Researcher portrait, 2010-06-15

Biobanking Infrastructure: BBMRI

Biobanks containing blood and tissue specimens from many tens of thousands of individuals are a fundamental resource in medical research. Large Swedish biobanks are joining together in a national infrastructure with the ambition to form the world´s largest biobank.
“Several large Swedish studies will collaborate. Using the same standards of quality and a common storage facility it should be possible to use specimens just as easily as if you were dealing with a single biobank – the largest of all in terms of the number of individuals," says Professor Joakim Dillner from Karolinska Institutet and coordinator of the Swedish Biobanking and Biomolecular Resources Research Infrastructure (BBMRI.SE).

Biobanks store blood, cells, urine, saliva, and other specimens from patients and healthy volunteers. Researchers use the specimens, for example, in attempting to discover methods to diagnose diseases earlier or tailor treatments for individual patients. Sweden has a long and successful history of using biobanks.

“Several of the older biobanks, for instance those in Umeå and Malmö, are so productive that we can say they are similar to academic and scientific research factories."

New facility in southern Stockholm


The Swedish biobanks will now be connected in a single, nationwide network. The Swedish biobank collaboration (BBMRI.SE) will coordinate the project with funding it receives through a so-called comprehensive infrastructure grant from the Swedish Research Council.

Just over half of the grant will be used for a large, automated facility to store specimens. The facility is being built in Flemingsberg, near the south campus of Karolinska Institutet. Here specimens will be stored in tanks of liquid nitrogen at extremely low temperatures to preserve many substances in the specimens.

“It will be a national research facility that will be used mainly to keep new specimens."

The remaining funds will be used to employ 21 people, distributed across the six faculties of medicine. They will coordinate the collection and use of specimens.

“We will standardize collection, collaborate on how to use current material, and develop quality standards and routines. Optimally useable specimens will be collected and used in an optimum manner," says Joakim Dillner.

Biobank research


Professor Dillner´s interest in biobanks emerged through his research on infections as causes of cancer. Using specimens from biobanks, he studied the papillomavirus that causes cervical cancer. When he compared 30-year-old specimens against the cancer registry he found that people with traces of virus in the old specimens had a higher risk for future cancer.

“It sparked my interest in biobanks, and now I work extensively with infrastructural biobank research — in other words, research on how we can construct and use biobanks."

Note: The Bio Banking and Molecular Resources Research Infrastructure (BBMRI) is a European collaboration. BBMRI.SE is the Swedish component in this collaboration.

Text: Siv Engelmark Cederborg

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Contact: webbredaktör
Updated: 2010-06-15
Joakim Dillner, professor Karolinska Institutet.

Joakim Dillner, professor Karolinska Institutet and coordinator of BBMRI.se.

Photo: Kennet Ruona, © Joakim Dillner.
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