# OSDR Biological Data API Release
**URL:** https://awg.osdr.space/t/osdr-biological-data-api-release/2352
**Category:** Announcements/Jobs
**Tags:** api, space-biology, bioinformatics, news, osdr, software, genelab, alsda
**Created:** [March 9, 2025, 7:34pm UTC](https://awg.osdr.space/t/osdr-biological-data-api-release/2352 "2025-03-09T19:34:40Z")
**Posts on this page:** 8
**Page:** 1
### Author:  [@kirill](https://awg.osdr.space/u/kirill)
#### Post date: [March 9, 2025, 7:34pm UTC](https://awg.osdr.space/t/osdr-biological-data-api-release/2352/1 "2025-03-09T19:34:40Z")
I am excited to share with you that we released the **OSDR Biological Data API** earlier this week:
> **[OSDR Biological Data API](https://visualization.osdr.nasa.gov/biodata/api/)**
It is a successor to GLOpenAPI that now **incorporates both GeneLab and ALSDA datasets** from the [OSDR data repo](https://osdr.nasa.gov/bio/repo/) (hence the rebranding) and **improves access to their metadata and data.**
The classic use cases are all there:
- you can select and retrieve sample-level _metadata_ across the entire database with compound queries and filters,
- and then request the matching underlying _data_.
To that, we added:
- a REST interface (making it easier to traverse the database and find dataset, assay, sample, and file objects);
- retrieval of more deeply nested metadata fields;
- additional sensible output formats;
- and we significantly improved the API’s performance, too.
Also, while it’s primarily intended for programmatic access, interactive in-browser
viewers for JSONs and tables are back and better than ever.
**Check it out and let us know what you think!**
Here’s some examples:
- file listings [for a dataset](https://visualization.osdr.nasa.gov/biodata/api/v2/dataset/OSD-37/file/*/?format=browser) and [for a specific sample](https://visualization.osdr.nasa.gov/biodata/api/v2/dataset/OSD-37/assay/*/sample/Atha_Col-0_sl-pool_FLT_Rep3_R1-FL-B1/file/*/?format=browser)
- [metadata for spaceflight-related tissue-specific M. musculus samples](https://visualization.osdr.nasa.gov/biodata/api/v2/query/metadata/?study.characteristics.organism=Mus%20musculus&=study.factor%20value.spaceflight&=study.factor%20value.tissue&study.factor%20value&format=browser)
- an interactive [differential expression table](https://visualization.osdr.nasa.gov/biodata/api/v2/query/data/?id.accession=OSD-100&file.data%20type=differential%20expression&format=browser)
- merged [unnormalized counts](https://visualization.osdr.nasa.gov/biodata/api/v2/query/data/?id=OSD-91%7COSD-127%7COSD-323%7COSD-331%7COSD-431&file.data%20type=unnormalized%20counts&format=browser) across several datasets
- a [metadata table with links to image files](https://visualization.osdr.nasa.gov/biodata/api/v2/query/metadata/?format=browser&investigation.study%20assays.study%20assay%20technology%20type&file.file%20name=/.tiff$%7C.jpg$/)
- a [MultiQC report](https://visualization.osdr.nasa.gov/biodata/api/v2/query/data/?id.accession=OSD-239&file.data%20type=raw%20multiqc%20report) that you don’t even have to download
P.S. The legacy GLOpenAPI is currently still operational in its original location, so none of your existing scripts will break: [https://visualization.genelab.nasa.gov/GLOpenAPI/](https://visualization.genelab.nasa.gov/GLOpenAPI/).
That said, the new Biological Data API has a layer that makes it backwards compatible with GLOpenAPI (just replace `https://visualization.genelab.nasa.gov/GLOpenAPI/` with `https://visualization.osdr.nasa.gov/biodata/api/` – no “v2”); we encourage people to try it out, or even better, to start transitioning to the new API and the new syntax that is described in the [documentation](https://visualization.osdr.nasa.gov/biodata/api/).
[@HUMANawg](https://awg.osdr.space/groups/humanawg) [@MultiOmicsAWG](https://awg.osdr.space/groups/multiomicsawg) [@AnimalAWG](https://awg.osdr.space/groups/animalawg) [@AIMLawg](https://awg.osdr.space/groups/aimlawg) [@ALSDAawg](https://awg.osdr.space/groups/alsdaawg) [@PlantAWG](https://awg.osdr.space/groups/plantawg) [@MicrobesAWG](https://awg.osdr.space/groups/microbesawg) [@RLWG](https://awg.osdr.space/groups/rlwg) [@FemaleReproAWG](https://awg.osdr.space/groups/femalereproawg)
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### Author:  [@kirill](https://awg.osdr.space/u/kirill)
#### Post date: [March 9, 2025, 7:36pm UTC](https://awg.osdr.space/t/osdr-biological-data-api-release/2352/2 "2025-03-09T19:36:08Z")
For those of you attending the [AWG Catalyst Summit](https://awg.osdr.space/t/awg-catalyst-summit-march-12th-save-the-date/1854), we will dedicate time to discussing the new API in more detail! Looking forward to seeing you there!
Also, we would like to hear your feedback and create an FAQ section in our docs based on common use cases.
Finally, in recognizing that the current documentation is rather terse, I put together a fairly informal Jupyter notebook with hands-on examples that shed light on the thinking behind the API design.
I would really appreciate you all giving it a go and letting me know how it went:
> **[OSDR Biological Data API primer 2025-03-09.ipynb](https://drive.google.com/file/d/1tybDRYxZmk6PBJerFLNvY8E3OQyCqX9G/view?usp=sharing)**
>
> Google Drive file.
Thanks all!
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### Author:  [@jessicadurbano](https://awg.osdr.space/u/jessicadurbano)
#### Post date: [March 9, 2025, 8:28pm UTC](https://awg.osdr.space/t/osdr-biological-data-api-release/2352/3 "2025-03-09T20:28:07Z")
Great news 🔝
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### Author:  [@rtscott2001](https://awg.osdr.space/u/rtscott2001)
#### Post date: [March 9, 2025, 11:42pm UTC](https://awg.osdr.space/t/osdr-biological-data-api-release/2352/4 "2025-03-09T23:42:59Z")
Thanks @kirill !
Looking forward to your lightning talk on Wednesday, followed by that dedicated breakout on Wednesday, led by @lauren.sanders to cover all things on how to use the new API
CHEERS!
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### Author:  [@anna.lewkowicz](https://awg.osdr.space/u/anna.lewkowicz)
#### Post date: [March 10, 2025, 8:40am UTC](https://awg.osdr.space/t/osdr-biological-data-api-release/2352/5 "2025-03-10T08:40:34Z")
This is SO cool and useful @kirill, thanks for sharing!
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### Author:  [@rtscott2001](https://awg.osdr.space/u/rtscott2001)
#### Post date: [April 18, 2025, 2:03am UTC](https://awg.osdr.space/t/osdr-biological-data-api-release/2352/6 "2025-04-18T02:03:14Z")
Will also add Kirill briefly presents about the new API at the March 2025 AWG Catalyst Summit
A post [here has all the YouTube live time point queued links](https://awg.osdr.space/t/post-awg-catalyst-summit-summary-youtube-slide-deck-links/2381). @kirill presents during the OSDR Resources section. The post also has link to Google Slide decks and more
Cheer 🎉🚀
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### Author:  [@rtscott2001](https://awg.osdr.space/u/rtscott2001)
#### Post date: [November 5, 2025, 7:44pm UTC](https://awg.osdr.space/t/osdr-biological-data-api-release/2352/7 "2025-11-05T19:44:29Z")
Check out the OSDR/Genelab API!
Here is a shared open document, with example API calls: [https://docs.google.com/document/d/1b0G6kLqxYudGTtEoZlpm837LQt318JWwJ4bI0F2WXyc/edit?tab=t.0](https://docs.google.com/document/d/1b0G6kLqxYudGTtEoZlpm837LQt318JWwJ4bI0F2WXyc/edit?tab=t.0)
The API documentation: [https://visualization.osdr.nasa.gov/biodata/api/](https://visualization.osdr.nasa.gov/biodata/api/)
And also a new Tutorial on the API: [https://osdr-tutorials.readthedocs.io/en/latest/pages/guides/biological\_data\_api.html](https://osdr-tutorials.readthedocs.io/en/latest/pages/guides/biological_data_api.html)
If you hadnt seen, here are ALL the tutorials for everything connected to OSDR/Genelab: [https://osdr-tutorials.readthedocs.io/en/latest/](https://osdr-tutorials.readthedocs.io/en/latest/)
[@ALSDAawg](https://awg.osdr.space/groups/alsdaawg) [@AnimalAWG](https://awg.osdr.space/groups/animalawg) [@AIMLawg](https://awg.osdr.space/groups/aimlawg) [@PlantAWG](https://awg.osdr.space/groups/plantawg) [@RLWG](https://awg.osdr.space/groups/rlwg) [@FemaleReproAWG](https://awg.osdr.space/groups/femalereproawg) [@MultiOmicsAWG](https://awg.osdr.space/groups/multiomicsawg) [@MicrobesAWG](https://awg.osdr.space/groups/microbesawg) [@HUMANawg](https://awg.osdr.space/groups/humanawg) [@BrainAWG](https://awg.osdr.space/groups/brainawg) [@HardwareAWG](https://awg.osdr.space/groups/hardwareawg) [@PPawg](https://awg.osdr.space/groups/ppawg) @kirill @asaravia
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### Author:  [@maneesh](https://awg.osdr.space/u/maneesh)
#### Post date: [November 5, 2025, 11:08pm UTC](https://awg.osdr.space/t/osdr-biological-data-api-release/2352/8 "2025-11-05T23:08:31Z")
Great