Institute for Clinical and Translational Research Services

The Johns Hopkins All Children’s Pediatric Biorepository safeguards access to specimens through diligent and scientific custodianship, while also minimizing risk to patient privacy and confidentiality. The decision to store or use biospecimens is an important one. The value of any request for advancing medical knowledge must be weighed against the irreplaceability of the specimen, as well as any ethical, legal or scientific challenges arising from the proposed research purpose. Access to biobanked specimens (defined as specimens available for future research by participant consent that are not committed to a specific study aim) is overseen by the Biospecimen Access Committee (BAC), consisting of physicians, scientists, Biorepository leadership, Institutional Review Board representative, ethics experts, and patient/family representatives.

• Study Design Consulting and Budgeting, Pilot to Multi-Institutional
• Kit Building
• Pelletized Dry Ice Production
• Specimen Distribution
• Specimen Storage
• Specimen Processing
• Special Services – email Johns Hopkins All Children's Biorepository

The Tissue-Based Diagnosis and Research Core accepts fresh, frozen, formalin fixed and formalin-fixed paraffin-embedded (FFPE) specimens from human case, animal material, and other tissue specimens in support of research applications. We offer instruction in diagnostic pathology methods for specimen procurement, optimization of fixation and specimen handling, and provide training in cryostat and paraffin specimen microtomy on the user’s own equipment or in the Shared Resources core.

• Human and animal tissue processing
• Frozen tissue and OCT embedded - Frozen sectioning
• Tissue and cell derivative preparation and aliquoting
• FFPE processing
• FFPE microtomy
• Routine H&E staining
• Special stains
• Immunohistochemistry
• Fluorescence in-situ hybridization
• Digital Slide Scanning
• Transmission electron microscopy processing and sectioning
• To request TBDRC services (both internal and external clients), please download and fill out this form, and we will follow up with you to provide a quote for services and finalize your request. Once complete, please email the form to Johns Hopkins Tissue-Based Diagnosis and Reserch Core, and we will follow up with you to provide a quote for services and finalize your request.

The Biospecimen Access Committee (BAC) provides an independent review of biospecimen access requests and assures that the study proposal associated with each request has been approved by the corresponding Research Council of the primary JHAC Institute or Department with which the biospecimen is associated, the JHM IRB, and the IRB of record of the requesting investigator’s home institution (if outside of Johns Hopkins Medicine).

1. Review available biospecimens using the following link: Biospecimen Availability Portal(a JHED ID is required for access).
2. Complete a BAC Biospecimen Access Request Form BAC Biospecimen Access Request Form. To complete the access request form, you will need the following items:
   • IRB protocol number (IRB decision may not be finalized at this step, however the protocol must be approved prior to biospecimen release from the Biorepository).
   • Note: If specimens will be sent to an organization outside of Johns Hopkins Medicine, unless otherwise exempt from the JHM Transferring Human Biospecimens to Outside Organizations Policy, you must complete a JHM Human Biospecimen Transfer Information Sheet (Transferring Human Biospecimens to Outside Organizations). This link describes the policy and any relevant exceptions. You will submit this form within the eIRB portal when submitting your IRB protocol. In addition, this circumstance will also require a material transfer agreement (MTA) and an IRB approval letter from the requesting investigator’s home institution prior to release of any biospecimens from the Biorepository.
   • Funding support.
   • Requestor NIH biosketch or curriculum vitae (CV) summarizing key funding and publications.
   • Recommendation from the applicable Institute-Based Research Council, Institute Director, or the Department Chair associated with the biobank.
   • Biospecimen information (sample types, number of biospecimens, volume requirements, quality limits e.g., no hemolysis, and requested inventory IDs obtained from the Biospecimen Availability Portal).
   • Research Protocol (sharing background, hypothesis, specific aim(s), and methods).

Should the use of the Tissue-Based Diagnosis and Research Core or Biorepository and any associated biospecimens result in a scientific publication, please acknowledge accordingly. A simple example may be “we would like to acknowledge the Johns Hopkins All Children’s Pediatric Biorepository for sample support.” Publications are an important measure of our impact and help communicate biospecimen utilization to the public and our patient donors.