The Oxford Brain Bank

• Research type

  Research Tissue Bank

• IRAS ID

  324513

• Research summary

  The Oxford Brain Bank

• REC name

  South Central - Oxford C Research Ethics Committee

• REC reference

  23/SC/0241

• Date of REC Opinion

  1 Sep 2023

• REC opinion

  Favourable Opinion

• Data collection arrangements

  The Oxford Brain Bank (OBB) facilitates the collection, storage and use in research of brains and spinal cords from deceased donors with or without neurological diseases. OBB stores extensive existing holdings from deceased donors, as well as paired samples collected during life for participants in longitudinal cohort studies which have ended. OBB collects samples from deceased participants in the bank’s supported clinical cohorts, in the fields of dementia research, Parkinson’s disease and related diseases, Motor Neurone Disease, demyelinating diseases and traumatic brain injuries. OBB recruits control donors by collaborating with the local NHS trust’s service who collects post-mortem samples for human application.
  OBB stores clinical and pathological data alongside the samples; consent is sought from donors to access their medical records to extract information about disease duration and progression, treatment and comorbidities. Collaborating clinical cohorts also provide data about their participants who consent to taking part in OBB.
  Informed consent is sought from participants during life by trained, delegated staff from OBB or from a potential donor’s clinical team. Alternatively, OBB may obtain consent from a potential donor’s representative after the donor’s death.

• Research programme

  The scope of research supported by the OBB is broad. The resource is intended to support the work of the University of Oxford's Nuffield Department of Clinical Neurosciences (NDCN), and any other research team in the UK or abroad, whether in academic or commercial settings, with a valid and ethical project. The OBB has a long history of providing high-quality biosamples and data to researchers investigating the healthy functioning and development of the human nervous system, as well as neurological and psychiatric diseases.

• Storage license

  12217

• RTBTitle

  The Oxford Brain Bank

• Establishment organisation

  University of Oxford

• Establishment organisation address

  Nuffield Department of Clinical Neurosciences

  John Radcliffe Hospital, Neuropathology, West Wing level 1

  Headley Way

  OX3 9DU