Australian Environmental Microbiome Research Data Cloud
This project has been completed (Q4 2018).
The information below may be out of date,
and is provided for historical purposes only.
Microbes are fundamental to human and ecosystem health. They mediate biogeochemical and nutrient cycling, are integral to the productions of crops, livestock and textiles, are responsible for disease and its treatment, provide clean drinking water and the means to mitigate waste/pollution. Understanding the combined genetic material of the microorganisms in their environment is of broad national and international utility for academic researchers, industry and government agencies, but it was only accessible to skilled bioinformaticians and this limits its potential.
In March 2018 we started work on the Australian Environmental Microbiome Research Data Cloud project to link significant national biological datasets with national biosciences computational infrastructure and services funded through the National Collaborative Research Infrastructure Strategy. These datasets map the Australian environmental microbial terrestrial and marine environments and result from over $10m of effort spent developing them through the Biomes of Australian Soil Environments (BASE) consortium, and the Marine Microbes (MM) consortium respectively.
Experts from the Centre for Comparative Genomics (CCG) at Murdoch University, Queensland Cyber Infrastructure Foundation (QCIF), Melbourne Bioinformatics, the Atlas of Living Australia, CSIRO and the EMBL Australia Bioinformatics Resource (EMBL-ABR) deployed a new cloud-based analysis system to make this data easier to find, analyse and interpret, curated according to FAIR principles.
Through this project it is now easier for biologists, not just skilled bioinformaticians, to interrogate the data using existing technology platforms like the Australian-made Genomics Virtual Laboratory. Via the Bioplatforms Australia Data Portal, experts will ensure that throughout any research project lifecycle, the data is continually updated to permanent international metagenomics repositories.
For more information, see Australian Microbiome Initiative.