As medicine charts new technological frontiers, such as bioinformatics, translational medicine and targeted therapies, notions of Tissue Banking are rapidly evolving. Tissue banking is on the forefront, allowing researchers to utilize resources such as paraffin-archives. Tissue Banks will ultimately function as cores for discovery of information essential to improving patient care. In a combined effort, the Abramson Cancer Center and the Department of Pathology and Laboratory Medicine have a shared vision that will provide investigators the resources and organizational capabilities to maximize the potential of using tissue for basic and translational research. In addition to undertaking tissue banking for the Abramson Cancer Center, the Core will also work to define data driven standards for tissue banking practices at Penn.

The Tumor Tissue Bank creates an extensive and robust bio-specimen and data repository by integrating efforts of Abramson Cancer Center investigators. The facility also banks de-identified bio-specimens, while providing bioinformatics capabilities. Access is determined by research protocols. Investigators’ banking efforts and data are unified through a new sophisticated web-enabled database that is currently being customized. Investigators use this database to easily identify and request material, regardless of physical location.