National Mesothelioma Virtual Bank: A Platform for Collaborative Research and Mesothelioma Biobanking Resource to Support Translational Research

Abstract

The National Mesothelioma Virtual Bank (NMVB), developed six years ago, gathers clinically annotated human mesothelioma specimens for basic and clinical science research. During this period, this resource has greatly increased its collection of specimens by expanding the number of contributing academic health centers including New York University, University of Pennsylvania, University of Pittsburgh Medical Center, and Mount Sinai School of Medicine. Marketing efforts at both national and international annual conferences increase awareness and availability of the mesothelioma specimens at no cost to approved investigators, who query the web-based NMVB database for cumulative and appropriate patient clinicopathological information on the specimens. The data disclosure and specimen distribution protocols are tightly regulated to maintain compliance with participating institutions' IRB and regulatory committee reviews. The NMVB currently has over 1120 annotated cases available for researchers, including paraffin embedded tissues, fresh frozen tissue, tissue microarrays (TMA), blood samples, and genomic DNA. In addition, the resource offers expertise and assistance for collaborative research. Furthermore, in the last six years, the resource has provided hundreds of specimens to the research community. The investigators can request specimens and/or data by submitting a Letter of Intent (LOI) that is evaluated by NMVB research evaluation panel (REP).

Figure 1

Presenting the organization of resource and collaborative efforts of expert domains to run the NMVB successfully. CDC (Center of Disease Control and Prevention), NIOSH (National Institute of Occupational Health and Safety), NYU (New York University), U. Penn (University of Pennsylvania), MSSM (Mount Sinai School of Medicine), and UPMC (University of Pittsburgh Medical Center).

Figure 2

(a) presents the distribution of retrospective and prospective mesothelioma cases of NMVB biorepository. (b) presents the breakup of NMVB accruals as per harmful substance exposure. (c) presents the breakup of NMVB accruals as per histological type of mesothelioma specimen collection. (d) presents the types of blood products available to research community. NMVB resource processes blood products and stores them as per standardized banking protocols.

Figure 3

NMVB password protected database. It is only accessible to the data manager for the annotation process and an approved investigator through REP process. Approved investigator can see only de-identified case level clinical information.

Figure 4

NMVB statistical database provides composite results to users upon querying the NMVB database.