"ShEEP-IC: Request for a Disk to Disk (D2D) High Capacity Storage Platform (HCSP)"

Va Boston Health Care System, Boston MA

Investigators

Abstract

The Neuroimaging Research for Veterans (NeRVe) Center of the Veterans Administration Boston Healthcare System will use this Disk-to-Disk (D2D) High Capacity Storage Platform (HCSP) to secure and maintain neuroimaging data across several VA research programs, including the Translational Research Center for Traumatic Brain Injury and Stress Disorders (TRACTS) National Network Research Center, the Geriatric Neuropsychology Laboratory of the Geriatric Research Education and Clinical Center (GRECC), the Memory Disorders Research Center (MDRC), and the two divisions of the National Center for PTSD (Behavioral Science Center and the Women's Division; NC PTSD). This new platform will expand and advance our research capability to store and secure a rapidly growing mass of raw neuroimaging data and multiple lines of processed analyses. These research groups currently comprise more than 25 Principal Investigators with affiliations at Harvard Medical School and Boston University in conjunction with students, post-doctoral fellows, and other trainees throughout the Boston Metropolitan area. While our technical capabilities for structural, metabolic, and functional MRI acquisition and analysis have continued to increase, commensurate improvements to backup and restore data for continuity of operations and disaster recovery operations has remained functionally static. Our backup platform is wholly inadequate to support our growing data collection, analysis capabilities, investigators, funded projects, and the large amounts of data we are now actively acquiring from the RR&D purchased, upgraded Siemen's Prisma MRI scanner. Therefore, we require this new Disk-to-Disk High Capacity Storage Platform to backup and recover 83 Terabytes (TB) that is quickly expanding. We also need a scalable HCSP that allows us to incrementally expand our storage capacity as the neuroimaging portfolio at VA Boston and the NeRVe continues to grow. This research data involves tens of millions of dollars of Veteran research results and analysis, addressing important health concerns in our Veterans including brain injury, PTSD, aging, dementia, and substance abuse.