Second Annual BRIDGE Global Workshop held in South Africa

In December 2025, we hosted a global workshop in Johannesburg, South Africa with more than 50 participants. It was a key international convening, funded by the Wellcome Trust, to help shape global standards for responsible data sharing in brain and mental health research. Attendees included people with lived experience, key stakeholders, ethicists, legal experts, and neuroscience researchers. The workshop's objectives aimed to lay the groundwork for forming an international brain coalition, advance manuscripts for supporting literature, and support the development of a first-of-its-kind handbook to guide researchers on data sharing and governance practices within and across national borders. Participants also explored new data governance tools and proposed innovative solutions to make brain science more accessible, ethical, and shareable worldwide.