AnoniMME

AnoniMME enables anonymous, encrypted querying and response exchange across the Matchmaker Exchange (MME) federated databases to protect researcher privacy while facilitating discovery of gene variants associated with rare diseases.

Key Features:

• Anonymity in querying: Enables researchers to submit queries without revealing their identity or specific research interests within the MME platform.
• Reverse Private Information Retrieval (RP-PIR): Leverages the RP-PIR cryptographic primitive to allow anonymous search operations over federated databases.
• Public-key encryption and public database storage: Queries are encrypted with a public encryption key and stored in a public database for processing.
• Multi-server support: Operates in a multi-server/federated database environment to distribute query processing while preserving anonymity.
• Encrypted responses: Supports encrypted exchange of responses and encrypted contact details between researchers.

Scientific Applications:

• Rare disease research: Facilitates secure cross-database querying to accelerate discovery of gene variations associated with rare genetic diseases.
• Personalized medicine: Enables access to federated genomic data with preserved privacy to support development of individualized diagnostic and therapeutic strategies.

Methodology:

Queries are encrypted with a public encryption key (using RP-PIR), stored in a public database, and processed by federated/multi-server databases without revealing requester identity or query contents; responses and contact details are exchanged in encrypted form.