Data science is crucial in advancing pediatric cancer research and patient care. Established in 2018 with CPRIT funding, the Pediatric Cancer Data Core (PCDC) at UT Southwestern Medical Center has been providing a research platform and services to enhance data management, harmonization, sharing, and analysis for the pediatric cancer research community. During its initial funding period, the PCDC successfully met all developmental goals outlined in the original facility plan. We have acquired, curated, standardized, and harmonized a large volume of multi-modal pediatric cancer data from clinical and research settings across multiple institutions and hospitals. Our development of the Childhood...

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Data science is crucial in advancing pediatric cancer research and patient care. Established in 2018 with CPRIT funding, the Pediatric Cancer Data Core (PCDC) at UT Southwestern Medical Center has been providing a research platform and services to enhance data management, harmonization, sharing, and analysis for the pediatric cancer research community. During its initial funding period, the PCDC successfully met all developmental goals outlined in the original facility plan. We have acquired, curated, standardized, and harmonized a large volume of multi-modal pediatric cancer data from clinical and research settings across multiple institutions and hospitals. Our development of the Childhood Cancer Explorer (CCE) - a data integration platform with a database and user-friendly online tools - facilitates research by enabling data exploration, analysis, and visualization. Despite these achievements, significant challenges persist in pediatric cancer research and care, especially in adapting to rapidly evolving technologies and managing increasing data volumes. In the renewal phase, we aim to address these challenges through specific objectives: 1) Further develop the CCE by integrating data from existing and new partners and incorporating new analytics and visualization tools; 2) Expand the PCDC's data science capacity by developing and implementing tools for clinical trial matching, federated learning, and the adaption of new data types and AI tools; 3) Provide customized support to individual pediatric cancer research projects in Texas; and 4) Design and implement a comprehensive education and training plan for users. Despite the rarity of childhood cancer, the impact of effective, life-saving therapy is dramatic. Successfully developing of this core will break academic silos across institutions and disciplines, significantly enhancing research and patient care in pediatric cancer.

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