We present the BioPortal system, an integrated cross-jurisdictional data sharing and analysis environment to facilitate detection, prevention, and management of infectious disease outbreaks.

Infectious disease informatics (IDI) is an emerging field of study that systematically examines information management and analysis issues related to infectious disease prevention, detection, and management. IDI research is inherently interdisciplinary, drawing expertise from a number of fields including but not limited to various branches of information technologies such as data integration, data security, GIS, digital library, data mining and visualization, and other fields such as biostatistics and bioinformatics. Funded by the NSF through its Digital Government and Information Technology Research programs with support from the Intelligence Technology Innovation Center, we have been developing scalable technologies and related standards and protocols, implemented in the BioPortal system, to deal with various data sharing and analysis challenges arising in the field of IDI. BioPortal provides distributed, cross-jurisdictional access to datasets concerning several major infectious diseases (of both humans and animals) West Nile Virus (WNV), Botulism, Foot-and-Mouth Disease (FMD), and Chronic Wasting Disease (CWD). It also provides access to test data collected from the BioWatch system, an air pathogen sensing system developed to detect airborne hazards. In addition to data access, BioPortal provides advanced spatial-temporal data visualization and analysis capabilities, which are critically needed for infectious disease outbreak detection and can provide valuable information to facilitate disease outbreak management and response. The intended users of BioPortal include public health researchers and practitioners at all levels of the government including international partners, analysts and policy makers; the general public and students in public health or related fields; and law enforcement and national security personnel involved in counter bioterrorism efforts and emergency preparedness and response.

Information technologies and infectious disease informatics are playing an increasingly important role in preventing, detecting, and managing infectious disease outbreaks. This paper presents a collaborative infectious disease informatics project called the WNV-BOT Portal system. This Portal system provides integrated, Web-enabled access to a variety of distributed data sources related to West Nile Virus and Botulism. It also makes available a preliminary set of data analysis and visualization tools tailored for these two diseases. This system has helped to demonstrate the technological feasibility of developing a cross jurisdiction and cross species infectious disease information infrastructure and identify related technical and policy-related challenges with its national implementation.

The WNV-BOT Portal project is an NSF-funded infectious disease informatics project (grant number: EIA-9983304) aimed at demonstrating and assessing the technical feasibility and scalability of a cross-jurisdiction, cross-species infectious disease information sharing, alerting, and analysis framework. The related technical and system development research is summarized in a regular paper and a demonstration plan appeared in this proceedings. In this project summary, we briefly present the project accomplishments and describe the inter-agency, inter-disciplinary, and academia-government partnership that has been critical to the success of our project. We also share the lessons learned from our project on important issues faced by many digital government projects such as data sharing, academic research versus practical applications, funding mechanism, and project management.

Information technologies are playing an increasingly important role in preventing, detecting, and managing infectious disease outbreaks. This paper presents a collaborative infectious disease informatics project led by an interdisciplinary team of information systems researchers and public health researchers and practitioners. This project has resulted in a research prototype called the WNV-BOT Portal system, which provides an integrated infectious disease information sharing, analysis, and visualization environment across jurisdictions.

Infectious disease outbreaks are critical threats to public health and national security. Information systems play a central role in developing an effective comprehensive approach to prevent, detect, respond to, and manage infectious disease outbreaks of plants, animals, and humans.

Hantavirus pulmonary syndrome is a newly recognized rodent-borne zoonosis, We report a case of hantavirus pulmonary syndrome in an employee of a California utility company who was probably occupationally exposed to Sin Nombre virus, Environmental assessment and genetic comparison of the patient's hantavirus isolates to hantavirus isolates from rodents trapped at possible sites of exposure suggested that the patient contracted his infection at the work site. The study revealed a close correspondence between the patient's viral genotype and that from a rodent trapped at the work site, This report alerts the public health and medical community to the fact that employees of utility companies and similar industries may be an important risk group in areas where hantavirus is endemic and emphasizes the need to incorporate strategies for preventing exposure to hantavirus and other emerging infections into occupational safety protocols.

Prospect Hill virus (PH) was isolated from a meadow vole (Microtus pennsylvanicus) in 1982, and much of its genome has been sequenced. Hantaviruses of other New World microtine rodents have not been genetically characterized. We show that another Microtus species (the California vole M. californicus) from the United States is host to a genetically distinct PH-like hantavirus, Isla Vista virus (ILV). The nucleocapsid protein of ILV differs from that of PH by 11.1% and a portion of the G2 glycoprotein differs from that of PH by 19.6%. ILV antibodies were identified in five of 33 specimens of M. californicus collected in 1975 and 1994-1995. Enzymatic amplification studies showed that 1975 and 1994-1995 ILV genomes were highly similar. Secondary infection of Peromyscus californicus was identified in Santa Barbara County, California. A long-standing enzootic of a genetically distinct hantavirus lineage is present in California voles.

We have cloned the S genomic segment of a novel hantavirus of the harvest mouse Reithrodontomys megalotis. The virus is phylogenetically distinct from other hantaviruses. The new hantavirus was identified in harvest mice separated by approximately 1,000 km. A wood rat (Neotoma mexicana) was found to be infected with the harvest mouse hantavirus.

A newly identified hantavirus, tentatively called Four Corners virus (FCV), was found to be the aetiological agent of a 1993 outbreak of hantavirus pulmonary syndrome (HPS) in the southwestern United States. Immunodominant epitopes of 43 and 31 amino acids were identified in the nucleocapsid protein and G1 glycoprotein, respectively. The G1 genes of different hantaviruses are highly divergent, suggesting that geographically diverse FCVs might fail to cross-react owing to antigenic drift. We now show that the immunodominant epitope of G1 is conserved among 18 FCVs from a broad geographical area, despite extensive nucleotide sequence heterogeneity. Antibodies from all 45 HPS patients, separated by more than 3000 km were shown to be reactive with the dominant G1 epitope. Evidence for limited cross-reactivity between the G1 antigen of a novel hantavirus of the cotton rat and that of FCV is presented.

In order to compare the biologic effectiveness of porcine and semisynthetic human insulins, a euglycemic clamp method was used in eight insulin-dependent diabetic subjects. Each subject was tested for each insulin on separate days. In order to derive glucose-insulin dose-response curves for both insulins, sequential but constant insulin infusion rates of 0.2, 0.5, 1.0, and 2.0 mU/kg/min were performed. Plasma glucose levels attained during the euglycemic clamp were 96 ± 3 mg/dL. At each insulin infusion rate, the steady-state glucose infusion rate required to maintain euglycemia was measured. At each increment of insulin infused, steady-state glucose infusion rates for porcine insulin were 1.12 ± 0.22, 1.90 ± 0.59, 4.28 ± 0.61, and 9.37 ± 0.66 mg/kg/min compared with 1.27 ± 0.42, 2.38 ± 0.20, 4.25 ± 0.43, and 8.87 ± 0.67 mg/kg/min for semisynthetic human insulin. By ANOVA, no significant difference was noted between the two insulins. Because insulin infusion rates may not result in predictable circulating free insulin levels in subjects who have circulating insulin antibodies, free insulin levels were determined. When steady-state glucose infusion rates were compared with free insulin levels achieved at the four insulin infusion rates, dose-response curves for both porcine and semisynthetic human insulins were virtually identical. These data suggest that semisynthetic human insulin has equivalent biologic effects on overall glucose metabolism compared with porcine insulin in insulin-dependent diabetes.