Progress Update on SYNTHEMA’s Federated Learning Platform (WP2)
The primary objective of Work Package 2 (WP2) in the SYNTHEMA project is to design and implement a robust Federated Learning (FL) platform infrastructure. This platform will connect clinical centers as distributed nodes, leveraging harmonized health data sources (developed in WP1) to enable federated training and validation of synthetic data generation (SDG) pipelines. Privacy-preserving techniques, such as Secure Multiparty Computation (SMPC) and Differential Privacy (DP), are central to ensuring data security and compliance.
The WP2 team has achieved significant progress during the M14-M18 period, transitioning from defining requirements and architecture to the integration and deployment stage.
Key Activities and Milestones (M14-M18)
Architecture and Deployment Planning:
- Finalized requirements specification through consultations with users and other work packages.
- Defined the initial FL framework architecture and local node technical requirements.
- Supported clinical partners in acquiring hardware and consulting their IT teams for seamless deployment.
Development and Integration Highlights:
- All platform components, including federated learning modules, data management tools, storage systems, and security features, are fully developed.
- Jenkins pipelines and Kubernetes services, such as NFS Storage, Helm package manager, and Kubernetes Dashboard, were deployed to support Continuous Integration/Continuous Deployment (CI/CD).
- The integration plan is in place, and development has reached Sprint 7, marking the completion of core functionalities.
Collaborations and Technical Advancements:
- Established a collaborative relationship with Flower developers to enhance FL capabilities. UPM, INTRA, SBA, and Vicomtech played key roles in formalizing this partnership, supported by periodic bilateral meetings.
- Flower’s rapid development progress aligns with SYNTHEMA’s objectives, although further refinement of design criteria is under review.
- SBA and INTRA have initiated further exploration into DP and SMPC advancements with Flower.
Deployment Roadmap
The deployment phase involves two approaches:
- Remote Access Management: Led by the consortium’s technical team for easier implementation.
- On-Site Management at Hospitals: Technical teams at hospitals will manage complex installations with support and documentation from SYNTHEMA. The deployment guideline is expected by December 2024.
WP2 has successfully reached the integration phase with all components implemented on schedule. The project’s collaboration with Flower developers has been instrumental in refining the platform’s capabilities, setting the stage for seamless deployment across clinical nodes. SYNTHEMA is on track to achieve its vision of secure, privacy-preserving federated learning in healthcare.