Clinical cytometry in the cloud: an ESCCA project to bring cytometry data to modern multidisciplinary translational research platforms

Cytometry constitutes a significant scientific domain of the big data era where the produced data-sets can easily grow beyond the available local management and analysis resources. The continuing increase in volume and complexity is the price to pay for the sustained evolution towards more precise, accurate and detailed results. Translational research, the critical bridge between lab and clinic, is a fertile big data field where the vast amount of information is being generated in a multidimensional space and cytometry plays a vital role not only as a single dimension, but also as an important member of most others. The complicate and abstract nature of translational research, which can be described as applying ideas, insights, and discoveries to the treatment and prevention of human disease, further intensifies the big data phenomena. Such increased complexity, volume and transdisciplinarity transforms data into a chaotic system that can only be elevated to information by the use of tailor-made computational tools. Discovering new pathways to handle and analyze big data is a one-way street to ensure the discoveries which will advance into human trials have the highest possible safety and efficacy. The digital evolution of the cloud computational services, aiming to improve accuracy, efficiency, productivity, resources consumption and ease of use, is the emerging platform of modern translational research. Cloud services represent a new approach in computer science where software and hardware become irrelevant and the only concern is the quality of service. Translational research cloud systems [such as transMART] readily process the majority of biomedical data such as clinical, gene expression, small and double region genomic variants, SNP, RNAseq, aCGH, proteomics, RBM, metabolomics and miRNA and enjoy support which extends beyond just reading data values to the interpretation of data properties and understanding the underlying relationships. Even though it is a vital field of drug discovery, part of most OMICs data production and one of the most requested features by tranSMART community, cytometry is not currently handled by the platform. ESCCA is taking actions to bring cytometry back on top of the research chain, by designing and implementing an international project, open to ESCCA members, that will create the necessary scientific guidelines and tools needed to include cytometric markers in the cloud processes of data management, integration and analysis.