Preparing for Biobanking 4.0: Biospecimens in a Distributed, Digital, and Data Driven World
To Know
About this Class
This presentation will explore the next emerging stage where biobanking is characterised by being part of system - Biobanking 4.0. Biobanking has always been about data generation with tissue specimens providing the biological and genomic information about a patient or donor. Within Biobanking 4.0 biospecimens are viewed ‘packages’ of information that once unpacked through ‘omics’ technologies provide a complex amount of digital information, able to be deciphered through novel computer science, including machine learning and AI. Using examples of our local biobanking activity I will define the growing role biobanks have in feeding the informatics pipelines that now function as integrated translational and clinical research data ecosystems enabled via data driven strategies including federated learning. The emerging needs of these ever increasingly intricate data driven systems are projected to have an impact on current biobanking practices requiring a more immediate and dynamic tissue handling activity where sample storage is not as prominent but a more distributed biobanking infrastructure will need to be established, utilizing novel enterprise architecture including blockchain. Finally, consideration of how new strategies for biospecimens management will challenge current dogma around patient engagement through their biospecimens into research including an exploration of the principles around the need for informed consent, anonymization practices, data ownership and commodification, donor agency as well as equity in data access to all researchers.