Meeting of the German Biobank Alliance (GBA) in Würzburg

Energy saving, cost calculation, e-learning – the meeting of the German Biobank Alliance (GBA) from 9 to 10 November 2022 in Würzburg offered a wide range of topics. The meeting, jointly organised by the German Biobank Node (GBN) and the Interdisciplinary Bank of Biomaterials and Data Würzburg (ibdw), was held at the German Centre for Heart Failure (DZHI) with 50 participants. "Our GBA events are now small symposia," said GBN Executive Director Dr. Cornelia Specht. "We owe this mainly to the high-quality contributions from the GBA community."

Biobank promotes harmonisation

Prof. Dr. Matthias Goebeler, Vice Dean and Speaker of the Interdisciplinary Centre for Clinical Research Würzburg, and Prof. Dr. Stefan Störk, Head of the Department of Clinical Research and Epidemiology of Heart Failure at the DZHI, opened the event. Prof. Störk, who is also involved in the GBN's testimonial campaign, highlighted ibdw's contribution to the establishment of the still young DZHI. The ibdw, partner biobank of the GBA since 2017, had decisively promoted the use of harmonised concepts, especially the approach of central storage was a great step forward. This also applies to broad consent. "Around 92 % of the patients asked sign the broad consent form and donate biospecimens for medical research," said ibdw head Prof. Dr. Roland Jahns. "This is a valuable basis for us".


ibdw also owes its good standing to wide-ranging public relations measures. Semira Both presented the portfolio on behalf of Stakeholder Manager Jörg Fuchs. Presenting the biobank with a poster at various scientific conferences and discussing it with researchers there has proven to be particularly successful.

Hot topic: Saving energy in the biobank

"When it comes to the energy consumption of biobanks, you have to take various aspects into account," said Dr. Jörg Geiger, laboratory manager of the liquid biobank at ibdw. "Not only the cooling systems need a lot of energy, but also air conditioning and ventilation." In addition, there are other influencing factors such as the number of employees present or the temperature of adjacent rooms. In his presentation, Jörg Geiger also addressed the question of whether the temperature of -80°C ultra-low temperature (ULT) freezers should be raised to -70°C. After the meeting, participants published recommendations on the energy-saving use of ULT as an editorial in the Laborjournal and on bbmri.de.

Transparent costs

Saving energy and thus costs is not the only urgent task for biobanks; transparent listing of all required financial resources is also necessary. A modular service catalogue, which breaks down the costs of individual items into personnel, material costs and investments, was presented by the finance working group. The goal is to use this catalogue to make biobank services also eligible for grant applications – corresponding discussions with the German Research Foundation (DFG) are ongoing. In order to test the catalogue, GBA biobanks will now calculate their costs accordingly using four exemplary queries. "Our catalogue provides the basis for standardising cost calculations within the GBA in the long term," said AG spokesperson Dr. Romy Kirsten, head of the biobank at the University Medical Centre Mannheim.

Which BIMS is the "right" one?

GBA biobanks use very different software solutions as biobank information management systems (BIMS). A GBN/GBA webinar series in autumn examined and compared different systems – in addition to long-established BIMS such as CentraXX or Starlims, also "newcomers" such as DIS, Open Specimen or HenRY. "For the selection of a system, it plays a major role how many IT resources are available to a biobank," Dr. Cecilia Engels, IT coordinator of the GBN, pointed out. "The need varies depending on the system." The comparison of the systems as well as the recordings of the webinars are available for GBA biobanks – also on the OpenILIAS learning platform, as GBN project manager Dr. Johanna Schiller demonstrated in a webinar on 7 December.

European Health Data Space (EHDS)

GBN IT coordinator Dr. Zdenka Dudová reported on a huge digitisation boost that the European Health Data Space (EHDS) launched by the EU Commission in May 2022 is likely to inspire, and its influence on biobanks. The aim of the EHDS is to link national health systems more closely through the secure and efficient exchange of health data. In this way, the EHDS will not only improve Europe-wide care, but also support research. A major challenge here is the interoperability of the data. First solutions are currently being developed in pilot projects in which GBN and BBMRI-ERIC are participating. The foundations for the EHDS are to be laid by 2025.

Valuable contacts in motivated community

The organisation of the event earned much praise: "I enjoyed the meeting very much," said Helene Dukal from the biobank of the Centre for Innovative Psychiatry and Psychotherapy Research (ZIPP) in Mannheim. "I have made a particularly valuable contact for me there and am now benefiting from a further exchange on the isolation of PBMCs." Promoting the exchange of knowledge and experience within the GBA community is a core task of the GBN. Thus, GBN director Prof. Dr. Michael Hummel was also highly satisfied: "A very well attended, lively and constructive meeting with many new faces. I am glad that the growing GBA provides more and more biobankers with a space to mutually benefit from their expertise."

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Questions?

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Tel. +49. 30. 450 536 347


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