Introducing the Cambridge BioResource

The Cambridge BioResource is a resource of patients and healthy volunteers who are willing to be approached and invited to participate in local research studies investigating the links between genes, the environment and common diseases. Volunteers who join the Cambridge BioResource donate their DNA via a blood or saliva sample. Their DNA can then be used together with their phenotypic data, such as gender and ethnicity, as the basis for selection and recruitment of best matched volunteers to research studies. In this way, the Cambridge BioResource is able to provide researchers with groups of volunteers, tailor-made to the research question at hand.

The Cambridge BioResource is located on the Addenbrooke's Hospital site and is a collaboration between the Cambridge Biomedical Research Centre, the University of Cambridge, NHS Blood and Transplant and the Medical Research Council, with additional support from the MRC Cusrow Wadia Fund and the Milly Apthorp Charitable Trust. It has ethical approval from the NHS Cambridgeshire Research Ethics Committee.

The Cambridge BioResource was initially set up in 2005 as a collaboration between the University of Cambridge, the Medical Research Council (MRC) Epidemiology Unit and in 2006, the MRC Cognition and Brain Sciences Unit. Since 2007, about 8,000 blood donors from NHS Blood and Transplant (formerly the National Blood Service) joined during their local blood donation sessions, bringing the total number of volunteers on the Cambridge BioResource panel to almost 10,000.

The Cambridge BioResource has become key to the Cambridge success in research on genes and diseases and by continuing to expand its volunteer panel it remains a world-leading resource for researchers. We are still recruiting so if you are interested in joining, please follow the links on the left.

"Bringing together local people and leading research."