NEW YORK (GenomeWeb News) – The National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases is seeking new contractors for its Bioinformatics Resource Centers program, a network of repositories for genomic data on infectious diseases.
In a solicitation issued on Friday, NIAID said that it plans to expand the program, which was launched in 2004 and currently includes eight BRCs, though it did not specify how many new centers it intends to support.
Like the current BRCs, the new centers are intended to host databases of genomic data and other information about infectious diseases caused by human pathogens that are included in NIAID’s Category A-C Priority Pathogen lists for biodefense research, as well as other pathogens causing emerging or re-emerging infectious diseases.
NIAID said in the solicitation that one of the BRCs under the expanded program will support and maintain the BRCs Portal, which will serve as a central repository of information for the program. This portal, currently named BRC-Central, is available here.
NIAID said that it expects to provide five-year contracts under the program beginning in August 2009. It added that it has expects to fund approximately 12.4 full-time employees per year per BRC and 16.4 full-time employees for the BRC that will also support the BRCs Portal.