Collaboration, Visualization Tool Speeds Vital Cancer Research at Biomedical Center
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Windows Vista Customer Solution Case Study Collaboration, Visualization Tool Speeds Vital Cancer Research at Biomedical Center Overview “People are predicting that … housing your data in Country or Region: United States SharePoint so that it can be collaborated on and Industry: Biotechnology looked at in different ways will become the pattern in Customer Profile scientific research for many years to come.” The Scripps Research Institute in La Jolla, California, is one of the largest private, Tim Huckaby. CEO, InterKnowlogy nonprofit biomedical research organizations in the United States and a With mountains of data created daily, The Scripps Research world leader in the structure of biological molecules. Institute, a world-renowned cancer and biomedical research facility, needed to help scientists and doctors from a variety of disciplines Business Situation Scientists at Scripps Research wanted a link their work on potential cancer treatments with the latest better way to organize biological research research. Scripps Research turned to InterKnowlogy, a Microsoft® information and share it with their colleagues. Gold Certified Partner with experience in developing custom applications. Using the Microsoft .NET Framework 3.0, Windows Solution Vista™, and Microsoft Office SharePoint® Server 2007, An application built on the Microsoft® .NET Framework 3.0 with Windows® InterKnowlogy created an application that allows researchers to Presentation Foundation, and Windows Vista™ gives scientists a powerful tool to examine 3-D models of cancer cell proteins, annotate the models visualize and annotate research results. with relevant data, and then share notes with colleagues. Benefits Researchers now spend less time searching for data and more time Faster scientific collaboration developing potential treatment solutions. To further streamline Easier access to data Dynamic development process communication, Scripps Research plans to add Microsoft Exchange Server 2007. Situation With researchers in multiple disciplines Fast facts The Scripps Research Institute in La Jolla, urgently needing better tools to manage the California, is a world-renowned cancer and mountains of data they create every day, Number of developers 2 biomedical research facility where scientists Scripps Research turned to InterKnowlogy, a Estimated weeks to 6 and doctors from a variety of disciplines work Microsoft® Gold Certified Partner with complete together to link cancer treatments with the extensive experience in custom application Developer tools Visual Studio 2005 latest research on cancer-fighting drugs. development on the Microsoft .NET Programming Visual C# Framework, an integral component of the languages Like any other cooperative effort, the key to Windows® operating system. Programming model Microsoft .NET successful collaboration is communication and technologies Framework 3.0 among the people on the team. At Scripps Solution Windows Research, the team includes pathologists, Scripps Research asked InterKnowlogy for Presentation oncologists, cell biologists, chemists, help creating a better way for scientists to Foundation molecular biologists, and immunologists. Dr. work together. Tim Huckaby, CEO of Peter Kuhn, Professor of Cell Biology at InterKnowlogy, remembers, “When I first Scripps Research, says, “In the past five to started talking to Peter [Dr. Kuhn at Scripps ten years, the concept of bringing together Research], he sounded just like the CIO [Chief clinical researchers, life science researchers, Information Officer] of any other business. He and physical science researchers has told me they had data everywhere, their become the big, new direction for science to applications were in islands, and their people get faster to outcomes.” were doing great research, but the information wasn’t getting to the people who Kuhn continues, “It’s hard enough to make needed it.” sure the person working next to you understands what you’re doing. It gets more Huckaby’s team came up with a solution for difficult when the person you want to work Dr. Kuhn’s lab called the Collaborative with is across the hallway or off in another Molecular Environment (CME), which provides building, or in a different institution in a a tool that researchers can use for data different town. In an ongoing collaboration, capture, visualization, annotation, and you want to exchange information and ask for archiving (Figure 1). opinions in real time.” The CME takes stored information about cell Collaboration at Scripps Research can be and protein molecules, builds 2-D and 3-D challenging because the topic of discussion models of these molecules, and makes the may be a single cancer cell found among 50 models available to Scripps Research staff million cells in a tube of blood. Sometimes and their collaborators around the world on a researchers focus on only one of the millions dedicated server using Microsoft Office of individual proteins in a single cancer cell. SharePoint® Server 2007. InterKnowlogy Kuhn says researchers at Scripps Research developed the customized application by communicated with their colleagues in- using the Microsoft .NET Framework 3.0 with person, at conferences or meetings, or by Windows Presentation Foundation, the exchanging e-mail. Each of these methods Windows Vista™ operating system, and Office had significant shortcomings for the rapid SharePoint Server 2007. exchange of precise and complex scientific information. Scripps Research has significant tools to analyze samples and display them as 3-D images, Huckaby explains. “What they didn’t Figure 1. The Collaborative Molecular Environment provides a tool that researchers can use for data capture, visualization, annotation, and archiving. have was a way to annotate those images or scenarios among the peers, researchers, a specific part of the image. They could only pathologists, doctors, and patients around look at an image, maybe discuss with their the world. The integration between Microsoft colleagues in the same room, but to confer Office and Exchange Server 2007 is fantastic with anyone else, they had to go offline or and it will be dramatically easier to create take notes on a piece of paper.” those workflow tools with Exchange Server 2007 in the solution,” Huckaby says. That was the problem CME is intended to solve. “We built a viewer on the .NET The CME is sponsored by Microsoft Research Framework 3.0 with Windows Presentation and the Microsoft BioIT Alliance, an industry Foundation, and the viewer allows cancer partnership that includes Microsoft, Scripps researchers to look at these 2-D or 3-D Research, InterKnowlogy, and several other images. Then, with just a right-click, they can life sciences research companies. “This use attach their notes, create Word documents, of Microsoft technology will help scientific attach other research or another picture, or researchers and institutions organize their point to a URL that is any specific point on information more effectively and help speed the rendering,” Huckaby says. up the process of innovation by reducing duplicate research,” says Don Rule, who In the near future, Scripps Research will link works with the BioIT Alliance for the External the CME to Microsoft Exchange Server 2007. Research & Programs team of Microsoft “We need to build complex workflow Research. “…[The] proof of concept Benefits Easier Access to Data The CME has already improved the The CME is easy for Scripps Research prototype took only six collaboration among Scripps Research scientists to use because Office SharePoint weeks to build. Before scientists by giving them an easy, convenient Server 2007 presents a familiar metaphor to way to pinpoint the specific topics they want users. “Why do people use e-mail?” asks [we had] the .NET to discuss with colleagues. In addition, the Kuhn. “Because it’s easy to use, and people Framework, it would CME allows scientists to organize their data use it every day. SharePoint is interesting in any way that makes sense to them. because it’s actually a database, but it looks have taken twenty like a file system, and you have very little developers two years to InterKnowlogy’s Huckaby believes other learning curve. People can organize their research organizations will use the model his information in any way they like. This is build this application.” team developed. “Many people are predicting important because we need productivity tools Tim Huckaby. CEO, InterKnowlogy that this paradigm—using a Web application that support the creative process of scientific and housing your data in SharePoint so that it research.” can be collaborated on and looked at in different ways—will become the pattern in “Researchers in the lab enjoy using the CME scientific research for many years to come,” application because it is so simple. It’s a very he says. natural way of annotating protein molecules, visualized in 3-D, and connecting those Faster Scientific Collaboration annotations with standard data files. We link The CME has dramatically improved the word processing documents, screen ability of Scripps Research scientists to captures, [Microsoft] Excel® spreadsheets, organize and collaborate around their data. sitting anywhere on our network, things we’d “The application gives us a graphical, high- put naturally in a lab notebook, except now content way of communicating research we can link them electronically using the results where the data is persistent,” Kuhn CME,” Kuhn says. says. “I can keep adding data to the same molecule.” Because Office