The Cancer Gene Trust (CGT) is a decentralized distributed database of cancer variants and clinical data.
Stewards working directly with patient-participants publish de-identified somatic cancer variants and basic clinical data. Researchers who find rare variants or combinations of variants in this global resource that are associated with specific clinical features of interest may then contact the data stewards for those participants.
The initial prototype implementation leverages IPFS for decentralized storage and distribution, and Ethereum for authentication, authorization, and accounting.
A submission consists of a JSON manifest file containing basic de-identified clinical data and references to one or more VCF files. The manifest and VCF files are published to IPFS and the path to the manifest file is added to an Ethereum block chain under the steward's account.
Maximilian Haeussler developed the initial Ethereum contracts and IPFS command line submission tool. In addition a simple prototype submission web server is under development.
To get involved join the discussion at the CGT mailing list