German Biobank Node Newsletter

Editorial

For this issue, we have decided to wrap up the German Biobank Node’s ongoing activities because the first funding period is almost at its end. We look back on two very intense years of discussions within all our work packages and are convinced that the “concept to develop concepts” has proven successful in every sense. We laid some important groundwork—especially for IT and quality, but also for public awareness and stakeholder analysis. In addition, we began involving the various biobank networks, such as cBMBs, DZGs and NaKo, and we can see that many collaborations have been initiated on different levels.
Now we have the opportunity to secure another round of funding to bring these concepts to life and to implement important structures—mainly within a consortium of ten biobanks (German Biobank Alliance), but with the prospect of rolling out implementation for all national biobanks. One future aim is to closely coordinate our activities with developments in medical informatics so as to build cross-linked infrastructures. Just recently, some brilliant examples of these infrastructures were showcased at the Europe Biobank Week in Vienna, which was jointly organized by BBMRI and ESBB. In this newsletter, we give you a short overview of the main topics discussed in the course of this international conference.
 
Michael Hummel & Cornelia Rufenach

You can read the whole newsletter here!