Biostatistics and Bioinformatics Facility Core

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Project Summary The mission of Mount Sinai's Transdisciplinary P30 Center on Early Environmental Exposures is to accelerate team science based research utilizing life course–informed models of health. The Biostatistics and Bioinformatics Facility Core (BBFC) plays a key role in that mission by modeling complex, sometimes novel, exposure and phenotype data generated by center members across a wide variety of study types (basic, clinical, epidemiologic) while focusing on developing methods to better address our Center's research themes (multiple exposures/mixtures, stress-chemical interactions, and sex specific effects of environmental exposure). The data structures we emphasize in this Center are multi-dimensional and complex—not simple, single exposures related to a single health outcome. While we offer standard data analytic services (e.g., linear models, longitudinal mixed effects models, power calculations, study analysis planning) the statistical methods and study designs needed for analyzing the complex, high-dimensional data that arise in much of our Center's work are still relatively new and require knowledge of advanced statistical techniques and the ability to curate and interpret complex biologic data – expertise maintained by the faculty of the BBFC. Core faculty and researchers engage in research motivated by questions and methodological challenges that arise from center collaborations and innovations by our Center Cores. For example, our Center's unique core facility services, such as the tooth biomarker that reconstruct past chemical exposure (described in the Integrated Health Sciences Facility Core) and the operant test chamber for multiple domains of executive functioning (detailed in the Phenotyping and Environmental Modifiers Facility Core) generated the need to create novel data analytical approaches that harness the full potential of these innovative measures. Core faculty and staff provide statistical and bioinformatics training for postdoctoral fellows working on environmental health sciences (EHS) related projects. Providing such services via a core facility allows the P30 Center to build and maintain specialized resources (e.g., expertise in measuring and advanced statistical methods related to evaluation of environmental mixtures). Thus, to support the overall goals of the P30 Center, the BBFC proposes the following specific aims: (1) to ensure that Center projects are grounded in sound biostatistical/bioinformatics principles and use state-of-the-art methods for design and analysis of EHS data; (2) to conduct mission-related biostatistical/bioinformatics methods research for further quality assurance of all research and data analysis methods; and (3) to assist in the training of biostatistical/bioinformatics principles and analysis methods to Center investigators, fellows and post-doctoral trainees.