STRIDES Initiative

The Science and Technology Research Infrastructure for Discovery, Experimentation, and Sustainability (STRIDES) Initiative

The STRIDES Initiative aims to help NIH and its institutes, centers, and offices (ICOs) accelerate biomedical research by reducing barriers in utilizing commercial cloud services. This initiative aims to harness the power of the cloud to accelerate biomedical discovery. NIH and NIH-funded researchers can take advantage of STRIDES benefits. These key benefits include:

• Professional services—Access to professional service consultations and technical support from the STRIDES Initiative partners.
• Training—Access to training for researchers, data owners, and those supporting the IT infrastructure side of biomedical computing to help ensure optimal use of available tools and technologies.
• Collaborative engagements—Opportunities to explore methods and approaches that may advance NIH’s biomedical research objectives (with scope and milestones of engagements agreed upon separately).
• Discounts on STRIDES Initiative partner services—Favorable pricing on computing, storage, and related cloud services for NIH ICOs and NIH-funded institutions.

Cloud Lab is a sandbox-like environment that provides a space to develop in an isolated and secure way. This can be incredibly useful for those with varying levels of cloud experience, allowing researchers to:

• Explore Cloud Consoles—Researchers can gain an understanding of the look and feel of cloud environments before they jump into a full STRIDES account for research.
• Supplement Cloud Training—Researchers can use the sandbox to strengthen their understanding of cloud training or follow along with training content in an independent environment.
• Experiment with Simple Cloud Solutions—Researchers interested in solutions for specific scientific tasks can use the sandbox to build proof of concept or other simple solutions to understand the level of effort and other details for production.
• Benchmark Costs—Testing out different tools and configurations (instance type, sizes, etc.) to optimize research analyses within cost-controlled environments.

Visit our Cloud Lab page and the FAQs for additional information.

NIH GitHub is an approved code storage and versioning solution for researchers, software engineers, and developers across NIH. The product offers a number of NIH-specific features and support that you can’t get from a personal GitHub account, including:

• Technical support from trained staff in each IC,
• The ability to search for repositories and users within and across ICs,
• Automatic retention of NIH data and code when staff, contractors, or fellows leave the NIH,
• Fully customizable configuration options that enable you to control when, how, and with whom to share your code,
• The ability to easily move existing code into the NIH environment,
• A fully inheritable FISMA Low Authorization to Operate (ATO),
• Convenient integrated NIH single sign-on, and
• The option to add enhanced data loss prevention with GitHub Advanced Security.

For pricing and purchasing information, visit NIH GitHub’s Information Systems Distribution & Procurement page (VPN needed). To learn more, visit the NIH GitHub Resource Center, contact your IC’s NIH GitHub Points of Contact, or contact the NIH GitHub team