Connecting complex health datasets for research and translational impact

A secure, interconnected approach to managing massive health datasets is enabling Australian researchers to accelerate the path from biological discovery to clinical treatment across multiple disease areas. By establishing shared digital infrastructure for complex genomic, multi-omic, and clinical data, national research teams can now pool resources, protect sensitive information, and collaborate at an unprecedented scale.

The open-source data platform, Gen3, is able to support robust data ecosystems that are tailor-made for their users. Australian BioCommons is supporting multiple deployments through the GUARDIANS Program, helping national consortia management and share their human omics data holdings between research collaborators.

Originally developed at the University of Chicago to power National Institutes of Health (NIH) initiatives, Gen3 provides a secure and scalable framework to receive, manage, and describe large-scale datasets while ensuring secure, governed access for authorised users. BioCommons helped establish the international Gen3 Community Forum, and regularly interacts with the rapidly growing community of people wrangling large and complex research datasets in the cloud. 

Prof Bernard Pope, GUARDIANS Program Lead and A/Director (Human Genome Informatics) at Australian BioCommons, highlights the value of this approach:

‘Data commons are a key factor in impactful and collaborative genomic research. The ability to securely connect, govern, and analyse large datasets is increasingly important for translating research into meaningful clinical and health outcomes.’

‘Through the GUARDIANS Program, we have leveraged the capabilities of the Gen3 platform, which has already extensively been used by researchers on the global scale, to ensure Australian researchers have the tools to effectively work with the available genomic data.’ 

How is Gen3 being used in Australian health research?

BioCommons is implementing Gen3 platforms for multiple landmark national projects, demonstrating its versatility across diverse data types and research fields:

• Australian Cardiovascular disease Data Commons (ACDC): Led by the Baker Heart and Diabetes Institute, the ACDC securely pools multi-omics data, longitudinal outcomes, and imaging from approximately 400,000 individuals across 18 Australian cohorts to discover new risk markers for heart attacks

• Biological Psychiatry Data Commons (BPsyc-DC): Developed in partnership with the Consortium for Preclinical Psychiatric Research (CPPR), the BPsyc-DC will provide a national digital infrastructure to harmonise multi-omics data across cellular, animal, and human models of psychiatric disorders

•  Px4 Health: Led by the University of Melbourne, Px4 Health utilises cutting edge multi-omics technology and deep phenotyping to deliver an Australian first for personalised medicine. By providing a secure, end-to-end data solution, Px4 Health is underpinning major clinical initiatives in rare and chronic disease, as well as establishing a baseline of health data on a cross section of the community. 

Supported by recent additional NCRIS funding, GUARDIANS will implement additional data commons to expand participation for new priority health areas.

Register for the upcoming webinar ‘Launching the Australian Cardiovascular disease Data Commons’

Read more about the Biological Psychiatry Data Commons

Building the Biological Psychiatry Data Commons

The development of a new national resource is underway that will unite pre-clinical models, data and researchers to better understand mental disorders at the molecular level. It will support the discovery, management and analysis of harmonised multi-omics data across diverse psychiatric model systems, allowing researchers to move faster from discovery to clinical impact.

The Biological Psychiatry Data Commons (BPsyc-DC) is being built through a partnership between Australian BioCommons, Phenomics Australia, the Australian Research Data Commons (ARDC), Bioplatforms Australia and the Consortium for Preclinical Psychiatric Research (CPPR). It builds on the Australian Psychiatric Research Knowledge Bank initiative from the CPPR in conjunction with Bioplatforms Australia, which brings together CPPR-associated biosamples and datasets generated in partnership with national infrastructure organisations

The CPPR is a national collaboration led by Monash University researchers Prof Rachel Hill and Prof Suresh Sundram, and provides coordination and leadership for a nation-first effort to standardise and integrate large-scale molecular data generated from cellular, animal and human models of psychiatric disorders. 

‘The new Biological Psychiatry Data Commons will provide shared digital infrastructure, governance frameworks and interoperability,’ said Prof Rachel Hill.

‘It will support the progression from curated datasets toward an integrated, reusable national resource, and will help us accelerate the translation of biological discoveries into real-world clinical outcomes.’

How will a data commons impact preclinical research into mental disorders?

Mental disorders are among the leading contributors to disease burden in Australia and globally, yet progress toward biomarkers and disease-modifying treatments has been limited. Diagnoses remain largely symptom-based, and existing treatments are often only partially effective and are associated with significant side effects. This represents a major unmet medical need for individuals, families and communities affected by mental illness. 

A key barrier to progress in biological psychiatry is the fragmentation of research data. Insights into disease mechanisms are generated across cellular, animal and human studies, but these data are typically siloed, modest in scale, and challenging to integrate. The absence of shared infrastructure to harmonise, manage and analyse data across model systems limits statistical power, slows discovery, and constrains translation into clinical impact. 

At its core, the BPsyc-DC is a cloud-based data platform with appropriate ethical oversight and governance, enabling the research community to manage, analyse and share sensitive data responsibly while maximising reuse and impact.

The BPsyc-DC is designed to:

• Support harmonisation of multi-omics data across cellular, animal and human psychiatric models

• Enable secure, governed access to data under CPPR-led ethical and data governance frameworks

• Improved discoverability and reuse of psychiatric research data through FAIR principles and national catalogues

• Facilitate scalable, cross-cohort and cross-model analyses that increase statistical power and biological insight

• Interoperate with national and international research data infrastructure to support collaboration and sustainability.

As a foundational capability, the BPsyc-DC is built to expand over time. Future directions include the incorporation of additional data types (such as epigenomics, metabolomics, lipidomics, and immune or inflammatory phenotyping), scaling to support a broader range of mental disorder models, and integrating secure analytics environments and AI-enabled tools to enhance hypothesis generation.

Read more about the Biological Psychiatry Data Commons

Unlocking multi-omics data to transform cardiovascular precision medicine

The Australian Cardiovascular disease Data Commons (ACDC) is launching as a cloud-based research platform built to accelerate the discovery of new risk markers for heart attack and stroke. The ACDC aims to build a secure, scalable, internationally integrated data infrastructure connected to best practice analysis platforms to enable the identification of novel insights, therapeutic targets and predictive biomarkers for coronary artery disease. Ultimately, the platform will facilitate a translational pipeline to ensure the deployment and evaluation of these predictors within clinical practice.

Why is a national data commons needed for cardiovascular disease

There is a current, known clinical gap, with up to 27% of heart attack patients having none of the well-known risk factors when they initially present to a GP. These can include high blood pressure, cholesterol, diabetes or smoking, and many people with coronary artery disease go on to have a second, life-threatening event despite optimal treatment. The ACDC aims to tackle this gap by securely pooling multi-omics data, longitudinal outcomes, and imaging from approximately 400,000 individuals across 18 Australian cohorts.

Prof Peter J. Meikle (Project Lead, Baker Heart and Diabetes Institute) highlights the urgency behind the project:

‘We need to understand what's really driving disease in these patients who are flying under the radar. This data commons will speed up how quickly new health technologies reach patients, and we expect it will generate a new precision medicine ecosystem in Australia.’

Led by the Baker Institute, contributions from a diverse group of participants are co-ordinated by BioCommons. The Baker Institute, the Australian Cardiovascular Alliance (ACvA), the University of Sydney, 23Strands, CSL Limited, BioCommons, data custodians and other partners are working together on infrastructure establishment, cohort onboarding and harmonisation, testing, validation, use case exploration, user experience, documentation, training, governance and intellectual property arrangements. BioCommons leads the implementation of the critical digital infrastructure underpinning the ACDC as part of the Australian BioCommons Human Genome Informatics activity.

Find out more at the online launch webinar

If you would like to learn more, you are invited to join a live webinar on 30 September 2026, 12 - 1 pm AEST. The session, featuring Prof Peter J. Meikle and Dr Tingting Wang (Baker Institute), and Prof Bernie Pope (Australian BioCommons), will explore how ACDC connects researchers to high-throughput data and global analysis environments. 

Key topics include:  

• Development of the data commons: an overview of the cloud infrastructure, data harmonisation processes, and federated standards built on the Gen3 platform 

• Research value of the platform: how secure access to pooled multi-omics, genomic, and imaging cohorts enables researchers to discover new risk markers and test Polygenic Risk Scores.  

• Future clinical applications: how the ACDC will streamline translational pipelines to bring new diagnostic tools into clinical practice. 

Register for the webinar

Shaping the next phase of Australian human omics infrastructure

GUARDIANS program leads and project delivery partners from across Australia gathered this month for the third GUARDIANS partner meeting. Held in Melbourne, the two-day event provided a forum to showcase achievements, discuss challenges, and plan for the future of secure, responsible genomic data infrastructure in Australia.

As this Australian BioCommons program enters its third year, the focus of the community is shifting from building the technical foundations to delivering sustainable, impactful and scalable solutions. Reflecting on the progress made so far, Prof Bernie Pope, A/Director, Human Genome Informatics at Australian BioCommons and Lead for the GUARDIANS project, noted:

‘We have reached a major program milestone - Phase I successfully demonstrates that Australia now has the production-ready digital research infrastructure, services, and expertise necessary to support human omics research at scale. We look forward to continuing our work in Phase II of the program, delivering national impact and lasting value for the broader research community.’

How do we build data systems for the future?

The meeting featured a comprehensive schedule of partner presentations, collaborative problem-solving sessions, and insightful keynotes that framed the program’s real-world applications.

The opening talk was a powerful joint presentation titled ‘Building Data Systems for Indigenous Precision Healthcare’ that explored how ethical, culturally informed data governance is driving equitable health outcomes. Delivered by Adam Heterick, Bioinformatician at Black Ochre Labs, The Kids Research Institute Australia and the National Centre for Indigenous Genomics (NCIG), Australian National University, and A/Prof Jimmy Breen, Chief Data Scientist of the Indigenous Genomics research group at The Kids Research Institute Australia in Adelaide, the presentation highlighted the key message of being ‘Open as possible, closed as necessary’ and the need for relationship building.

On the second day, Dr Matilda Haas, Director at Genomics Australia, spoke on strategic priorities for integrating genomics into healthcare, which sparked valuable discussions around data governance, infrastructure, and future touchpoints with the Precision Health Initiative. By mapping out these intersections, the partners explored how to ensure the frameworks and solutions currently being built will effectively support downstream clinical applications. 

What lessons are important for the GUARDIANS Program in Phase II?

Discussions over the two days converged on two important themes:

1. Governance, trust and responsible data use need to be embedded from the beginning

   Governance needs to be considered throughout the data lifecycle, alongside technical design, access, security and community engagement. Building trust early and establishing clear, practical governance enables collaboration rather than creating barriers to it.

2. Interoperability and collaboration are key to getting greater value from what we have built

   The importance of shared standards, common approaches, connected services and the ability for different environments to work together. The value of the infrastructure increases dramatically when services are connected and capabilities can be reused across projects rather than developed independently.

A new GUARDIANS website has been launched that shows how all of the strategic partners and activities are coming together to shape a new Australia's human omics ecosystem. It offers a comprehensive view on individual project updates, pilot services, and collaborative achievements from across the entire network.

Explore the GUARDIANS website

Global collaboration advancing AI and biomedical data infrastructure

As part of a week-long international engagement program, BioCommons brought together research data infrastructure experts from the USA, Finland, New Zealand and across Australia. The Human Genome Informatics division at BioCommons hosted Prof Robert Grossman, University of Chicago, the founder and lead of the Gen3 platform, to strengthen the collaborative and technical capability required to build world-class human genomics and biomedical data infrastructure in Australia.

Participants engaged in a series of strategic discussions and technical demonstrations focused on solving the complex challenges of data commons development, federated data access, security and governance frameworks, and international interoperability initiatives. 

Reflecting on the growing importance of research data infrastructure, Prof Matthew Watt, Associate Dean Research at the University of Melbourne’s Faculty of Medicine, Dentistry and Health Sciences, noted that ‘well-designed data ecosystems are no longer optional - they are foundational infrastructure for modern biomedical discovery.’

Prof Robert Grossman presenting during his seminar at the University of Melbourne

A particular highlight of the week was a seminar, ‘In Praise of Midscale Language Models and AI Commons and Their Applications to Biology, Medicine and Healthcare’, which sparked significant interest in how secure infrastructure can support the next generation of AI-driven biomedical research.

The discussions highlighted the value of strong international collaboration in advancing secure, scalable, and interoperable approaches to genomics and health data sharing, while also strengthening relationships across the global research infrastructure community. Participants noted the high quality of strategic conversations, which not only strengthened relationships but also reaffirmed Australia’s position as a leader in deploying these sophisticated systems.

How is Gen3 utilised in Australian human genomics research?

The Gen3 platform provides a robust framework to receive, manage, and describe massive datasets, allowing them to be shared securely with authorised users. It is the technology behind numerous US National Institutes of Health (NIH) projects that house data from hundreds of thousands of samples.

BioCommons has successfully led the implementation of Gen3 platforms for several landmark national projects, demonstrating our capability to adapt global best practices for the Australian research landscape. These include:

• OMIX3: Led by the University of Melbourne, OMIX3 utilises mass spectrometry to enable the parallel collection of proteomics, metabolomics and lipidomics data, and is the first successful implementation of a Gen3 platform outside of the USA.

• Australian Cardiovascular disease Data Commons (ACDC): Led by the Baker Heart and Diabetes Institute, ACDC provides a secure, Gen3-powered infrastructure to pool data from 400,000 individuals across 18 clinical cohorts. 

• Biological Psychiatry Data Commons (BPsych-DC): Led by the Consortium for Preclinical Psychiatric Research, providing a national digital infrastructure to harmonise multi-omics data across cellular, animal and human psychiatric models, bridging the gap between discovery and clinical impact

Prof Bernard Pope, GUARDIANS Program Lead and A/Director (Human Genome Informatics) at BioCommons, reflected on the highlights of the week: 

‘Data commons are the backbone of collaborative genomic research. The ability to securely connect, govern, and analyse large-scale datasets is increasingly critical for translating research discoveries into meaningful health and clinical impact.’

‘The success of projects like OMIX3 and ACDC is built on years of shared expertise between our team and the architects of Gen3. By hosting international experts through the GUARDIANS program, we are ensuring that Australian researchers have access to the same secure, scalable technologies that power the world’s largest genomic projects.’

Take a closer look at the GUARDIANS Program: https://www.biocommons.org.au/guardians

Global genomic data sharing enabled by purpose-built platform

A new secure data sharing platform, called SeqHaven, is facilitating the transfer of large volumes of human genomics research data in Australia. Delivered by the QIMR Berghofer Genome Informatics and Medical Genomics teams as part of the GUARDIANS program of work, the new service has streamlined the way massive genomic datasets are shared.

What does the data sharing platform do?

The platform is a dedicated, scalable system that provides an environment for safely and efficiently transferring large volumes of genomic data generated by QIMR Berghofer's researchers. Significantly, it recently shared the first major dataset using technology built for GUARDIANS, and will go on to underpin the sharing of resources such as the International Cancer Genome Consortium’s (ICGC) datasets on melanoma and pancreatic cancers. 

The tailored infrastructure is helping to relieve a technical bottleneck in collaborative research, which has enabled QIMR Berghofer to share data with collaborators in Australia and globally. As with all components of the national GUARDIANS project, strict privacy and confidentiality requirements have been a priority. Access and data governance are supported by the QIMR Berghofer Data Access Committee, who ensure responsible transfer of genomic data that always respects the wishes of research participants.

The platform uses Globus to securely transfer large files between research organisations in Australia and overseas, enabling genomic research data to be made available to verified researchers via controlled access. This demonstration of a scalable solution to a common challenge used AARNet’s Globus service to share large-scale data across organisational boundaries and international borders.

How will this impact researchers?

The ability to move large volumes of data without compromising security is an integral requirement for genomics. Increased data sharing improves statistical power, supports new insights from existing datasets, and promotes collaboration across institutions to accelerate discovery and improve health outcomes. The new platform allows researchers to leverage valuable datasets, with data custodians being confident that rigorous data governance policies are in place.

‘The SeqHaven platform is a game-changer in how we, as researchers, manage collaborations and data sharing,’ says John Pearson, Project Lead at QIMR Berghofer. ‘It allows us to move big data while protecting our systems and, ultimately, our participants.’

This sentiment is echoed by BioCommons A/Director (Human Genome Informatics) and GUARDIANS program lead, Prof Bernie Pope:

‘This national collaboration is a prime example of how the GUARDIANS program is uplifting our national research infrastructure to help researchers easily discover, access and analyse human genomics research data.’’

Learn more

QIMR Berghofer welcomes further enquiries from the Australian genomics community about sharing their data by contacting the QIMR Berghofer Data Access Committee.

You can hear more from John Pearson, Manager, Genome Informatics Group, QIMR Berghofer Medical Research Institute, about the development of the SeqHaven platform and the integration of Globus software, along with other life science applications in the upcoming BioCommons webinar: Globus: moving large volumes of research data with ease.

GUARDIANS partners gather in Brisbane to align on national human omics infrastructure

Partners collaborating on the future of Australia’s human omics research data ecosystem gathered in Brisbane this month for their second in-person meeting. This effort is driven by the GUARDIANS program that is delivering digital research infrastructure for human omics data nationally.

Building a complex national ecosystem for this data demands more than just the technical tools, it needs active collaboration and a genuine community of practice. Coming together to review the foundational achievements of Year 1 of the program and strategically align activities for Year 2, the meeting fostered an environment of open communication, mutual learning, and collective problem-solving across the two days.

The first day  of the program focused on partner presentations, with teams highlighting their progress and challenges. These covered data commons deployments, data access control frameworks, and platform integration, and the presentations concluded with an engaging retrospective discussion.

A/Prof Natalie Taylor, UNSW, speaking on ‘Implementation to Impact’

Partners and GUARDIANS team members at QIMR Berghofer

A highlight of the day was the keynote presentation on ‘Implementation to Impact’ from A/Prof Natalie Taylor, UNSW, speaking to systematic approaches to bridge the gap between research evidence and clinical practice. She challenged the attendees to design infrastructure not just for technical functions, but for real-world adoption to deliver real health outcomes. 

The second day focused on practical applications, featuring a series of workshops to showcase the progress and frameworks across the project. An integrated data access and release management workflow was demonstrated by the Collaborative Centre for Genomic Cancer Medicine, the Garvan Institute of Medical Research showcased their Elsa, CTRL and REMS tools, and QIMR Berghofer gave a highly practical review of consent and the data access request process.

The session from the GUARDIANS’s Ethical, Legal, and Social Implications (ELSI) team navigated through the complexities of cross-border omics data governance. This was complemented by the ‘Threat Modelling’ workshop run by the BioCommons Cybersecurity Specialist. Finally, GUARDIANS Project Managers led a workshop to identify concrete opportunities for inter-organisational interoperability in Year 2, ensuring future efforts are integrated rather than siloed.

The strategic discussions and practical demonstrations in Brisbane showed that progress is being made towards a national human omics research data ecosystem. 

“Reflecting on Year 1, the significant outcomes include technical tools and infrastructure, and also the genuine community of practice and collaborative environment we’ve built,” said Prof Bernie Pope, A/Director (Human Genome Informatics) at BioCommons and Lead for the GUARDIANS project.

“This foundation will be crucial as we tackle increasingly complex challenges in delivering this national data ecosystem. ” 

Read more about the GUARDIANS program

ELSI presentation on ‘Omics Data Beyond Borders - Law, Ethics and Governance’

GUARDIANS team and partners discussing collaboration opportunities

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The GUARDIANS program is accelerating human omics research in Australia through the development of world-class digital infrastructure. The program is led by Australian BioCommons with contributions from partner organisations including the Australian Access Federation, Children’s Cancer Institute Australia, Garvan Institute of Medical Research, National Computational Infrastructure, QIMR Berghofer Medical Research Institute, The University of Melbourne, and The University of Sydney. GUARDIANS forms part of Australian BioCommons’ Human Genome Informatics Initiative and receives National Collaborative Research Infrastructure Strategy (NCRIS) support through Bioplatforms Australia.

Building a trusted ecosystem to accelerate research: the Australian Cardiovascular disease Data Commons

A new paper describing the progress and vision of the Australian Cardiovascular disease Data Commons (ACDC) project has been published in Nature Reviews Cardiology. This national-scale project is designed to accelerate the fight against Australia’s single biggest killer through creating a comprehensive, secure, scalable and internationally integrated data infrastructure, offering cardiovascular researchers around the world the opportunity to uncover the hidden drivers of disease risk and progression, as well as patient recovery and survivorship.

Authors Corey Giles and Peter J. Meikle from the Baker Heart and Diabetes Institute (Baker Institute) describe how the ACDC project will provide researchers with secure access to pooled data from approximately 400,000 individuals across 18 clinical and population cohorts within Australia.

These cohorts contain a wealth of diverse information, including rich omics phenotyping, genotyping data, longitudinal cardiovascular outcomes, and comprehensive imaging data.

The path to a comprehensive, secure, scalable, and internationally integrated data infrastructure connected to global best practice analysis platforms includes many complex phases. Led by the Baker Institute, contributions from a diverse group of participants are co-ordinated by BioCommons. Baker Heart and Diabetes Institute, ACvA, University of Sydney, 23Strands, CSL Limited, BioCommons, data custodians and other partners are working together on infrastructure establishment, cohort onboarding and harmonisation, testing, validation, use case exploration, user experience, documentation, training, governance and intellectual property arrangements. BioCommons leads the implementation of the critical digital infrastructure underpinning ACDC as part of the Australian BioCommons Human Genome Informatics activity.

The highly collaborative project receives advice and oversight from a multi-disciplinary Scientific Advisory Committee made up of clinicians, researchers, digital infrastructure experts, and consumer representatives. The group has representatives from BioCommons, Baker Heart and Diabetes Institute, University of Sydney, University of Tasmania, Busselton Health Study, RENCI, NHLBI, University of Chicago, Broad Institute, HeartBeat Victoria, as well as a large number of data custodians. They are responsible for shaping the scientific objectives of the platform and providing feedback to the Project Management Committee to ensure that the development and implementation of the ACDC platform aligns with those objectives.

The ACDC project is synchronising the efforts and experiences of a large and diverse group of experts who together can advance the early detection of disease processes and the discovery of new disease-modifying pathways that contribute to cardiovascular disease development.

Read the paper Building the Australian Cardiovascular disease Data Commons.

Learn more about how BioCommons is implementing the ACDC infrastructure.

The ACDC project is led by the Baker Heart and Diabetes Institute and funded by Bioplatforms Australia and the Medical Research Future Fund (MRFF 2022 National Critical Research Infrastructure Grant: Building an Australian Cardiovascular disease Data Commons). Additional contributions are being made by the Baker Heart and Diabetes Institute, ACvA, University of Sydney, 23Strands, CSL Limited, Australian BioCommons, data custodians and other partners.

Partners meet to start building the digital infrastructure needed for human genomics research though GUARDIANS

A diverse group came together, including special guest Dr Melissa Konopko from ELIXIR who is standing here with BioCommons’ Prof Bernie Pope.

Australian researchers are set to make significant strides in discovering, accessing, and analysing human genomics data. The first in-person meeting of a significant new collaboration brought together partners who are committed to implementing the Australian BioCommons’ GUARDIANS program.

The meeting in Sydney represented the start of two years of implementation work as part of the GUARDIANS mission to empower Australian researchers to easily and securely discover, access, analyse and use human genomics data across national infrastructure, using the latest tools and resources.

The project brings Australian BioCommons together with Australian Access Federation, Children's Cancer Institute / ZERO, Garvan Institute of Medical Research, National Computational Infrastructure (NCI), QIMR Berghofer Institute of Medical Research, University of Melbourne, and University of Sydney. The project builds on years of foundational work in the Human Genomes Platform Project which also included a funded program and contracted schedules of work with partners. 

This first GUARDIANS meeting helped to build a sense of shared purpose as the group established effective ways of working together across their diverse organisations. Explorations into the policies, processes, and technologies that will be required during the project were driven by the open exchange of ideas, and collaborative discussions on solutions to potential challenges.

Scientific Product Manager at ELIXIR, Dr Melissa Konopko, travelled from the UK to share her insights into the Genomic Data Infrastructure (GDI). There were many parallels to learn from this project which is enabling access to genomic and related phenotypic and clinical data across Europe through establishing a federated, sustainable and secure infrastructure to access the data. 

Explore how GUARDIANS is accelerating human genomics and related omics research in Australia through the development of world-class digital infrastructure.

Contact us if you’d like to learn more.

Creative collisions: Bio Day a hit at Supercomputing Asia 2024

This month's Supercomputing Asia (SCA) conference featured a dedicated ‘Bio Day’ which focused on the intersection of biology and computing. Life scientists were enthusiastically invited to interact with the Asia Pacific high performance computing (HPC) community at the Sydney event. The conference organisers offered special access to almost 40 researchers and research infrastructure providers who were keen to participate in the biology-focused sessions. This extra support to add the unique voice of life scientists to the HPC forum was generously provided through Bioplatforms Australia's platinum sponsorship of the event.

Bio Day commenced with Prof Alex Brown, Director - National Centre for Indigenous Genomics, delivering a keynote presentation ‘Towards a National Indigenous genomics Ecosystem within Australia.’ As Professor of Indigenous Genomics at the Telethon Kids Institute and The Australian National University, Alex is an internationally leading Aboriginal clinician/researcher who has worked his entire career in Aboriginal health in the provision of public health services, infectious diseases and chronic disease care, health care policy and research.

Later, sessions titled ‘Building the Foundation: Genomic Data Infrastructure for Precision Medicine and Beyond’ showcased several key pieces of research infrastructure that Australian BioCommons has developed to support life scientists including:

• The Australian BioCommons Leadership Share (ABLeS)

• The Australian Alphafold Service

• The newly funded GUARDIANS project

• A pilot program bringing Seqera Platform to Australian researchers

Some of BioCommons’ significant national partners such as the Australian Amphibian and Reptile Genomics Initiative (AusARG) and international collaborators ELIXIR were also showcased on Bio Day. Additionally, Dr Kate Michie’s (UNSW) talk revealed the ‘Transformative Impact of Deep Learning on Accelerating Molecular Research: A Focus on AlphaFold2 and its Implementation Challenges.’ The Skills and Training Track on the same day also featured our training guru, Dr Melissa Burke, presenting our unique Training Cooperative model.

Sessions held on Bio Day illuminated the unique challenges that bioinformatics research brings to HPC, including:

• Episodic and extended access is required for compute resources

• Compute use is reliant on experimental outcomes, and difficult to predict in advance

• Software is diverse, rapidly evolving, and in many cases not optimised for HPC

• Researchers may have limited experience working in HPC environments

The light shone on these unique challenges stimulated some uncommon conversations at SCA, which aim to improve life science researchers' access to appropriate and scalable bioinformatics methods and compute resources. Dr Johan Gustafsson, Bioinformatics Engagement Officer at BioCommons said:

The conference was a unique opportunity to bring two worlds together - researchers working hard in their particular field of biology don’t normally attend HPC conferences, and vice versa. So it was great to see them starting to speak the same language!

Uwe Winter, BioCloud DevOps Engineer at BioCommons attended a workshop on the recently launched Trillion Parameter Consortium (TPC), a group formed to address the challenges of building large-scale artificial intelligence (AI) systems and advancing trustworthy and reliable AI for scientific research.

Discussions at the TPC workshop brought up a lot of exciting ideas on utilising AI in a fully automated research environment. I was inspired to hear TPC’s future plans and can’t wait to apply them to BioCommons infrastructure for the benefit of Australian researchers!

Overall, Bio Day at SCA was a fantastic chance to continue important conversations around the specialised support and infrastructure that life scientists need. BioCommons extends our thanks to Bioplatforms Australia for their sponsorship and to the conference organisers for running a successful event.