LabCAS is a platform for building a data commons. 

It provides the following:

• A secure, reliable means to capture, process, manage, search, and enable analysis of scientific data
• Plug in of analytical methods
• Repeatable data processing pipelines
• Integrate visualization and other analytical tools
• Support data delivery from EDRN sites
• Support secure sharing of data between EDRN sites
• Support linking of data to publications with persistent identifiers
• Citation of Data: Simplify the process of locating, accessing, and citing the original resource to ensure proper credit and acknowledgment

Scientific data collected in the EDRN Cancer Biomarkers Data Commons (LabCAS) can be made either public or private and secure for sharing with EDRN members. Data that is made public can be assigned a unique, permanent identifier, a Digital Object Identifier (DOI), which allows your data to be linked to publications.

LabCAS uses data models and data elements (login required) metadata, when a site submits data, to capture data consistently across the EDRN Cancer Biomarker Data Commons. Data can be captured and added over time, and it is linked and available for integration with different analytical methods and tools to drive data-driven discovery. This results in a consistent data architecture.

Data in LabCAS is organized in a hierarchical structure with collections at the top level, datasets below collections, and files below datasets. Collections are used to group data logically, such as by consortium. Datasets can be used to further subcategorize data within a collection, such as a submission for a multi-site study. Files are the smallest unit of data and can be stored at the collection level or within a dataset.