The Nanomaterial Registry: facilitating the sharing and analysis of data in the diverse nanomaterial community

The amount of data being generated in the nanotechnology research space is significant, and the coordination, sharing, and downstream analysis of the data is complex and consistently deliberated. The complexities of the data are due in large part to the inherently complicated characteristics of nanomaterials. Also, testing protocols and assays used for nanomaterials are diverse and lacking standardization. The Nanomaterial Registry has been developed to address such challenges as the need for standard methods, data formatting, and controlled vocabularies for data sharing. The Registry is an authoritative, web-based tool whose purpose is to simplify the community’s level of effort in assessing nanomaterial data from environmental and biological interaction studies. Because the Registry is meant to be an authoritative resource, all data-driven content is systematically archived and reviewed by subject-matter experts. To support and advance nanomaterial research, a set of minimal information about nanomaterials (MIAN) has been developed and is foundational to the Registry data model. The MIAN has been used to create evaluation and similarity criteria for nanomaterials that are curated into the Registry. The Registry is a publicly available resource that is being built through collaborations with many stakeholder groups in the nanotechnology community, including industry, regulatory, government, and academia. Features of the Registry website (http://www.nanomaterialregistry.org) currently include search, browse, side-by-side comparison of nanomaterials, compliance ratings based on the quality and quantity of data, and the ability to search for similar nanomaterials within the Registry. This paper is a modification and extension of a proceedings paper for the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers.