Researchers to ask 10,000 to share data of their lives

NEW YORK — Wanted: 10,000 New Yorkers interested in advancing science by sharing a trove of personal information, from cellphone locations and credit-card swipes to blood samples and life-changing events. For 20 years.

Researchers are gearing up to start recruiting participants next year for a study so sweeping it’s called “The Human Project.” It aims to channel different data streams into a river of insight on health, aging, education and other aspects of human life.

There have been other “big data” health studies, and the National Institutes of Health plans to start recruitment as soon as this fall for a million-person project intended to foster individualized treatment.

But the $15 million-a-year Human Project is breaking ground with the scope of individual data it plans to collect simultaneously, says Dr. Vasant Dhar, editor-in-chief of the journal Big Data.

Participants will be invited to join; researchers are tapping survey science to create a demographically representative group.

They’ll start with tests of everything from blood to genetics to

IQ. They’ll be asked for access to medical, financial and educational records, as well as cellphone data such as location and the numbers they call and text.

Participants get $500 per family for enrolling.