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NINDS is part of the
National Institutes of
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Various neuroscience reagents and resources can be obtained by researchers, including human DNA, brain bank tissue and stem cell lines.

 

National NeuroAIDS Tissue Consortium
Brain Banks
NINDS Genetics Repository

National NeuroAIDS Tissue Consortium

The National NeuroAIDS Tissue Consortium (NNTC) has been supported by NIMH and NINDS since 1998 and operates through a National Coordinating Office and four regional centers : the Texas NeruoAIDS Research Center; the California NeuroAIDS Tissue Network; the National Neurological AIDS Bank; and the Manhattan HIV Brain Bank. The mission of the NNTC is to provide high quality and well-characterized tissue samples from patients who died with HIV, including neuromedical and neuropsychiatic data gathered antemortem, to scientists studying the effects of HIV on the human brain. Since NNTC inception 1,842 participants have been enlisted for clinical evaluation and tissue donation. As of July 2005, 488 central nervous system specimens from both HIV-infected and control subjects have been collected with an additional 4,392 blood samples and 2,235 CSF samples obtained from the NNTC patient cohort. NNTC encourages external researchers to request tissues and/or clinical data for ancillary studies.

Related Sites:
National NeuroAIDS Tissue Consortium
NIH Neuroscience Blueprint

Contact:
Dr. May Wong, Program Director, NINDS

Brain Banks

The Human Brain and Spinal Fluid Resource Center was created to help provide specimens related to neuropsychiatric and neurological diseases and disorders. The Center is associated with the Veterans Administration of Greater Los Angeles and is supported jointly with NINDS, NIMH and the National Multiple Sclerosis Society. The Center collects, stores, and distributes the highest quality and quantity of pre- and post-mortem tissues and fluids: brains, spinal cords, cerebrospinal fluid, serum, blood cells and urine. In addition the Center can provide neurological tissue from subjects with neurological disorders as well as control tissues from family members or other donors for use in research toward identifying treatments and cures for neurologic diseases.

The Harvard Brain Tissue Resource Center is a centralized resource for the collection and distribution of human brain specimens for brain research. Utilizing postmortem brain tissue from the center scientists have been able to develop genetic tests for Huntington's and Parkinson's disease. In addition, neurochemical and anatomical studies are being performed focusing on the biological nature of severe mental illnesses with the hope to eventually understand the underlying brain mechanisms associated with psychosis and other brain disorders. The Brain Bank also provides normal control tissue for neuroscience research. /

Related Sites:
Human Brain and Spinal Fluid Resource Center
Harvard Brain Tissue Resource Center
NIH Neuroscience Blueprint

Contact:
Dr. May Wong, Program Director, NINDS

NINDS Genetics Repository

The aim of the NINDS Cell Repository is to store and distribute genetics samples and clinical data to aid in the discovery of genes involved in neurological disorders. The repository is an NINDS-funded contract to the Coriell Institute for Medical Research that banks and distributes cell lines and DNA for neurological disease. The available high quality DNA is accompanied by excellent clinical data. The repository aims to a bank a large number of samples to generate the statistical power necessary to detect the moderate effects of a single susceptibility gene in studies such as whole genome analyses. Currently the repository has samples with the following diagnoses: Parkinson's disease (~1300 available), stroke (~300 available), epilepsy (~225 available) and motor neuron disease (~40 available). The repository also banks and distributes control samples (~800 available). The repository is currently expanding to accept Tourette's disorder samples. Finally, samples with known Mendelian mutations are also available. Academic and industry-sponsored investigators may deposit or withdraw samples and there is a negotiable grace period of three years after sample submission. Future plans include adding additional neurological disorders, continued banking of samples, standard control characterization between repositories, the generation of a data dictionary and increased database capabilities to include SNP genotyping data, pharmacogenetic data and large project data integration.

Related Sites:
NINDS Cell Repository
NIH Neuroscience Blueprint

Contact:
Dr. Katrina Gwinn-Hardy, Program Director, NINDS

Last updated April 03, 2008