Translator User Interface Sources Sought Notice.pdf

COMBINED VIRTUAL INDUSTRY DAY AND SOURCES SOUGHT NOTICE

Agency/Office:

National Center for Advancing Translational Sciences (NCATS) National Institutes of Health (NIH)

Location: Rockville, MD

Title:

Biomedical Data Translator User Interface Development

Solicitation number:

75N95021R00018

PSC:

DA01, IT and Telecom – Business Application/Application Development Support Services (Labor) [includes customer experience/UX] B529, Special Studies/Analysis – Scientific Data

NAICS:

541511, Custom Computer Programming Services, $30M 541519, Other Computer-Related Services, $30M 541690, Other Scientific and Technical Consulting Services, $16.5M 541990, All Other Professional, Scientific and Technical Services, $16.5M

Contracting Office Address:

National Institutes of Health NIDA Office of Acquisitions, NCATS Section 3 WFN Rm 03C18 MSC 6012 301 North Stonestreet Ave.

Bethesda, MD 20892

INTRODUCTION:

The National Institutes of Health, through the National Institute on Drug Abuse Office of Acquisition – NCATS Section, is seeking capability statements related to development of a user interface for the Biomedical Data Translator.

This is a SOURCES SOUGHT NOTICE to determine the availability of BOTH Other than Small Business (including academic and not-for-profit entities) and Small Businesses (e.g., 8(a), veteran-owned small businesses, service-disabled veteran-owned small businesses, HUBZone small businesses, small disadvantaged businesses, and women-owned small businesses) with the capability to meet the objectives and requirements described below. Your responses to the information requested will assist the Government in determining the appropriate acquisition method, including whether a set-aside is possible.

In addition, the Government seeks to clarify and better tailor this requirement, and is offering a virtual industry day for interested parties to familiarize themselves with the Government’s requirement; ask questions to clarify their understanding of the Government’s requirement; and provide feedback regarding industry capabilities and the state of information science, including commercial services and solutions, to meet this requirement. This INDUSTRY DAY NOTICE provides links to documents and presentations describing the Government’s requirements and objectives. Interested parties should submit questions and comments regarding this project so that the Government can refine this requirement, shape the statement of work, define measurable outcomes, etc. The Government does not intend to answer questions directly.

BACKGROUND:

Translational research aspires to use the huge amounts of complex data across multiple scientific domains to develop actionable knowledge. The data comes in all forms, and represents domains from basic science to clinical data. It includes gene products, genomics, model organisms, tissues, chemicals, pathways, conditions, and patient groups

The National Center for Advancing Translational Sciences (NCATS), one of the 27 institutes and centers of the National Institutes of Health (NIH), is catalyzing the development of the Biomedical Data Translator (“Translator”), a tool to augment human reasoning in analyzing that data to provide better understanding of the pathophysiology of human disease. Translator will support the research community by offering computationally-assisted exploration of data, whether related to existing research or leading to development of new research hypotheses.

Essential to the use of Translator by biomedical researchers is an intuitive interface that enables the user to interact with complex, diverse data sets and relationships and encourages trust in the sources and search results. Among the design challenges of the Translator interface are:

• Presentation of multiple complex knowledge graph “answers” in response to a single query;

• Establishing confidence in the ability of Translator to address the user’s question by providing provenance of the knowledge returned to the user;

• Capturing the collection and history of user decisions used to formulate, iterate, filter and merge results as they develop their query;

• Capture feedback from the user.

The contract concept presented at this Translator Industry Day is for an entirely new scope of work for a user interface (UI) that will interact with existing Translator tools. The work will include design, development, pilot release, and initial public release. No work has started on the user interface.

PURPOSE:

The purpose of this Sources Sought Notice and Virtual Industry Day is to:

• Obtain market research to support acquisition planning;

• Obtain industry feedback to clarify and better tailor the requirement;

• Allow interested parties to familiarize themselves with the requirement;

• Allow interested parties to ask questions to clarify their understanding of the requirement;

• Obtain information regarding industry capabilities and the state of user interface development, search interface development, and information science, including commercial services and solutions, to meet this requirement.

The materials provided as part of this virtual industry day include:

• This notice

• Audio-only Presentation, “Biomedical Data Translator Overview (Audio Only)”, https://youtu.be/Tx4VIMAuKnQ.

• Video Presentation, “Biomedical Data Translator Architecture and Workflow”, https://youtu.be/-rKngxwtHX4.

• Translator User Interface Materials (PDF portfolio – 7 items):

o “Translator and UI Background” o “18F Discovery Research,” GSA 18F o “Biomedical Data Translator Architecture and Workflow,” slide deck presented in the video presentation.

o Four Example Use Cases:

“Pain Points for Pain Meds – Introduction” “Pain Points for Pain Meds – Detailed” “Explaining Finasteride’s Use to Treat Hair Loss: A Translator Use Case” “Finding Genes with Any Connection to IL-6”

• Extensive background on the Biomedical Data Translator:

o https://ncats.nih.gov/translator

GENERAL REQUIREMENTS:

A capable vendor must demonstrate its experience and ability to perform the following key requirements:

I. Background – Statement of Objectives

The contractor will work with NCATS and parts of the Translator development consortium (currently fifteen different teams from within and outside the Government) to develop a user interface for biomedical researchers to interact with Translator. The development of a user interface poses several distinct design challenges for the developer, including but not limited to:

• presentation of multiple complex knowledge graph “answers” in response to a single query;

• establishing confidence in the ability of Translator to address the user’s question by providing provenance of the knowledge returned to the user;

• capturing the collection and history of user decisions used to formulate, iterate, filter and merge results as they develop their query; and

• gathering feedback from the user.

Translator requires an intuitive interface that encourages trust while enabling the user to consume complex, diverse results. The intended users of Translator – biomedical researchers

– typically have a set of sites and computational tools they use that allow them to explore information in their area of research. Since these users may be super or power users of their current toolset, the interface for Translator will need to familiarize biomedical researchers with different data types from diverse sources that are the result of connections uncovered by Translator. The interface should engage users without being overwhelming or intimidating.

https://youtu.be/Tx4VIMAuKnQ https://youtu.be/-rKngxwtHX4 https://ncats.nih.gov/translator

The answers and supporting evidence that Translator will present may be novel and unfamiliar to biomedical researchers, however Translator must present these results in a way that evokes both trust and curiosity while also enabling and encouraging the user to explore (incrementally and wholly) and iterate. The interface must allow the user to formulate their intent and iteratively increase the relevance of the knowledge returned for their questions. Ultimately, we expect “answers” to be critically evaluated by our users, and want to solicit and capture feedback on both systematic and specific complications that are encountered in the ongoing use of Translator. This feedback will loop back to the development teams to address in later iterations.

Translator knowledge providers contribute deep expertise within the different scientific domains that constitute translational research as well as technical expertise to take complex data and turn it into knowledge. The data represented by the knowledge providers ranges from basic science to clinical data and includes gene products, genomics, model organisms, tissues, chemicals, pathways, conditions and patient groups. The autonomous relay agents employ novel analytic approaches that integrate knowledge across the different knowledge providers.

The vendor for the user experience should complement the existing teams by providing a foundation of deep user research experience, creative design history, dependable testing approaches, and technical development expertise that has been applied to the specific challenges of biomedical data and translational research.

The Translator website will provide biomedical researchers a place to ask questions. The website will utilize the autonomous relay system to communicate with and access multiple graph “answer” sets delivered by the autonomous relay agents and knowledge providers. Result sets are available in the form of knowledge graphs, which provide a variety of answers and supporting evidence that range from known knowns to surprising and radical unknowns, though Translator need not present these answers in classic knowledge graph form. Biomedical researchers will need a place to explore the results and the processes and data sources used to generate the answers. The processes and data are complex analysis implementations and rich biomedical data objects which the user may be unfamiliar with and that will require thoughtful presentation and explanation in order to enable the user to trust the methods and further their research. These rich results will need to be presented in such a way that the user can meaningfully decode this abstract information. The visualizations presented will need to optimize cognitive fit and maximize users’ working memory.

It is anticipated that performance of the contract will include:

• User research including identifying and working with biomedical researchers of this novel system

• User interface design based on the user research insights

• Agile development and testing

II. SPECIAL CONSIDERATIONS

DELIVERY OR DELIVERABLES

While the project methodology will drive the overall framework, NCATS anticipates that an Agile development approach will be used. The deliverables will be conducted for each interface (question asking, answering, exploration, feedback, and collaboration with other users). Translator will iterate in parallel with the interface as needed. The vendor will need to demonstrate flexibility in order to pivot direction based on the priority and availability of the program.

Initially the minimally viable product will provide a space for a biomedical researcher to submit a “templated” question to the autonomous relay system, display the results to the user, allow the user to explore the results and send feedback to Translator. In the future, the interface will need to enable and guide users to pose questions in a manner that the autonomous relay system can interpret in addition to the functionality introduced in the templated question phase. As Translator evolves, the responses will be unique, however we want to ensure that the interfaces provided are comfortable enough to encourage acceptance and trust. Additionally, as the system gains use, researchers may need a way to collaborate and communicate. While Translator does not intend to be a forum or email box, the community aspect should be embraced and facilitate the sharing of exploration spaces.

TRAVEL

The Translator Development awardees meet and collaborate both with NCATS and other awardees on a periodic basis remotely, individually and in working groups. We also plan to have three, four-day, consortium-wide, in-person working meetings per year, to facilitate collaborations between teams as needed. The meetings will generally rotate between east coast, west coast, and central U.S. locations.

The contractor that partners with us for the User Experience Lifecycle for the Development of the Translator User Interface will conduct meetings as needed. The vendor will also have the opportunity to attend the face-to-face meetings, both to work with the Translator Development teams as well as to present and iterate on research and prototypes.

The NCATS team is available virtually and at our offices in Rockville, MD and in-person meetings are available on an ad-hoc basis with prior scheduling.

DATA RIGHTS

All software and other tools used for the entire Translator program (to include this user interface) are expected to be open source and publicly available. All software created during the project period must be made publicly available through NIH-directed source code repositories. The NIH expects and supports the timely release and sharing of final research data, software and tools that support the publication of these data from NIH-supported programs for use by other researchers. NCATS expects that this project will be intensely collaborative among research partners and NIH staff, and that the unrestricted exchange of source code and software tools written as part of this program will be essential to a successful outcome.

Open source software is considered to be commercial software under the FAR. Any contract for user interface development will address the licensing of open source software, and will include FAR clauses addressing patents and rights in data. It is expected that the Government will receive, at a minimum, unrestricted rights as described in the FAR.

INSTRUCTIONS:

Interested organizations must demonstrate and document in the submitted capability statement extensive experience in the technical areas and requirements listed above. Furthermore, organizations should include relevant and specific information on each of the following qualifications:

1) Experience: An outline of previous similar projects, specifically the techniques employed in the areas described above.

2) Personnel: Name, professional qualifications of personnel with specific experience in the work requested and knowledge of, and experience in, the field of biomedical research.

3) Facilities: Availability and description of the facilities and equipment required to conduct this type of work.

4) Compliance with Requirements: Vendors should identify and demonstrate specifically how they will meet the requirements listed above.

5) In addition to capability statements, the Government is particularly interested in information related to:

• The current availability of commercial products or solutions (to include open-source solutions);

• Industry capabilities for development of the user interface to mee the requirements discussed in this Notice;

• Notional timelines for development.

The Government will assess the appropriateness of professional and technical personnel classifications. The Government will consider any other specific and relevant information about this announcement that may improve our assessment of respondents. Organizations should demonstrate capability to administer and coordinate interrelated tasks in an effective and timely manner. Documentation may include, but is not limited to, contracts in which the organization performed equivalent tasks (Government and commercial); references, i.e., names, titles, telephone numbers and any other information serving to document the organizations capability;

and awards or commendations.

The NAICS for this requirement has not been determined. Respondents may suggest appropriate NAICS. Possible NAICS include:

541511, Custom Computer Programming Services, $30M 541519, Other Computer-Related Services, $30M 541690, Other Scientific and Technical Consulting Services, $16.5M 541990, All Other Professional, Scientific and Technical Services, $16.5M

All capability statements also should include the following: 1) company name and address; 2) point of contact, 3) phone/fax/email; 4) NAICS Code(s), 5) business size and status; 6) capability information in response to the requirement and qualifications identified in this notice;

and 7) type of organization (e.g., other than small, academic, not-for-profit, small business, veteran-owned, service-disabled veteran-owned, women-owned, 8(a), Small Disadvantaged Business (SDB), and Historically Underutilized Business Zone (HUBZone).

The Government does not intend to answer questions submitted in response to this notice.

Capability statements/responses to the sources sought will be used to plan the appropriate acquisition approach (e.g. commercial/noncommercial; set-aside/full-and-open; etc.). Questions and comments/reactions in response to the industry day are encouraged and will be used to better define the Government’s requirement, shape the statement of work, define measurable outcomes, etc., but the Government does not intend to answer questions directly.

THIS IS NOT A REQUEST FOR PROPOSAL: This notice is for information and planning purposes only and does not commit the Government to any contractual agreement. The Government does not intend to award a contract based on responses under this announcement nor otherwise pay for the preparation of any information sent for the Government’s use. Any proprietary information should be so marked. The Government reserves the right to use information provided by respondents for any purpose deemed necessary and legally appropriate. Any organization providing a capability statement in response to this notice should ensure that its response is complete and sufficiently detailed to allow the Government to determine the organization’s qualifications to perform the work. Respondents are advised that the Government is under no obligation to acknowledge receipt of the information received to provide feedback to respondents with respect to any information submitted. After a review of the responses received, this requirement may be published on SAM.gov Contracting Opportunities.

However, responses to this notice will not be considered adequate responses to a solicitation.

The information submitted must be in a clear and concise format that addresses each of the elements of the project requirement listed above. A cover page and an executive summary may be included but is not required. The response is limited to fifteen (15) pages not including a cover page or executive summary. Responses must include your technical and administrative points of contact, including names, titles, addresses, telephone and fax numbers, and e-mail addresses. Additional marketing materials, pamphlets, and information not relevant to the requirements identified above should not be submitted with the capability statement.

Confidentiality: No proprietary, classified, confidential, or sensitive information should be included in your response. The Government reserves the right to use any non-proprietary technical information in any resultant solicitation(s).

Respondents are encouraged to submit questions and comments related to the Biomedical Data Translator user interface so that the Government can use this input to better define this requirement, shape the statement of work, define measurable outcomes, etc. In addition, any respondent that believes they possess the capability necessary to successfully undertake the work described above must submit a capability statement by email to Stuart Kern, Contract Specialist, stuart.kern@nih.gov no later than 1:00 p.m. Eastern time on Monday, April 12, 2021.

The subject line for the submission must include Sources Sought Number 75N95021R00018.

Primary Point of Contact:

Stuart Kern, Contract Specialist Stuart.Kern@nih.gov mailto:stuart.kern@nih.gov