International Human Phenome Consortium (IHPC) was officially cofounded in October 2018 by Prof. Li Jin from Fudan University of China, Prof. Jeremy Nicholson from Murdoch University of Australia, and Prof. Leroy Hood from Institute of Systems Biology of the US. The IHPC was proposed to align the leading institutions to form a global network dedicating to large-scale research effort on human phenome. The IHPC comprises international, national and regional centers that are interested in delivering the goals of acquisition, dissemination and sharing of human phenome data at full epidemiological scale.

The overarching mission of IHPC is to create an international network of integrated efforts designated to discover new knowledge and models on the origins and diversity of human traits and diseases from the molecular, cellular to organismal levels by using a diverse range of physical, chemical, and biological metrics and to apply the newly discovered knowledge to create novel translational medicine paradigms for improving health and patient care for common diseases. The IHPC will establish harmonized protocols on standardized phenotyping measurements, data processing, and shared informatics. The IHPC aims to launch the International Human Phenome Initiative (IHPI), an effort of deep phenotyping in diverse populations and cohorts across the world to discern human biological variabilities.

The Advisory Committee of IHPC, consisting of outstanding representatives from the global centers, serves to provide expertise to the Board of IHPC on studies, research-based activates to ensure the management of the IHPC program. The first board meeting of IHPC was held on October 31st 2018 as the close-door program of 2nd International Symposium of Human Phenomics. The attendees of the first board meeting consisted of 11 board members: Prof. Peter Atadja, Prof. Oleg Balanovsky, Prof. Endashaw Bekele, Prof. Leroy Hood, Prof. Li Jin, Prof. Mitali Mukerji, Prof. Jeremy Nicholson, Prof. Yerlan Ramankulov, Prof. Akihiro Umezawa, Prof. Chen Wang (represented by Prof. Bin Cao), and Prof. Tao Xu (in alphabetical order by the initials of last name).

During the first board meeting of IHPC, the IHPC guideline was discussed for modification and the IHPC Committees was agreed to set up, including committee on technology and standards, committee on ethics, law and societal issues and committee on data sharing. Besides, Prof. Leming Shi from Fudan University was nominated as the Secretary-General of the IHPC.