Abstract

Launched in 2001, the Biomedical Informatics Research Network (BIRN; http://www.nbirn.net) is an NIH - NCRR initiative that enables researchers to collaborate in an environment for biomedical research and clinical information management, focused particularly upon medical imaging. Although it supports a vast array of programs to transform and calculate upon medical images, three fundamental problems emerged that inhibited collaborations. The first was that the complexity of the programs, and at times legal restrictions, combined to prohibit these programs from being accessible to all members of the teams and indeed the general researcher, although this was a fundamental mission of the BIRN. Second, the calculations that needed to be performed were very complex, and required many steps that often needed to be performed by different groups. Third, many of the analysis programs were not interoperable. These problems combined to created tremendous logistical problems. The solution was to create a portal-based workflow application that allowed the complex, collaborative tasks to take place and enabled new kinds of calculations that had not previously been practical.