| abstract: |
In recent years, biomedical research has crossed international borders in large, collaborative studies showing the value of multidisciplinarity and scale advantage. This has yielded valuable insights and some led to new and better medicines and treatments for diseases. However, disease-focused studies provide less insight in the real disease onset, the relative disease burden in the population, and the actual comparability of selected patients. Large prospective cohort (LPC) studies following up initially healthy participants for years or decades are considered more reliable and different diseases can be studied. LPC studies require large numbers of subjects which are costly but particularly benefited from the advent of high throughput techniques providing opportunities for powerful study designs. This project unites the large study sets of the European Biobanking and Biomolecular Research Infrastructure (BBMRI) and the International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC), thus achieving a worldwide unique scale of integration. Specifically, we aim to:1)Evaluate/improve the harmonization of individual data on health, lifestyle and other exposures;2)Develop/implement harmonized definitions of diseases;3)Improve biobanking and research technologies and develop innovative solutions facilitating high-quality, fair access to samples and data;4)Provide free transnational access by users, through study proposals selected by an open, pan-European call;5)In the framework of these studies, generate and provide access to whole genome sequences, transcriptome, proteome, metabolome and methylome data;6)Build new public-private partnerships involving large-scale prospective cohorts, and strengthening existing ones, allowing transparent industrial access to academic expertise;7) Build a network transferring the expertise of established European large-scale biobanks to new biobank initiatives under development in other countries. |
