Cross-departmental Center B: Data Science

Description

High quality research data are essential for epidemiological research. Generally, it is not possible to fully exploit the potential of the research data generated in individual research projects given their typically narrow focus and limited duration. These data frequently offer the opportunity to investigate further questions that may not have been foreseen at the time of project inception or could not have been answered within the context of the individual project. In order to fully exploit this potential in terms of efficient use of resources, there have been increasing demands to publish research data and share them with external researchers (data sharing). To this end, research data should be provided in accordance with the so-called FAIR Guiding Principles: According to these principles, research data should be findable, accessible, interoperable, and reusable by third parties. This means that data-generating institutions such as BIPS will face the necessity to significantly increase the efforts for data processing and documentation in order to enable meaningful third-party use in compliance with all legal and ethical requirements. At the same time, data sharing offers the opportunity to address own research by additionally analyzing external data sources and to develop novel research questions by combining various external data sources with own data.

The Cross-departmental Center for Research Data Infrastructure and Data Science in Epidemiology is directly linked to the scientific director and accommodates staff from all departments, with a major focus on Department of Biometry and Data Management. The cross-departmental center targets two areas: (A) research data infrastructure and management and (B) the methodological competence in the field of data science. In each area, we will focus on two model projects to address the particular requirements of primary and secondary data.

In model project B1, we will establish a research group that will conduct a pooling study to determine reference values for clinically relevant biomarkers in children: Biomarkers4Pediatrics - International Multicohort Pediatric Biomarker Collaboration. This will build on a previously published special issue in the International Journal of Obesity "Filling the gap: international reference values for health care in children" (edited by Ahrens W, Moreno LA, Pigeot I). The research group will identify suitable biomarker studies worldwide, assess their data quality and establish collaborations with them. The data from the participating studies will subsequently be calibrated and harmonized, virtually pooled and analyzed using federated data analyses.

In Model project B2, we will conduct a pharmacoepidemiological study on new cancer therapeutics under the leadership of BIPS together with international partners using harmonized large European registry and secondary data sources. We will use approaches to standardize data sources with so-called common data models and then analyze the data locally with standardized scripts, which has been shown to be the most feasible way to conduct international pharmacoepidemiolocial studies in compliance with data protection regulations. The established methods and collaborations can also be used for other projects and will secure the international competitiveness of the BIPS in pharmacoepidemiological research.

Funding period

Begin:   January 2023
End:   December 2025

Sponsor

  • AV-WGL

Contact

Prof. Dr. rer. nat. Iris Pigeot

Links

Cross-departmental Center A: Research Data Infrastructure (German)

Cross-departmental Center A: Research Data Infrastructure (English)

Biomarkers4Pediatrics - International Multicohort Pediatric Biomarker Collaboration

Selected project-related publications

    Articles with peer-review

  • Swenne A, Veidebaum T, Tornaritis M, Dello Russo M, Moreno LA, Molnár D, Mårild S, De Henauw S, Pigeot I, Pohlabeln H. Reliability of parental recall of birth weight, birth length and gestational age in the multicenter cohort study IDEFICS. Maternal and Child Health Journal. 2024;28(12):2071-2085.
    https://doi.org/10.1007/s10995-024-04009-y
  • Presentations at scientific meetings/conferences (invited)

  • Intemann T, Dreger S, Wolters M, Hebestreit A, Iqbal K, Aleksandrova K, Ahrens W, Pigeot I, De Henauw S, Kelishadi R, Lauria F, Lissner L, Molnár D, Moreno LA, Tornaritis M, Veidebaum T. Upscaling from African to global initiatives for child growth curves: International multicohort pediatric biomarker collaboration (Biomarkers4Pediatrics) and childhood hypertension consortium of South Africa (CHCSA). World Congress of Epidemiology, 24-27 September 2024, Cape Town, South Africa.
  • Ahrens W. Determinants of eating behaviour in European children, adolescents and their parents: Overview & key findings. 9th Cyprus Public Health Workshop, 3 October 2023, Limassol, Cyprus.
  • Intemann T. Federated analyses in epidemiological studies using DataSHIELD. DFG Sino-German collaboration workshop on statistical methods on lifestyle intervention studies and sharing data, 20 October 2023, Beijing, China.
  • Presentations at scientific meetings/conferences

  • Mändle A. Interactive dashboard for analysing and visualizing data through DataSHIELD. DataSHIELD Statistical Development Theme Meetings, 2 July 2024, online presentation.
  • Swenne A, Intemann T, Pigeot I. Federated generalized additive models for location, scale and shape in DataSHIELD. Monthly Meeting of the DataSHIELD Statistical Development Theme, 7 March 2024, online presentation.
  • Swenne A, Intemann T, Pigeot I. Federated generalized additive models for location, scale and shape in DataSHIELD. 70th Biometric Colloquium, 28 February-1 March 2024, Lübeck.
  • Posters at scientific meetings/conferences

  • Intemann T, Dreger S, Wolters M, Hebestreit A, Iqbal K, Aleksandrova K, Ahrens W, Pigeot I, De Henauw S, Kelishadi R, Lauria F, Lissner L, Molnár D, Moreno LA, Tornaritis M, Veidebaum T. Biomarkers4Pediatrics - International multicohort pediatric biomarker collaboration. World Congress of Epidemiology, 24-27 September 2024, Cape Town, South Africa.