Ms for Current Opinion in Systems Biology Special Issue on Systems Immunology The AIRR Community as a model for FAIR stewardship of big immunology data

Scott, Jamie K.; Breden, Felix

Systems biology involves network-oriented, computational approaches to modeling biological systems through analysis of big biological data. To contribute maximally to scientific progress, big biological data should be FAIR: findable, accessible, interoperable and reusable Here, we describe high-throughput sequencing data that characterize the vast diversity of B- and T-cell clones comprising the adaptive immune system (AIRR-seq data) and its contribution to our understanding of COVID-19. We describe the accomplishments of the “adaptive immune receptor repertoire” (AIRR) Community, a grass-roots network of interdisciplinary laboratory scientists, bioinformaticists, and policy wonks, in creating and publishing standards, software and repositories for AIRR-seq data based on the FAIR principles.