The Geneva Brain bank, presentation
The Geneva Brain Bank, established at the beginning of the 20th century, is one of the largest of its kind in Europe, preserving more than 10,000 brains with various pathologies. They come from medical autopsies performed at the Geneva University Hospitals and for which consent was given to keep the tissues for research. Over the decades, it has been a valuable resource for the study of brain diseases, such as Alzheimer's disease, Parkinson's disease, neurosyphilis, frontotemporal dementia or Huntington's disease. In addition to formalin-fixed brain samples, this vast collection includes more than 200,000 stained tissue sections, more than 100,000 paraffin-embedded tissue blocks and, most importantly, pathological diagnostic reports and clinical records. The size, quality and historical depth of this collection make it of unique value for research. However, its preservation and conversion into a modern brain bank faces major challenges.
The first is the relevance of ancient tissue samples for modern research. The size and age of the collection allow for research on rare or presumed extinct disorders, on the evolution of diseases over time and on the role of the environment in their development, which is difficult or impossible to achieve on a more recent or smaller brain bank. While the scientific value of the collection is clear, the ability to conduct modern biomedical research on it is questionable. The use of cutting-edge neurobiological methods such as multiplexed immunofluorescence, tissue transparency, expansion microscopy, in situ hybridization or deep sequencing of DNA and RNA is thus necessary, which requires their adaptation to ancient tissues.
The second challenge is making brain bank data available to researchers. This involves digitizing written documents and histological slides and integrating them into a database with a search tool that allows for searches on different types of data. This effort is now made possible by advances in artificial intelligence (AI).
Overall, the combination of automated AI-based analysis tools and advanced neurobiological techniques increases the potential for brain bank research. This is also true for many clinical tissue archives preserved around the world. The ArchiMed project, associating the Geneva Brain Bank and the Strasbourg Pathological Tissue Archive, aims to develop the tools needed to valorize tissue archives and to demonstrate the effectiveness of this approach for research on contemporary and emerging diseases.
To go further :
1- Kovari et al. 2012, Ann N Y Acad Sci
2- European infrastructure for research dedicated to biobanks
23 Nov 2024
