Locator – Federated Search Across Biobanks

Locator is the central tool of the BBMRI-ERIC Federated Platform, a decentralised system that allows researchers to search across data from European biobanks while ensuring that all data remain within the local institutional environment. It provides aggregated information on biological material and related clinical data without transferring any identifiable or sensitive information outside the biobank. The system allows the researcher to fine-tune the query until a reasonably high number of candidate samples is achieve. Then a formal access request can be submitted and conditions for the biological material sharing negotiated.

Bridgehead - the local component

When a researcher runs a search query in the Locator the local components (Bridgeheads) of the connected biobanks pull the query and process it locally. The results of the queries are sent back to the Locator and aggregated following privacy preservation policies.

There is a FHIR repository (Blaze Store) within the Bridgehead where transformed and harmonised data is stored. The data comes from the hospital information system (HIS) and is processed through Extract-Transform-Load (ETL) process. Data is extracted, pseudonymised, converted to the HL7 FHIR standard and loaded into the Blaze Store. This ensures that all data is standardised and ready for federated queries.

The ETL process in the Czech biobanks is supported by a FHIR module application developed by BBMRI.cz IT team.