Cloud, what Leonardo and Dompé will do on health data
Leonardo and Dompé Farmaceutici have signed an agreement for the construction of the first national digital health security infrastructure core with Cloud architecture
The first national cloud infrastructure for health data provided by Leonardo with Dompé Farmaceutici is operational for targeted public health and precision medicine interventions.
This was announced by a press release explaining how the core of the project concerns the aggregation of health data at national level (from laboratory data to the genetic profile of the individual patient) with the highest safety standards (cyber security and real active protection, time).
In fact, the newly created infrastructure allows patients to be clustered, to identify therapeutic indications targeted with secure cloud services available to healthcare facilities throughout the country.
But not only. It will allow accurate merit assessments also in a predictive key about the epidemiological evolution of specific diseases. Essential element in case of health emergency (such as epidemics) or for biological safety events (presence of harmful contaminating substances).
In Italy, Leonardo takes another step forward in the cloud, following the partnership in January with the most important national operator in the sector, Aruba . On the other hand, last week the Minister for Technological Innovation, Vittorio Colao, had spoken of the intention to start a National Strategic Pole with public control for the most sensitive data.
And according to the rumors of the newspaper La Verità a few days ago, “a state financial player (which could be CDP) and other interlocutors will play an essential role. In the front row Leonardo ”.
All the details on Leonardo and Dompé's digital health security infrastructure.
WHAT DIGITAL HEALTH INFRASTRUCTURE DOES
Currently, the digital health security infrastructure launched by Leonardo is enabling the Exscalate application, the molecular library of Dompé, to run in the cloud, as a service, in such a way as to allow the health network (Universities, Research Centers, Hospitals) a quick and low-cost diagnostic tool.
THE TARGET
The development of services in the cloud gives healthcare facilities the possibility to access very advanced and accurate digital solutions with basic IT tools (a PC or a tablet). Such as the simulation of the interaction between a drug and a specific biological entity or pathology; identify the onset of abnormal phenomena in patients, or improve the personalized therapeutic approach (precision medicine).
Above all, the infrastructure will make it possible over time to have an accurate photograph of health needs throughout the country, with the possibility of an accurate planning of public health interventions.
LEONARDO MAKES THE CLOUD AVAILABLE
As we said, the infrastructure uses the supercomputing (150 nodes for a power of 5 petaflops) and cloud (with a power of 20 petabytes distributed over 1500 hard drives) capabilities of Davinci-1 and Leonardo's HPC .
“The Davinci-1 supercomputer greatly enhances data processing capacity and represents an extraordinary 'knowledge accelerator'. The potential deriving from the computing capacity of Davinci-1 and from the activities of the Leonardo Laboratory dedicated to HPC (High Performance Computing) give shape to a new path aimed at exploring innovative and dynamic application scenarios. Particular attention is dedicated to data security ”underlined Carlo Cavazzoni, Head of Computational R&D, and Director of the HPC Lab at Leonardo.
AND DOMPÉ THE EXSCALATE MOLECULAR LIBRARY
Dompé made available the Exscalate molecular library instead.
The project also benefits from the contribution of the Politecnico di Milano on the implementation of some functionalities, developed over time on Exscalate with over 5 billion digitally synthesized molecules (polypharmacological profile) for complex simulations in the health sector.
Exscalate is currently the leader of the public-private project Exscalate4Cov of "urgent computing" of the European Commission, created to identify the safest and most promising drugs against Covid-19.
“This agreement strengthens Exscalate as a strategic platform in research and data processing not only in the management of the current pandemic but as a tool that can become permanent at the service of health in the European Union. Exscalate has also demonstrated the ability to aggregate various public and private entities in the field of scientific research and technological excellence at an international level ”said Andrea Beccari, Chief Scientist of Exscalate in Dompé Pharmaceuticals.
THE EXSCALATE4COV CONSORTIUM
As the note explains, Exscalate4Cov is a consortium that brings together 18 institutions and research centers in seven European countries and uses one of the most powerful supercomputing and artificial intelligence platforms in the world associated with the processing of biological data to verify the potential impact of molecules. notes on the genomic structure of the coronavirus. The program is supported by the European Union's Horizon 2020 program.
To date, the activity of Exscalate4Cov has led to the identification of Raloxifene (a generic drug) as an effective molecule in the treatment of patients with mild symptoms of Covid. The molecule is already in a phase 3 clinical trial in Italy and shortly in other European countries.
ADVANCED SAFETY STANDARDS
Returning to the digital health security infrastructure implemented by Leonardo and Dompé, this allows data to be preserved with the most advanced security standards both in the cloud and during the online exchange phase. The security systems adopted make it possible to promptly identify and block potential malicious access attempts.
WHAT IS POSSIBLE TO DO WITH THE EPIDEMIOLOGICAL AND HEALTHCARE PARAMETERS
Thanks to this cloud infrastructure, starting from epidemiological and health parameters (even non-homogeneous) such as laboratory data, medical records or from patient genetic profiles, it is possible to create clusters of patients for homogeneous classes for specific characteristics such as the response to a drug, the incidence of a disease, drug resistance, adverse reactions, repurposing of a drug for another therapeutic indication.
SERVICES IN PHASE ONE
In phase one, the first services concern the evaluation of the efficacy of a drug and the possible side effects with respect to a pathology and a specific health profile (precision / personalized medicine); the identification of effective drugs on a known biological target (repurposing) or unknown as in the case of new viruses or bacteria (health emergency); the identification of effective molecular profiles for orphan pathologies of care. In the area of national security, the infrastructure can guarantee the identification of an effective response quickly even in the event of biological attacks.
THE SECOND PHASE
The second phase consists in the system for collecting information from the health facilities in the area (to be evaluated on the basis of available sources and the active collaboration of the institutions active in the research field and the NHS). This will make it possible to make predictions about the epidemiological impact of specific diseases in specific areas, developing personalized medicine and prevention measures, with significant savings for the national health system (eg intercepting outbreaks of diabetes before the acute phase).
THE COMMENT OF THE CORRIERE DELLA SERA
“On the other hand, we are witnessing more and more the urgent need to access massive computing resources to carry out complicated simulations in very short times. Think of epidemiological containment measures or large-scale planning of vaccination campaigns. If we had already shared all our data, already contained in our health card, we would already be a good step forward. Political will would be needed to make the best use of this digital infrastructure that would enter the cyber security perimeter. A tool that could also network the data of university studies, research centers, allowing costs to be reduced by two billion a year. In the background there would be studies on genomics. Another quantum leap ”.
This is a machine translation from Italian language of a post published on Start Magazine at the URL https://www.startmag.it/innovazione/cloud-che-cosa-faranno-leonardo-e-dompe-sui-dati-sanitari/ on Wed, 21 Apr 2021 14:27:10 +0000.