The Rheumatic Disease Research Informatics Core (RIC, Informatics Core) provides biomedical informatics expertise and infrastructure to the Cincinnati Rheumatic Diseases Core Center (CRDCC) Research Base at the Cindrmati Ctiildren's Research Foundation (CCRF) of Cincinnati Children's Hospital Medical Center (CCHMC), and the University of Cindnnati College of Medicine (UCCOM). Research data management and bioinformatics analyses are essential components of rheumatology research programs at CCRF, espedaily as data streams from expression microarrays, flow cytometry and genotyping have increased. Investigators have learned to rely on easy, secure access to curated, reliable clinical and genomic data, as well as analysis tools. Access to informatics expertise through the Informatics Core will continue to enable the Research Base to imdertake large-scale, multi-institutional, data and processing-intensive research projects. While Informatics Core staff contribute their own background and expertise, they also see themselves as facilitators of access to the larger pool of informatics expertise at the institution (including the Division of Biomedical Informatics). Thus, the Informatics Core is the Research Base's gateway to state-of-the-art biomedical informatics support. The prindpal functions of the RIC are: ? Provide research data management expertise and tools for the Research Base. This includes support for flow cytometry, expression and genetic microarray data and management, as well as design and implementation of clirucal research data acquisition tools. ? Develop irmovative, web-based informatics solutions and bioiriformatics expertise to fadiitate integrative analysis of genomic data, including expression microarrays and genome-wide SNP data. The RIC proposes several significant enhancements to a GWADB (genome-wide association database), a custom-built web-based software application that has been at die center of genome-wide association studies (GWAS) for JIA undertaken in the Division of Rheumatology. Furthermore, the RIC will continue to support analyses of JIA gene expression data using state-of-the-art tools. Design and implement web-based, user-friendly informatics tools to measure and assure high quality and efficiency of CRDCC services. Part of this effort consists of deployment of user survey tools as well as monitoring tools that meeisure utilization of CRDCC services. Furthermore, the RIC develops billing and scheduling tools that increase accuracy and transparency of CRDCC services. The availability of the unique resource of the Informatics Core is essential to enabling defirutive genomic and dinical studies necessary to understand and define childhood rheumatic diseases.
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