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Annual Report 2017

Department of Biobank and Tissue Resources

Nobuyoshi Hiraoka, Hiromi Sakamoto, Masumi Tanaka, Teiko Yamane, Izumi Hayama, Nobuko Nangi

Research activities

 The Department of Biobank and Tissue Resources operates the National Cancer Center Biobank under the supervision of the National Cancer Center Biobank Administration Committee.

 In 2017, 8,462 vials of tissue specimens obtained from surgically resected materials of 1,697 patients were newly deposited at the National Cancer Center Biobank and 1,323 vials of tissue specimens obtained from surgically resected materials of 912 patients were provided for researches approved by the National Cancer Center Ethics Committee. The ratio of the number of patients from whom samples were provided for researches to those of whom samples were newly deposited at the Biobank was about 54%. At the end of March, 2018, we reposited 98,938 vials of tissue specimens of 23,145 patients.

 In 2017, 55,019 vials of plasma samples drawn from 10,702 patients were newly deposited at the National Cancer Center Biobank and 2,719 vials of plasma samples drawn from 2,521 patients were provided for researches approved by the National Cancer Center Ethics Committee. At the end of March, 2018, we reposited 270,355 vials of blood samples of 61,150 patients who consented to give blood samples for research purposes.

 Researchers who received samples from the Biobank have published 534 scientific papers (total impact factor; 2,903.555, total citation index; 12,613). A total of 65% of the published papers was based on collaborative researches between researchers of the National Cancer Center (NCC) and outside researchers; in particular, 15 % of those were based on collaborative researches with industries.

 Many founders and/or contact persons of bioresource repositories of other universities and hospitals visited the National Cancer Center Biobank to learn about the management knowhow of the biobank. We have been consulted by contact persons of bioresource repositories of other universities about storage system for specimens. We made efforts to get outside researchers to see appropriate collaborators in the NCC for collaborative researches using our biobank specimens.

 We have built up the catalog database, HosCanR Biobank Edition, by extracting appropriate information from the Interview Sheet Database in a common form among six National Centers in Japan and HosCanR, an application specialized for the National Program of Cancer Registries. Researchers and biobank users can find out samples suitable for their own research plans using the search commands of this catalog database. In 2017, we established the close connection between HosCanR Biobank Edition and the central database of the National Center Biobank Network (NCBN) using an application programming interface. We also started to set up the catalog database in the NCC Kashiwa campus. The staff of the National Cancer Center Biobank participates in the Central Steering Committee, the Chief Committee, Sample Handling System Review Working Group, and Medical Information System Review Working Group of the NCBN.

Future prospects

 The continuous collection of samples for various research needs and management of the biobank, including a high-quality clinicopathological information database, are considered to be a national mission. The National Cancer

Center Biobank should be continued and become a more robust and permanent research base, and it should also continuously support the NCBN and connect the intentions of voluntary donors to next generation personalized medicine.