Enabling Demonstrated Consent for Biobanking with Blockchain and Generative AI.

Journal: The American journal of bioethics : AJOB
PMID: 39499856

Abstract

Participation in research is supposed to be voluntary and informed. Yet it is difficult to ensure people are adequately informed about the potential uses of their biological materials when they donate samples for future research. We propose a novel consent framework which we call "demonstrated consent" that leverages blockchain technology and generative AI to address this problem. In a demonstrated consent model, each donated sample is associated with a unique non-fungible token (NFT) on a blockchain, which records in its metadata information about the planned and past uses of the sample in research, and is updated with each use of the sample. This information is accessible to a large language model (LLM) customized to present this information in an understandable and interactive manner. Thus, our model uses blockchain and generative AI technologies to track, make available, and explain information regarding planned and past uses of donated samples.

Authors

  • Caspar Barnes
    Harvard Medical School.
  • Mateo Riobo Aboy
    University of Cambridge.
  • Timo Minssen
    Centre for Advanced Studies in Biomedical Innovation Law, Faculty of Law, University of Copenhagen, Copenhagen, Denmark.
  • Jemima Winifred Allen
    Faculty of Medicine, Nursing & Health Sciences, Monash University, Clayton, Victoria, Australia.
  • Brian D Earp
    Philosophy, Psychology, Yale University, New Haven, Connecticut, USA brian.earp@yale.edu.
  • Julian Savulescu
    2Uehiro Centre for Practical Ethics, University of Oxford, Oxford, UK.
  • Sebastian Porsdam Mann
    University of Oxford.

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