CYNAPSE: supporting health data research

A transformational computational infrastructure providing systematic, standardised data storage and a secure cloud-based research environment. With a view to enabling equitable access, CYNAPSE aims to facilitate discovery and translational research whilst working towards state-of-the-art federation capabilities.

Introducing CYNAPSE

Many modern health research studies, such as the Genomics England 100,000 Genomes project and the UK Biobank, collect and investigate biological samples from many thousands of people. This research creates vast amounts of data about their genetics and other biological information and how this relates to health and disease. The very large, very valuable datasets produced by these, and other projects, are currently held in many locations, and each differs in the way that it is recorded and stored. This makes it challenging for different research groups to make use of each other’s data, even within the same organisation. If data were held and saved in a standardised way, scientists could work with each other's information more easily, maximising the usefulness – and potential benefit to patients – of each dataset.

Researcher booklet Expression of Interest

CYNAPSE aims to improve this situation locally by developing improved data connection systems (known as 'infrastructure') across the Cambridge Biomedical Campus, providing a standardised system for researchers to store and access data so that information can be shared and used more efficiently. Developing improved oversight ('governance') processes is an important part of CYNAPSE too, ensuring that data are well-managed and fairly accessed, including by research groups that do not have access to large computational resources. The CYNAPSE team are working with the company Lifebit, who are building this new software platform and cloud-based TRE (Lifebit CloudOS).

The platform

The CYNAPSE platform, powered by Lifebit CloudOS, brings a next-generation computational infrastructure to enable secure analytics in a scalable, flexible, and more collaborative way.

Lifebit have an extensive track-record of keeping data secure and running the platform at scale in the cloud (ISO 27001 certified). They will continue to work on future developments and features which deliver excellent functionality for discovery and translational research.

CYNAPSE will co-create improved oversight processes with patients and the public to ensure data are well-managed and accessible to all levels of users, whether strongly computational or otherwise. The result will be an inclusive platform which enables discovery as well as clinical research.

Platform