New data hub aims to advance alternatives to animal testing

A research team at NYU Langone Health and Sage Bionetworks has been awarded a $25 million grant to establish the data hub and coordinating center for the National Institutes of Health's Complement-Animal Research in Experimentation (Complement-ARIE) program.

The mission of Complement-ARIE is to speed the development of new approach methodologies (NAMs). These lab- or computer-based testing approaches can more accurately model human biology and complement or replace traditional animal research models. Technologies to be developed include complex, often 3D, human-based cell systems (such as organoid or organ-on-a-chip platforms); computational, machine learning, or artificial intelligence models; and cell-free biochemical assays for toxicology screenings.

The NIH award to NYU Grossman School of Medicine and Sage is $5 million a year for five years, for a total of $25 million. The award will establish the NYU-Sage NAMs Data Hub and Coordination Center (NYU-Sage NDHCC), which will enable the standardization, harmonization, and sharing of datasets - from molecular tests to 3D cultures to simulated population outcomes - using a cloud architecture. The hub will serve as the consortium's backbone for data, metadata, code, and computational models; provide AI-augmented data curation and a framework for harmonizing NAMs data across the consortium; and be a source of analytical tools to help researchers work with datasets.

The NYU-Sage NDHCC will also foster collaboration among all components of the Complement-ARIE consortium through interactive workshops, benchmarking competitions for an extended community of researchers, and engagement with constituencies vested in the advances of NAMs technologies.