The Biomedical Informatics Research Network, commonly referred among analysts as “BIRN” is a national proposed project to assist biomedical researchers in their bioscience investigations through data sharing and online collaborations. BIRN provides data-sharing infrastructure, advisory services from a single source and software tools and techniques. This national initiative is funded by NIH Grants, the National Center for Research Resources and the National Institute of General Medical Sciences (NIGMS), a component of the United States National Institutes of Health (NIH). Overview To serve the Biomedical community, BIRN is designed to share significant and intensive data between researchers across geographic distance using user driven base software. Participants can transfer data securely and privately, internal and external. All data transfer is designed to be consistent with Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996 (HIPAA) privacy and security guidelines. BIRN also offers documented best practices, expert advice, data-sharing, and query and analysis software tools specific to biomedical research. Its researchers develop authorization capabilities and new data-sharing and engineering tools to assist researchers in making sense of new information. Structure BIRN is a collaborative effort between the NIGMS and a variety of nationwide leadership associations: Information Sciences Institute (ISI) at the University of Southern California, University of Chicago, Massachusetts General Hospital, University of California at Irvine, and the University of California at Los Angeles. Its interdisciplinary team consists of computer scientists, engineers, physicians, biomedical researchers and other technical experts, including grid computing developers Carl Kesselman of USC ISI, and Ian Foster of Argonne National Laboratories. Co-Principal Investigators are: Carl Kesselman, Ph.D., a professor in the University of Southern California (USC) Daniel J. Epstein Department of Industrial and Systems Engineering, and a Fellow of the Information Sciences Institute (ISI), its highest honor; Ian Foster, Ph.D., director of the Computation Institute, a joint project between the University of Chicago and Argonne National Laboratory, and associate director of Argonne's Mathematics and Computer Science Division; Steven G. Potkin, M.D., a professor in the Department of Psychiatry and Human Behavior at the University of California at Irvine (UCI) and Director of UCI's Brain Imaging Center; Bruce R. Rosen, M.D., Ph.D., a professor of radiology at Harvard Medical School and Health Sciences and Technology at the Harvard-MIT Division of Health Sciences and Technology, and Director of the Athinoula A. Martinos Center for Biomedical Imaging at the Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston, MA; Jonathan C. Silverstein, M.D., associate director and senior