A four-year, $10 million NIH grant will allow the institute to establish a first-of-its-kind repository of tissue from human donors that can be used by researchers worldwide to study Type 1 and Type 2 diabetes.

Scientists hope these efforts, which will include harnessing the power of artificial intelligence, will eventually lead to new treatments that better manage or even prevent diabetes and its complications.

Joining UF in this effort will be investigators at the University of Alabama at Birmingham and Vanderbilt University, who will process heart and kidney tissue, respectively, and the University of Pennsylvania, which will assist in data analysis.

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Compared with human biobanking, animal biobanking is in its infancy. This initiative may be the largest and most ambitious so far to try to pinpoint what triggers disease in healthy pets by sifting through genomic patterns.

“The overall aim is to improve pet care of the future and health outcomes, and to improve the health span and quality of life of our pets,” says Kay O’Donnell, vice president of the Waltham Petcare Science Institute, a division of Mars Petcare.

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From the group of UKB volunteers, individuals were chosen pseudo-random and split across the two sequencing sites. The authors stated that through a depletion rank (DR) score of windows spanning the genome, this extensive database of variants enables the assessment of selection based on sequence diversity inside a population.

Overall, the study report on the initial data release contains a sizable collection of sequence variants centering on the WGS of 150,119 people, including short insertions or deletions (indels), single-nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs), structural variants (SVs), and microsatellites.

The authors mentioned that the present research’s description of extensive sequencing, and ongoing efforts to sequence the whole UKB, are expected to significantly advance knowledge of the role and relevance of the non-coding genome.

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Under the agreement, Regensburg, Germany-based Lifespin will gain access to more than 25,000 longitudinal blood samples from roughly 4,800 cancer patients that it will analyze using its NMR-based metabolomics platform.

“We are excited about this very important partnership with the Medical University and with Biobank of Med Uni Graz, which we anticipate will be an aperture for further joint programs,” Lifespin CEO Ali Tinazli said in a statement.

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The current Biobanks Act from 2003 has been criticized for being unclear and outdated and to create unnecessary administration, thereby leading to increased costs for healthcare and research. The new Biobanks Act includes several changes which are expected to help reduce administration and costs as well as help speed up processes when conducting clinical trials without diminishing the protection of the sample donor.

Some of the changes that will apply under the new legislation:

• The scope of the new Biobanks Act is broadened to apply to all identifiable samples that are collected, stored or used for the purposes set out in the new Biobanks Act, regardless of where the samples are collected.
• The new Biobanks Act will apply to samples that are stored for more than 9 months from the time of sampling, as well as to the time prior to this, if the intention is that the sample is to be stored for more than 9 months or if the sample is not destroyed immediately after it has been analysed.
• The concept of primary and secondary sample collections is abolished.
• The general ban on the final storage of samples abroad has been removed.
• It may also be noted that the new Biobanks Act provides a possibility for authorities to issue regulations regarding traceability of the samples in case of transfer outside Sweden.

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The ambitious effort would collect not only genetic information but also medical, environmental, and lifestyle data for a so-called biobank that researchers could use to spot patterns in the population and better understand what ails us.

The project is called My Healthy Maryland and is a collaboration among the school of medicine, the University of Maryland Medical Center and the 13-hospital University of Maryland Medical System.

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“We are able to assess how genetics are important to treating our patients here,” Kao said. “We can tell providers what the best things to do are, with confidence that it applies to the person in front of them.”

For example, Kao said, Hispanics make up about 15% of UCHealth’s patient population. Genetic information from a biobank of patients from, say, the United Kingdom, with a much smaller Hispanic population, would not make an ideal match.

“You know you’re going to miss something,” he said.

In addition, the Biobank specimen data links to a deep reservoir of clinical data stored in the Epic electronic health record (EHR), a capability many other institutions lack, Kao said.

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Among them is Stevens-Johnson syndrome (SJS) and the more severe Toxic Epidermal Necrolysis (TEN), two forms of the same life-threatening disease that are triggered by severe adverse skin reactions to a variety of medications. SJS and TEN cause a rash similar to a second-degree burn, as well as sores on the mucous membranes and eyes.

“SJS and TEN are mercifully not very common conditions,” notes Pasieka, who focuses her research around these conditions and others like them. “But they’re very poorly diagnosed because there aren’t that many people who have a high index of suspicion who’re trained to know what they’re looking for.”

Within the last year, Pasieka has started setting up a translational science lab at USU. Her main goal is to create a biorepository to collect SJS and TEN patient tissue and data about their hospitalizations, biosigns, blood work, and lab tests. She hopes to receive patient samples from across the country.

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The BIG project will apply new genomics solutions to better protect and conserve the wood bison population in Canada. It’s directly connected with the massive $17-million-dollar research initiative called “Integrated omics for sustainable animal agriculture and environmental stewardship” (IntegrOmes) that’s based at the USask Livestock and Forage Centre of Excellence (LFCE).

Funding for IntegrOmes was made possible by the Canada Foundation for Innovation’s Innovation Fund and included contributions from federal, provincial, and private agencies. USask veterinarian and reproductive biologist Dr. Gregg Adams leads IntegrOmes’ multi-agency research team.

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