Rick Helmich, MD PhD, Associate Professor, Donders Institute, Radboud University, Nijmegen, Netherlands

My main motivation for supporting ENIGMA-PD and the use of Nipoppy and Neurobagel tools is that science benefits from large and diverse datasets, and these initiatives are instrumental in making existing datasets visible and accessible to the larger neuroscience community. What helps is the fact that raw data stay at each location, as well as short ties between involved researchers and centers, and a smaller, dedicated group of scientists who coordinate the project. Long-term funding is crucial to support a scientific “core team” that coordinates efforts within the larger community, provides help and supervision, and makes sure that software (e.g. analysis scripts for ENIGMA-PD, but also tools such as Nipoppy and Neurobagel) are “plug-and-play”. This may be challenging in the current funding landscape.