Eight years building for the UK’s largest adult twin registry
TwinsUK is the UK’s largest adult twin registry, run by the Department of Twin Research and Genetic Epidemiology at King’s College London. We worked on it from 2015 to 2023, for the twins who volunteer and for the researchers who apply to use what the studies produce. The registry describes itself as the most clinically detailed in the world.
Twinzone
What We Did
- 2015 to 2016: A web app for twin volunteers, on a WordPress REST API we wrote, with Android and iOS clients built against the same backend.
- 2016 to 2017: Twinzone, the members’ site, designed and built as its own site at twinsuk.ac.uk/twinzone. Signed-in members reach their details, their research results, their study team, their questionnaires and the twin visit flowchart. Live in November 2017.
- 2017 to 2018: twinsuk.ac.uk rebuilt, with the publications made searchable and the data access procedure drawn as a flowchart.
- 2018 to 2019: The data access system for researchers. An application form, committee approval, and a generated PDF to the applicant and the data access manager on every decision. Built on WordPress, then rebuilt as a Laravel application with ORCID validation.
- 2019: A malware infection found and cleared across the sites.
- 2020: The DietMetab study search rebuilt.
- 2023: Both sites repaired when PHP 8.1 broke what they were built on.
The engagement ended when we closed our UK chapter. The registry works with UK-registered companies.
Deliverables
- Information architecture
- Wireframes
- High-fidelity design
- Members’ portal
- Data access application system
- REST API
- Ongoing maintenance
Tools & Skills
- WordPress, PHP
- Laravel
- HTML, CSS, JS
- Sketch
- InVision
- Zeplin, Sympli
- Basecamp for delivery
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