Welcome to Decoding Us

Decoding Us will be a next-generation platform for citizen science focused on empowering individuals to contribute to genealogical and population studies using Whole Genome Sequencing (WGS) data and compatible technologies. Recognizing the limitations of centralized data silos and the growing importance of user data sovereignty, Decoding Us will be architected as a federated system, placing control and ownership firmly in the hands of the participants. This approach will foster greater trust, encourage broader participation, and unlock new possibilities for collaborative discovery in understanding our shared human history.

The system shall be architected with these goals:

• Federated Design:
  • Identity: Users will possess permanent decentralized identifiers for their accounts using the robust and user-centric @ATProtocol. This ensures portability and long-term control over their digital identity within the ecosystem.
  • Personal Data Stores (PDS): Participation will involve users securely sharing their sequencing data through software operating on their own infrastructure – be it a personal computer, a dedicated Virtual Private Server (VPS), or potentially even services offered by their sequencing vendors. This personal data store remains under the user's direct ownership, offering the flexibility to migrate between providers as needed. The software running on the PDS will manage data storage, facilitate secure communication with the network, and potentially perform initial data processing tasks.
• Secure Computing: The system will prioritize user privacy by enabling participating individuals to compare specific genetic features, such as Single Nucleotide Variant (SNV) values downstream of identified Y or mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) haplogroups, in a privacy-preserving manner. The necessary genetic features for comparison will be exchanged with potential matches through end-to-end encrypted messages. Specialized applications running on the user's PDS can then perform the computationally intensive comparisons, with a mechanism for consensus checking among peers to ensure the reliability of the results. This secure exchange ensures that sensitive raw genomic data remains within the user's control.

Looking Ahead: While the initial focus is on WGS data, the federated architecture of Decoding Us is designed to be extensible, potentially accommodating other compatible genomic or related data types in the future. We envision a vibrant community of citizen scientists collaborating on research questions, sharing insights, and contributing to a deeper understanding of human history and population dynamics, all within a framework that prioritizes data ownership, privacy, and security.