The DBEI, Abramson Cancer Center (ACC) and Institute for Biomedical Informatics (IBI) are pleased to jointly announce the establishment of the Center for Cancer Data Science (CCDS), under the leadership of Qi Long, PhD.

Cancer research and patient care continuously generate massive amounts of diverse data, including electronic health records (EHR) data, claims data, registry data, clinical trial data, -omics data, imaging data, and mobile health data. Data science – broadly defined as drawing expertise from biostatistics, informatics, mathematics and computer science – has emerged as a vital approach for harnessing the full power of such rich yet complex big health data in cancer research and patient care. The goals of CCDS are to:

• catalyze and accelerate innovation and enhance training in cancer data science towards the goal of advancing cancer research and transforming cancer care in a learning health system;
• increase capacity for data-driven cancer research and evidence-based cancer care by bringing together and serving as a hub for all data scientists with interest in cancer research and cancer care from across campus; and
• become a national and international leader in cancer data science that will exert powerful impact on cancer research, practices and policies.

Under Dr. Long’s leadership, the Core expanded to the Biostatistics and Bioinformatics Core in 2018. The CCDS will further strengthen the partnership between the ACC and the IBI. The DBEI, ACC and IBI look forward to working together to accelerate cancer research, care and prevention.