Save the Date!
ISBER 2012 Annual Meeting & Exhibits
Westin Bayshore Hotel
Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada
May 15-18, 2012

More Information

 

President
Marianne K. Henderson, MS
Office of Division Operations and Analysis
NCI/NIH/DHHS
6120 Executive Blvd, Rm 8060
Bethesda, MD 20892, USA
Tel: (301) 496-8672
Fax: (301) 402-3256
Email

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

President's Message

Thank you for visiting our website. International Society for Biological and Environmental Repositories (ISBER) welcomes you to become engaged in an organization of growing influence in the science, support and management of biospecimens and biobanking. We also hope that you take the opportunity to provide input and receive feedback on the advancements and changing times for biobanking.

The ISBER website provides a list of tabs and subjects. Under each you can derive information and discover areas of interaction. Perusing these tabs will certainly give you a clearer understanding of the degree of effort that the ISBER member volunteers and ASIP staff contribute to maintaining ISBER. More than a website, ISBER is a place/person/ or thing where you can connect with others with an interest in biospecimen science and biobanking. We are an experience-rich, diverse group of people in biology, computer science, marketing, management, environmental science, medicine, etc., with similar challenges in managing collections of environmental and biological specimens. We can simply say -- ISBER is a very interactive, energetic and diverse member society!

ISBER is international by its name and is inclusive of the various bio- and enviro- repository community. The wonderful aspect of attending an ISBER annual meeting is the opportunity to hear and see presentations on topics that "open you up" to worlds of interest, that while related, may be new and interesting twists to the basic core of learning more about the expanding world of biospecimen and biorepository science.

ISBER's Working Groups and standing Committees are forums on topics of interest. There is a very active and heavily used ISBER member's listserv which provides amazing content and feedback almost instantaneously (someone is out there listening to you!!). ISBER provides access where product suppliers can appropriately present information about their services, and ISBER has an official journal, Biopreservation & Biobanking, for academic contributions to biobanking. The ISBER Council, who are ISBER member volunteers, are elected by the membership, and work to ensure the Society functions to serve its membership well. If you are not a member of ISBER, I hope that you will consider becoming one.

This year, we held our Annual Meeting in Arlington, VA from May, 15-18, 2011. We hope you were able to attend this very exciting meeting which was rich in presentations and workshops that were informative and instructive to biobanking and biospecimen research. Our new European, Middle Eastern and African chapter of ISBER will hold their inaugural meeting November 16-19, 2011. It will focus on region-specific issues for the ISBER community.

I am happy to be serving you as the new ISBER President, having started my term on May 17, 2011. I want to express my gratitude to the ISBER members for allowing me this special opportunity to serve our society. This role promises to be challenging and enriching and I hope that I serve you well. If you have any questions or statements you would personally want to send my way, my email is hendersm@mail.nih.gov. I will answer these personally or with your permission forward them to an appropriate committee, working group, or to the Council.

Sincerely,

 

Marianne K. Henderson, M.S.

ISBER President 2011-2012