Facilitating Biodefense Research with Mobile-Cloud Computing

This paper proposes the use of a mobile-cloud by combining mobile devices and the cloud together in a biodefense and emerging infectious diseases (BEI) research application scenario. A mobile-cloud framework is developed to facilitate the use of mobile devices to collect data for, and manipulate and interact with the scientific workflows running in the Cloud. In this framework, an independent trusted accountability service is used to provide data provenance and enforce compliance among the participants of a biodefense research workflow. The authors have implemented a prototype which allows the researchers to use mobile devices to design and participate in biodefense workflows. The authors evaluated the effectiveness of the mobile-cloud with a prototype and conducted performance testing with example biodefense workflows.