The Fraunhofer Institute for Biomedical Engineering IBMT in Germany will coordinate the Global HIV Vaccine Research Cryobank, a centralized storage for viruses, immune cells and other relevant substances related to HIV research.

The researchers at the Fraunhofer Institute have already developed a technology platform that stores biological samples in small closed well substrates allowing the removal of single wells at low temperatures. The advantage is that the rest of the precious sample stays cold and safely stored.

Another development are cryo-tolerant electronic memory chips. These are firmly attached to the sample and may be read and written even at -180°C. Information about each sample is stored in a central databank. A wrongly stored sample can be detected automatically by communication between the central databank and the cold memory chips in the cryo containers. This technology not only sets standards for HIV storage; it is also a core element of banking for stem cells.

This project is supported by the World Health Organization, the British National Institute for Biological Standards and Control, the San Raffaele Scientific Institute in Italy, the Universities of Lund, Saarland and Washington, and the National Institutes of Health (NIH). It is funded by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation.

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