New Delhi, March 23 (IANS) Union Minister of State for Science & Technology, Dr Jitendra Singh on Monday said that India’s largest pregnancy cohort study of 12,000 women under the GARBH‑INi initiative aims to develop indigenous, AI‑driven solutions to prevent preterm births.

Singh at an event here, said the study supports creation of AI-based pregnancy dating models tailored for Indian populations, identification of microbiome-based predictors of preterm birth, rapid diagnostic tools, and genetic markers for early risk assessment.

Such models and solutions can improve maternal and child health outcomes in the country and tackle preterm births, one of the leading causes of neonatal mortality as well morbidity in adulthood, he added.

The programme has enrolled about 12,000 pregnant women, one of South Asia’s largest pregnancy cohorts and built a repository of over 1.6 million well‑characterised biospecimens and over one million ultrasound images to support research.

The minister noted that India carries a significant share of the global burden of preterm births, making it essential to develop solutions suited to Indian conditions.

The programme marks a comprehensive, data-driven approach integrating clinical epidemiology, multi-omics biomarkers, and artificial intelligence for personalised predictions, he said.

The initiative has also established a national biorepository and the GARBH-INi-DRISHTI data-sharing platform, enabling wider access for the research community and contributing to global scientific publications.

On the occasion, key partnerships and technology transfer initiatives were formalised, including transfer of microbiome-based biotherapeutics technology. Initiatives such as GARBH-INi are part of a larger national mission linking science with long-term nation-building, he noted.

India’s bioeconomy grew from nearly $10 billion in 2014 to about $195 billion, the minister said, adding the country is now being recognised globally for its strengths in preventive and primary healthcare, supported by indigenous innovations.

Dr. V.K. Paul, Member, NITI Aayog, said that the next phase of the programme should focus on effectively utilising the tools, predictive models and platforms developed so far.

—IANS

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