GA4GH Connect session follow up - The future is FAIR beyond genomics
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Beatrice Amos
Oct 13, 2025, 11:01:52 AM10/13/25
to Wolmar Nyberg Åkerström, Sveinung Gundersen, Heather Creasy, Stian Soiland-Reyes, Pascal Derycke, Nico Matentzoglu, GA4GH Variation Representation, GA4GH Variant Annotation, TASC, Cloud Work Stream, GA4GH Implementation Forum, Work Stream - Large Scale Genomics (LSG), Product - Categorical Variation Representation Specification (Cat-VRS), Work Stream - Genomic Knowledge Standards (GKS), Discovery Technical Work Stream
Dear Colleagues,
Thank you all for contributing to the GA4GH Connect session: The future is FAIR beyond genomics: Building bridges to the Research Data Alliance (RDA) and other FAIR research data initiatives - what a productive and engaging discussion! A big thank you to Sveinung Gundersen, Wolmar Nyberg Åkerström, and (Heather Creasy) and our guest speakers: Stian Soiland-Reyes, Nicolas Matentzoglu and Pascal Derycke for an excellent session, and to all participants for their valuable contributions and engaging discussions. Your input made this a truly meaningful conversation.
Thank you all for contributing to the GA4GH Connect session: The future is FAIR beyond genomics: Building bridges to the Research Data Alliance (RDA) and other FAIR research data initiatives - what a productive and engaging discussion! A big thank you to Sveinung Gundersen, Wolmar Nyberg Åkerström, and (Heather Creasy) and our guest speakers: Stian Soiland-Reyes, Nicolas Matentzoglu and Pascal Derycke for an excellent session, and to all participants for their valuable contributions and engaging discussions. Your input made this a truly meaningful conversation.
‼️ Please take a moment to review the meeting notes and share any edits or additions to help keep the summary accurate and complete. If you notice any mistakes, have resources to add, or want to share more details, please feel free to jump in and update the notes - we welcome your input! A link to the recording is available in the linked meeting notes.
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Key Takeaways
🔶 Bridging domain-specific (GA4GH) and domain-agnostic (RDA) communities can prevent silos, promote reusable standards, and extend FAIR principles to non-genomics areas like biodiversity and healthcare, but requires active alignment to avoid "not-invented-here" issues.
Key Takeaways
🔶 Bridging domain-specific (GA4GH) and domain-agnostic (RDA) communities can prevent silos, promote reusable standards, and extend FAIR principles to non-genomics areas like biodiversity and healthcare, but requires active alignment to avoid "not-invented-here" issues.
🔶 Technologies like JSON-LD, RO-Crate, and FAIR mappings offer practical ways to enhance interoperability, enabling GA4GH standards to integrate with broader ecosystems without major reinvention.
🔶 Ongoing collaboration is essential, relying on individuals at the working group level rather than just high-level partnerships, with opportunities for genomics to influence and adopt from RDA while pushing research into healthcare applications.
🔶 Ongoing collaboration is essential, relying on individuals at the working group level rather than just high-level partnerships, with opportunities for genomics to influence and adopt from RDA while pushing research into healthcare applications.
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Meeting Summary
The meeting focused on fostering collaboration between the GA4GH and the Research Data Alliance (RDA) to extend FAIR (Findable, Accessible, Interoperable, Reusable) data principles across domains. The session highlighted RDA's community-driven approach to research data sharing, its interest and working groups, and a strategic partnership with GA4GH established in 2023.
Lightning talks covered RDA initiatives like the Verification of Genomic Annotations Working Group (adopting GA4GH standards like Refget and DRS), RO-Crate for packaging research objects with JSON-LD, FAIR Mappings for bridging metadata models, and HealthDCAT AP for harmonising health data catalogs in the European Health Data Space (EHDS).
Discussions explored aligning GA4GH products (e.g. Passports/Visas, Phenopackets, Beacon, DUO) with non-genomics standards, leveraging technologies like linked data, JSON-LD, and signposting for better interoperability, and addressing obstacles such as silos and the need for extensible APIs.
The session ended with a Q&A and calls for ongoing engagement, including joint sessions and hackathons, to avoid reinventing standards and ensure genomics fits into broader ecosystems like healthcare and biodiversity.
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Action Items
🔶 Organise joint activities, such as invited talks, hackathons, or co-located events between GA4GH workstreams and RDA groups.
🔶 Set up a mechanism for regular check-ins to identify high-priority alignments between GA4GH products and RDA outputs, involving individuals familiar with both organisations.
🔶 Explore integration of linked data technologies (e.g. JSON-LD) into GA4GH APIs and map them to broader standards like schema.org or HealthDCAT.
🔶 Join relevant RDA groups and attend plenaries to facilitate grassroots connections, with facilitators like the co-leads bridging introductions.
🔶 Organise joint activities, such as invited talks, hackathons, or co-located events between GA4GH workstreams and RDA groups.
🔶 Set up a mechanism for regular check-ins to identify high-priority alignments between GA4GH products and RDA outputs, involving individuals familiar with both organisations.
🔶 Explore integration of linked data technologies (e.g. JSON-LD) into GA4GH APIs and map them to broader standards like schema.org or HealthDCAT.
🔶 Join relevant RDA groups and attend plenaries to facilitate grassroots connections, with facilitators like the co-leads bridging introductions.
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Your feedback is invaluable and helps us improve future GA4GH Plenary and Connect meetings, ensuring they continue to provide the best possible experience for our community.
If there's anything we missed or anything you'd like to add, feel free to reach out!
Thanks again for your engagement and contributions!
Best,
Beatrice
Beatrice Amos
Work Stream Manager
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