Sage Bionetworks President Announces 'Friendly' Development for Biomedical Research

"Though it may be a slow week for government entities, other organizations around the United States are moving full speed ahead. Recently, president of Sage Bionetworks Dr. Stephen Friend attended the Stanford Medicine X Conference and announced his company’s plans to provide funding and collaborate with three health organizations in an effort to develop BRIDGE. This cloud-based technology does just as its name suggests and bridges open data, patient knowledge, and public participation to provide biomedical research. The company was founded in 2009 to enhance such research by way of open systems, motives, and interworking standards. Yet, up to this point, Sage Bionetworks has made Synapse its main focus. While remaining in line with the 'research sharing' theme of the company’s products, Synapse, affectionately referred to as the 'geek’s sandbox,' allows researchers to exchange data, analyze it, and swap their results on a real-time basis. Given its Robert Wood Johnson Foundation-provided two-year, $1.9 million grant, Sage Bionetworks can continue development of their sharing prowess by working on BRIDGE. After all, the infrastructure is the second piece of its kind that the Sage Bionetworks team deems necessary for users to share data, to collaborate on research, and to fund important science. Users will be able to utilize BRIDGE’s set of online tools to connect with other users and share information and stories, which will ultimately contribute to the build-up of Web-based communities that focus on providing important disease- or health-related research. Just as with Synapse, patients and researchers alike will be able to use BRIDGE to collectively contribute their findings to open projects ..."