INBIOMEDvision Reports
The INBIOMEDvision project (http://www.inbiomedvision.eu) has produced reports on two of the project's think tank sessions. The reports have been requested by the European Commission in order to ascertain the status of the bioinformatics/biomedical informatics interface today within Europe and globally; future funding will benefit from the opportunities and gaps identified within these reports.
1) "Strategic Report for Translational Systems Biology and Bioinformatics in the European Union".
This white paper was prepared in order to assess the opportunities and obstacles that confront us in facilitating a translational role for bioinformatics and systems biology in drug discovery and clinical medicine. The report represents the consensus outcome of intensive discussions among 23 invited world-leading experts who participated in a Think Tank convened in Barcelona, Spain, on 17 October 2011.
We see potential in sub-cellular (or molecular) systems biology approaches to biomedicine, as compared to conventional methods of drug design. Despite these approaches being at an infant state, and a vast amount of research remains to be done, they may be able to assist in more personalised approaches to drug treatment, for example in the use of multi-target therapy for finding genotype association to risk of disease and drug response. For translational systems biology to make a major impact, the whole system of data access (including access to medical records) needs to be transformed into one based on more openness and sharing of information between hospitals, academia and industry. Various societal structures currently impede this development. Regulatory and funding agencies must be involved to overcome these obstacles.
Available at
http://www.inbiomedvision.eu/PDF/Report-TranslationalBioinformatics-FINA...
2) "Strategic Report on Genotype-Phenotype Resources in the European Union".
This white paper was prepared to assess the opportunities and obstacles that confront us as Europe plans to make full use of the integration of genome-based data resources with resources detailing disease-based and other human phenotypes. The report represents the consensus outcome of intensive discussions among 17 invited experts who participated in a Think Tank convened in Brussels, Belgium on 5 October 2011.
The report addresses prospects for the development and application of genotype-phenotype resources, considering them to be very promising. Establishing clear relationships (correlations) between increasing amounts of genotypic information available from clinical studies (e.g. as provided by genome wide association studies (GWAS)), and similarly of phenotype information at the population level, is still largely impossible today. Indeed, assuming that genotype controls phenotype in all situations is very unlikely to be correct. Indeed there are rather general grounds for thinking that establishing such correlations will always be fraught with difficulty. This approach advocated also assists in “stratification” – instead of rejecting so many drugs during clinical trials, it could be that many deemed to be failures today will work well for sets of patients on genotypic/phenotypic grounds.
Available at
http://www.inbiomedvision.eu/PDF/Report-GenotypePhenotype-FINAL.pdf
A further report, on the re-use of clinical data in translational research, will be distributed shortly.
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