Advancing Global Standards for Biomedical Imaging Data: New EMBO Reports Article from the GBI Community

A new Science & Society article in EMBO Reports highlights an international effort to build the foundations for interoperable, ethical and sustainable data sharing in biomedical imaging. The paper, titled “A global effort toward standards for data sharing in biomedical imaging: Developing Consensus and Infrastructure for Global Data Interoperability”,  was written by members of the Biomedical Imaging Community Working Group of the Global BioImaging (GBI) following a workshop with experts in the field of imaging data management, Josh Moore (German BioImaging), Adriana Tavares (University of Edinburgh), Michel Dojat (Univ. Grenoble Alpes), Dario Longo (National Research Council of Italy), Ryan Sullivan (University of Sydney), with contributions from Euro-BioImaging Head of Image Data Services, Aastha Mathur, and Euro-BioImaging Med Hub Director, Linda Chaabane as corresponding author. Special thanks to Sophie Winter (Global BioImaging) and Graham Galloway (University of Queensland, Brisbane) for their great efforts to develop the discussion across the globe.Each author shared its view on the challenges and the current approach developed to support the scientific community for image data sharing.

Building a shared vision for imaging data interoperability

Biomedical imaging generates vast and diverse datasets across modalities, institutions and continents. Yet, the lack of harmonised metadata, common ontologies, and sustainable data infrastructures continues to limit the reuse and impact of imaging data worldwide.

This new publication brings forward a global, community-driven perspective on how the imaging field can overcome fragmentation and move toward coordinated, standards-based data ecosystems. 

The article grew out of a Global BioImaging Biomedical Imaging Data Workshop held in April 2025, where panelists from Australia, Europe and the UK presented national and international initiatives tackling data sharing at scale.