1. What is GHGA?
2. DcGC and GHGA

German Human Genome-Phenome Archive (GHGA)

The German Human Genome-Phenome Archive (GHGA) provides an extremely useful platform for researchers to securely store, share, and access sequencing data from human samples (e.g. patients).
Submitting your data to GHGA offers numerous advantages that can enhance scientific discovery, ensure compliance with ethical standards, and amplify the impact of your work. GHGA also aims to protect the rights of the human individuals who contributed to this data.
You can read more about GHGA’s mission here.

Below are some of the several compelling reasons to submit the data that you have sequenced to GHGA:

1. Secure and Compliant Infrastructure

GHGA has a multi-layer approach to protect human data. It has built a secure infrastructure to store human data and provides a legal framework which is compliant with the European General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR).

2. Facilitate Collaboration and Reuse

GHGA promotes responsible data sharing, allowing other researchers to access datasets under the FAIR principles. This fosters collaboration across disciplines and accelerates progress in biomedical research. For instance, the GHGA data portal is currently hosting genomics and transcriptomcs data for a varierty of cancer samples. Essentially, these data could be instrumental in unlocking new insights e.g. in relation to disease progression or therapeutic interventions.

3. Enhance the Visibility and Impact of Your Research

As a researcher, it is always your endeavour to make your research more visible. Data deposited in GHGA is linked to your published work, increasing its discoverability and impact.
Many journals and funding agencies encourage or explicitly require data sharing as part of open science initiatives. Submitting to GHGA ensures your data is aligned with the FAIR (Findable, Accessible, Interoperable, Reusable) principles, amplifying its long-term value.

4. Contribute to the Greater Good

By sharing data over a secure and under the FAIR principles operation structure, like GHGA does, you contribute to a growing repository of knowledge that can drive innovation and address global health challenges. GHGA’s collaborative framework helps translate raw data into actionable insights, benefiting both science and society.

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DRESDEN-concept Genome Center (DcGC) and GHGA

When you sequence human samples at the DRESDEN-concept Genome Center, you have the option to submit the raw and/or processed data to the German Human Genome Phenome Archive (GHGA). The entire process of the submission of data to GHGA will be handled by a Data Steward at the DcGC.

For the impatient reader – feel free to skip the sections below and jump to the decision tree describing the various steps and checkpoints to assist you in your journey to a successful GHGA submission.
However, we strongly recommend that you read the sections below to familarize yourself with the technicalities associated with a GHGA submission.

1. Legal Requirements

The very first step towards a successful submission to GHGA requires the signing of a Data Processing Contract (DPC) between GHGA and the Research Data Controller (RDC). A DPC establishes how GHGA may process the data, the role of the GHGA Data Hubs and the responsibilities of the Data Controllers. The contract is designed to conform with Art. 28 GDPR Nr.3.
Please have a look at the GHGA User Story about this topic which provides detailed information about the content of the contract.

A very important part of the contract is the listing of Persons Authorized to Act, which is also known as a Data Access Committee (DAC). It evaluates data access requests based on criteria such as ethical approval, research intent, and security measures, ensuring that access is granted only to qualified and authorized parties.

2. Pre-submission enquiry

If you are looking to submit data to GHGA but have concerns/doubts, you can get in touch with the local Data Steward at the DcGC. You could also contact GHGA central and submit a pre-submission enquiry via their form available here or contact the helpdesk to get more advice about your potential submission.

3. Sample/Study Related Requirements

The samples that will eventually be submitted to GHGA need to be annotated properly to ensure that they are findable (F in FAIR) and reusable (R in FAIR) for others. More specifically, certain fields of information associated with the samples and the individuals/donors who contributed to these samples must be filled.

The DcGC Data Steward will take care of handling the submission for you and we will provide you with a metadata information submission sheet. You can find an example of this submission sheet here.
We are able to fill out all the mandatory non-personal information about the sequencing protocols and samples but require that you fill out the sample information.

The fields which are required/mandatory are highlighted. In addition, there are other fields that are recommended or optional but may be left blank. These fields are highlighted in a bluish shade in the submission-ready example.
Even though filling out these fields involves greater work and effort, we would like to emphasize how important it is to provide as much information as possible for a submission. Instructions on filling out these fields can be obtained from the documents corresponding to each spreadsheet.

• Study info study_info
  
• Individual info individual_info
  
• Sample info sample_info
  

Here is an example of a file that contains information filled from the client. sample_filled

Please have a look at GHGA’s user story about how to prepare the essential components for a submission here and on the GHGA Metadata model which is the underlying structure of a successful submission.
Lastly, don’t hesitate and approach the Data Steward if you need help.