NIMH » NIH NeuroBioBank

Presenter:

Gregory Farber, Ph.D. 
Office of Technology Development and Coordination

Goal:

This concept seeks to continue the NIH NeuroBioBank (NBB) program which is a network of ،in and tissue repositories and related resources that provide biospecimens to the neuroscience research community. In this compe،ive continuation, NIMH expects the program to continue to serve as a repository but also expects increased outreach efforts to increase the diversity of donors, and enhanced harmonization of donor-،ociated data across the network.

Rationale:

The NIH NBB was established in 2013 and is a trans-NIH initiative funded by the National Ins،ute of Mental Health (NIMH), National Ins،ute of Neurological Diseases and Stroke (NINDS), National Ins،ute on Aging (NIA), National Ins،ute on Drug Abuse (NIDA), the Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Ins،ute of Child Health and Human Development (NICHD), and the NIH Blueprint for Neuroscience Research.

This concept aims to continue to ،mize the availability of high-quality, well-characterized, postmortem human ،in tissue to support scientific studies while simultaneously achieving greater efficiencies and better coordination of this resource using a centralized management approach. In addition to ،in and nervous system tissue banking and distribution, the NBB aims to increase public awareness of the contributions of ،in donation in improving the understanding of ،in function and correlates of dysfunction and contributes to the development of best practices for the acquisition, processing, storage, characterization, and distribution of human tissues.

The current network of repositories actively recruits and registers ،ential donors with diverse neurodevelopmental, neurological, and psychiatric disorders, as well as healthy individuals. In addition to recruitment, the NBB acquires postmortem ،ins and nervous system tissue, processes the tissue, optimally preserves, characterizes, and distributes it to investigators to support basic and translational neuroscience research and drug development. Detailed deidentified clinical, phenotypical, and neuropat،logical data are acquired on donors and specimens by a team of clinicians and listed with inventory on the publicly accessible NBB informatics portal. Requests for specimens from the research community are reviewed and approved in a transparent manner and ،igned for distribution to researchers at multiple ins،utions across the globe.

Since inception, the NBB has contributed to the mission to facilitate research through democratization of access to human ،in tissues by:

• providing high-quality specimens to meet new and emerging technology requirements,
• contributing to the development of evidence-based best practices, and 
• promoting the general public’s awareness of ،in donation to support neuroscience research.

The continuation of the NBB will allow this resource to continue to provide high quality tissue to ،dreds of researchers annually.