Living Human Project

The Living Human Project (LHP) is developing a worldwide, distributed repository of anatomo-functional data and of simulation algorithms relative to the human musculoskeletal apparatus, fully integrated into a seamless simulation environment and directly accessible by any researcher in the world. This infrastructure will be used to create the physiome of the human musculoskeletal system.

The Story so far
This initiative started in 2002 as a result of the BioNet coordination action, aimed to establish the grand challenges for European biomechanics. The BioNet consensus document clearly pointed out the need for an Internet-based virtual community as a mean to share biomechanics data.

In 2003 a group of partners who were also involved with the BioNet action wrote a public document drafting a possible strategy to have the LHP started.

In the meanwhile Marco Viceconti, a researcher at the Rizzoli Institute in Bologna (Italy) started a voluntary effort called Biomechanics European Lab (BEL). The idea was to create a community of interested colleagues, who would develop the LHP without any centralised funding.

In 2006 The BEL was merged with to Biomed Town, a new Internet community reserved to all those who have professional interest in biomedical research. The BEL data repository remains available on Biomed Town for historical reasons.

It was evident that the most important limiting factor for LHP was the lack of an adequate information technology infrastructure. This need is now being matched by two separate provisions.

Living Human Digital Library
A consortium of European institutions is developing the Living Human Digital Library, as part of the LHDL STRP project supported by the European Commission. This wiki page contains constantly updated information on the LHDL project.

The LHDL project will end in January 2009; soon after, the LHDL consortium will release a biomedical data management and sharing service, called Physiome Space. Physiome Space will make possible for single researchers as well as for large consortia to share with their peers very large collections of biomedical data, including medical imaging, computer simulations, etc. It is possible to sign up for the beta users group, which should start in the last quarter of 2008.

Biomed Town
The users of LHP, e.g. all those research, industry, or clinical professionals that are interested in the musculoskeletal system in every possible way and at every dimensional scale, from the whole body down to the cell and the proteins, created a collaborative community within Biomed Town. The activities of the LHDL Consortium are hosted in the LHDL Building. The community consensus process takes place in the Living Human Square.