African Genomics Data Hub Biomedical Knowledgebase - African Genomics Data Hub Biomedical Knowledgebase Project Summary African genomic data has the potential to benefit researchers and clinicians world-wide, given the African origin of global populations, and the current wide geographic spread of people with African ancestry. However, African genomic data are sparse and often kept in silos or under controlled access, usually not curated at an adequate level of granularity. The African Genomics Data Hub (AGDH) Biomedical Knowledgebase aims to address these issues by providing a centralized resource of curated genomic data for populations of African ancestry to increase findability and accessibility. More specifically, the knowlegebase will serve as a data submission centre to promote the submission of multi omics and genetic data to public repositories, ensuring adherence to international standards and data quality. Existing data in public repositories and the literature will be further curated and accessible via web portals focussed on African-relevant information. Aggregated genomic data from populations of African ancestry that are not available in gnoMAD or other databases for valid reasons, will be served with appropriate access levels in the African Genome Variation Database hosted by the AGDH. Datasets will be indexed and searchable via a catalogue to increase findability. Additionally, tools and resources relevant to the processing and analysis of African data (African pangenome and reference graph, African reference panel and imputation service) that complement and fill gaps in international efforts will continue to be developed and maintained. These will be used in the production of the AGDH resources. User support will be provided through a help desk and continuous training. These activities draw on the extensive experience and valuable outputs of the H3ABioNet consortium, which has been developing capacity and resources for genomics in Africa for more than 9 years. All components of the knowledgebase will work with public database counterparts in the USA and United Kingdom (dbGAP, EGA, INSDC, GWAS Catalog, gnoMAD) to ensure alignment, avoid redundancy, fill gaps, and cover niche areas The AGDH will collate and add significant value to African genomic data and ensure findability and accessibility to the global scientific community that would not otherwise be available, thus facilitating compliance with FAIR principles.
