including annotations and visualisation of algorithm results, while we will develop new and generic models to facilitate AI development and mining of WSI data. By engaging and building consensus with all the relevant stakeholders, we will contribute to the development of a regulatory framework for digital slides and AI-based methods. Finally, BIGPICTURE envisions sustainability of its platform through a community- based model which relies on reciprocity, value creation and inclusiveness. To achieve our vision, we have brought together Europe’s leaders in the field of computational pathology who have access to national and European high-performance computing infrastructures as well as Europe’s fully digitalised pathology departments. Additionally, the consortium has currently access to approximately 4.5 million clinical WSI covering a wider range of indications through 17 partners and 23 third parties from the largest European and international pathology and trial groups. Our consortium is further strengthened by the presence of the European Society of Pathology, Digital Pathology Association, FDA and 9 SMEs as partners, while we are further supported by professional societies, and patient advocates.

Research Infrastructures (RI) are standing pillars for excellence in science and a vital element for the realization of the European Union as a knowledge-based society. Together with Core Facilities (CF)- existing in many universities, academic research centres and national nodes of distributed… Leggi tutto RI- RI are also major actors in the implementation of the EU Open Science and Open Innovation strategy and a major factor for its success. As RI and CF increase in importance, questions about how to organize, maintain, manage and finance them have become a major topic for funding and research organisations. This proposal brings together, for the first time, RI, CF and European universities, in a new innovative concept to transform the access and empowerment of human resources for national and international scientific facilities in Europe. The overarching goal of RItrainPlus is to design and deliver a training programme to fulfill the competency requirements for the current and future managers of European RI and CF. RItrain Plus will: i) drive excellence, operational improvements and long-term sustainability of European RI and CF by developing: formal learning activities: executive post-graduate courses; learning on the job: staff exchange, with a short-term mobility programme at different RI/CF locations; peer learning: a Community of Practice, within all RI and CF, able to promote existing excellence and experience, and share knowledge; ii) create a foundation for the long-term provision of highly qualified personnel for managing RI and CF by developing Learning Activities embedded in existing university programs and a certifiable European Longitudinal Learning Track; iii) establish a permanent and self-sustainable European School for Management of Research Infrastructures. In the fouryear project all the required steps will be performed, with extended involvement of ERICs, EIROforum members, national agencies, and other relevant stakeholders in the design process.

Instand-NGS4P is a 54-month PCP project federating 7 leading medical centers (two are coordinating ERNs) as buyers’ group with major experience in using different NGS platforms in research and routine diagnostics. The consortium is further strengthened by European patient advocacy… Leggi tutto groups, a standardization organization and partners participating in the European infrastructures BBMRI-ERIC, ELIXIR as well as several NGS-related EU programs to cover all technical aspects and transversal needs & requirements. Driven by patient and clinical needs, innovative NGS workflows from sample-preanalytics to medical decision making will be developed. The modular design of the workflow will particularly enable SEMs to contribute, and provides flexibility to adopt emerging user needs and technologies. Specifications will address regulatory requirements for IVDs and refer to international standards and requests development of reference materials and implementation of EQA schemes covering the whole workflow. R&D suppliers will be selected based on a public tender all along this PCP process in 3 phases according to the best-value for money solution. The 3 phases foresee the leverage of 4 technical modules (pre-analytics, sequencing, bioinformatics, e-reporting/e-medication) and their standardized interfaces – from design (Phase 1) to prototypes (Phase 2), and full integration in Phase 3. At the end, this PCP will provide 2 fully integrated, standardized NGS workflows for routine diagnostics of common and rare cancers from adults to children. In order to enable broad implementation in healthcare systems throughout Europe and beyond and to increase benefit to patients a series of support activities are planned including communication and dissemination activities targeting a broad stakeholder community, development of training and education material for healthcare professionals and patients, health economic assessment and engagement with healthcare payers and policy makers.