Quality assurance of biospecimens for biobanking purposes: Sri Lankan Twin Registry Biobank

Quality assurance is a vital component in biobanking to assure integrity and viability of samples. Although standards are established for biobanking in the western world, such guidelines are yet to be drafted and adapted to Sri Lanka. Sri Lankan Twin Registry Biobank (SLTR-B) was established in 2012 as a component of a large-scale study conducted by Institute for Research and Development. As no local guidelines exist we adopted several international guidelines.

Whole blood was collected in sterile vacutainers and transported to the laboratory using passive containers and coolant packs in the main study. Following several performance assays of various DNA extraction methods a commercial purification kit was selected for DNA extractions. DNA concentration and purity were determined by spectrophotometry, and integrity assessed by agarose-gel-electrophoresis. Two aliquots each of DNA and serum are stored in cryo-vials separately. Samples were labeled using cryogenic-labels with unique barcodes and identification numbers, and stored in -80°C freezing conditions. Whole blood was collected from 3483 participants of the main study. Poor quality DNA samples were removed during the quality checking process. DNA of 102 participants were not extracted and stored as they did not consent to this component. The SLTR-B contains 3483 samples of serum and DNA of 3360 participants for future research. Biobanks hold the key to future breakthroughs in scientific research. Quality assurance practices play a major role in maintaining integrity and viability of samples for downstream application. Therefore, establishing of national standards is paramount to build high quality research infrastructure in the country.