Concepts, tooling, and workflows for secure multimodal research data management in TSD
Note: MultiSense Hub-Node is a research and development initiative.
It does not constitute a centrally operated or general-purpose service on TSD.
The repository provides software, configuration examples, and documentation that projects may adapt in collaboration with their local IT/TSD contacts.
- For step-by-step instructions about installing REDCap on TSD, see INSTALL.md
- If you face any issues with this repository, open a new GitHub issue here
- For official information from USIT TSD, see here
- For an in-depth overview of REDCap functionality, see https://project-redcap.org/ or join the REDCap community
Deployment on TSD uses podman. Local development (building images and testing) should use docker.
See INSTALL.md for deployment details and CONTRIBUTING.md for image build/publish steps.
MultiSense Hub-Node is an initiative designed to explore and support approaches for researchers using University of Oslo's Services for Sensitive Data (TSD) for collecting and organizing sensitive, multimodal datasets—including clinical, genetic, neuroimaging, registry, and socio-economic information—by providing standardized, reproducible, and user-friendly data infrastructure patterns and tooling.
The project focuses on enabling secure data organization, harmonization, quality assurance, and analysis workflows within TSD, while ensuring compliance with legal, ethical, and security requirements for handling protected research data.
This work is intended to conceptually complement Nettskjema on TSD, which is used for secure data collection, by offering patterns for organizing already collected data and linking complex multimodal datasets into a coherent resource within a TSD project.
MultiSense aims to help address key challenges in modern data-intensive research:
- Integration of heterogeneous multimodal data sources
- Standardization and harmonization across studies and formats
- Reproducible and scalable analytical workflows
- Secure handling of person-sensitive information
- Improved data quality control and metadata organization
- Readiness for distributed and collaborative analyses across infrastructures
By operationalizing and documenting these capabilities in TSD, the project aims to make advanced data management and analysis conceptually accessible to a broad range of research users, independent of technical background.
A central component of the hub is REDCap (Research Electronic Data Capture), a widely used secure web-based platform for managing research data.
Key characteristics of REDCap:
- Used by thousands of institutions worldwide for clinical and research data capture
- Provides role-based access control, audit trails, and secure data handling
- Supports structured data collection, validation, and real-time quality checks
- Enables direct export to common analysis environments (e.g., R, Python, SPSS)
- Facilitates integration of questionnaire data, clinical variables, imaging metadata, and omics data
- Aligns with regulatory, legal, and interoperability standards for sensitive research data
Within MultiSense, REDCap is used as a core database layer in example deployments to curate, connect, and prepare multimodal datasets for downstream statistical analysis and machine learning.
MultiSense Hub-Node develops and documents:
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REDCap-based deployment patterns in TSD
- Secure storage and structured organization of multimodal data
- Tools and examples for curation, validation, and quality assurance
- Integration with questionnaire-based data collection workflows
- User-oriented configurations for non-technical researchers
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Multimodal data linkage and harmonization approaches
- Example connections of genetics, imaging, clinical, and registry data
- Metadata organization aligned with national and international standards, where applicable
- Support for reproducible and distributed analyses through shared practices
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Training materials, documentation, and examples
- Written guides and example research workflows
- Suggestions for workshops and user meetings
- Contributions to community knowledge around multimodal data handling in TSD
These assets are intended as building blocks and examples.
They do not in themselves constitute a centrally managed service for end users.
The primary objective is to develop and document operational models and tooling for MultiSense-like workflows within TSD, so that secure multimodal database infrastructure can be:
- Adapted by interested research projects in collaboration with TSD/USIT
- Sustained beyond initial funding through reusable procedures and materials
- Extended to national and international collaborations where local governance allows
MultiSense is conceptually targeted at:
- Researchers handling sensitive human data
- Projects requiring multimodal data integration
- Teams needing secure databases and reproducible workflows
- Users seeking accessible tools without extensive IT specialization
These are example use cases, not an indication of an automatically available service.
The hub emphasizes:
- Documented installation and operational procedures
- Reusable training materials and course content
- Community-driven knowledge sharing and contributions
- Continued evolution of practices within TSD infrastructure
The aim is to support long-term availability of secure multimodal data management methods and tooling for the research community, without implying a specific centrally operated service.
This repository serves as the root entry point for:
- Documentation of the MultiSense Hub-Node concepts and tooling
- Deployment and operational guidance for example setups
- Training materials and example workflows
- Resources for researchers interested in using REDCap and related tools within TSD