FORUM

Biological Collections: Chasing the Ideal

P. A. Kamenski*, A. E. Sazonov, A. A. Fedyanin, V. A. Sadovnichy
M.V. Lomonosov Moscow State University, Leninskie Gory 1, 119991, Moscow, Russia
*E-mail: [email protected]

This article is based on the results of an analysis of existing biological collections in Russia and abroad
set up in the framework of the project “Scientific Basis of the National Biobank – Depository of Living
Systems” by M.V. Lomonosov Moscow State University [1].

W
hat is a “biological col- be successfully stored in cryogenic pdb/home/home.do) can be men-
lection”? Today, the collections. Furthermore, nucleic ac- tioned as examples. The main dis-
terms “biological collec- ids extracted from living organisms tinctive feature of collections of bi-
tion” and “biobank” are not inter- can also be stored in frozen form; ological information is their global
changeable. A biological collection is hence, the corresponding collections character, which means that they
typically defined as a systematized are also supposed to be classified as can be freely accessed from any lo-
repository of a combination of any cryogenic collections. cation via the Internet.
biological material type specimens. “Classical” collections are an- Why do we need biological col-
The term “biobank” is usually used other type of biological collections. lections?
only for collections of human bio- First of all, they include collections In addition to the types of speci-
specimens [2]. Hence, the term “bi- of zoological museums and herbar- mens stored, the purpose of biocol-
ological collection” is broader than ia. Classical collections were the lections can be viewed as a criterion
the term “biobank”: so, the former first collections of biological mate- for their classification.
term will be used hereinafter in this rial in the world; some of them go Most collections that currently
study. back over two centuries. Recently, exist in the world are research col-
Based on the definition given it has become clear that these col- lections. This term is used for sets
above, several types of biological lections of biological material, in of biological specimens that are
collections can be distinguished, addition to being used to study bi- stored in research laboratories and
depending on the types of biologi- odiversity, are a valuable source of are needed in daily routines. Types
cal material stored and the storage DNA that can be extracted from of specimens in these collections
methods. the specimens stored and analyzed may vary largely, from individ-
Cryogenic collections with mate- using the methods of molecular ge- ual biological molecules to entire
rial stored in frozen state are most netics [4]. This enables large-scale organisms. Research collections
often meant when talking about molecular phylogenetic studies for typically are small; however, they
biological collections. These collec- big samples amounts, which yield are today the main contributors to
tions are created for long-term stor- more statistically significant results. the development of fundamental
age of biospecimens that are always When talking about biological life sciences and allow scientists to
supposed to retain their viability collections, collections of biological carry out comparative research. It
and normal functioning after being information are often not included. should be mentioned that such col-
thawed. Cryogenic collections are This category is extremely impor- lections can also be extensive. For
typically used to store cells rather tant for the development of science example, collections of natural his-
than entire organisms (of course, and technology and mainly includes tory museums and herbaria often
unicellular organisms are an excep- computer databases containing in- comprise several million specimens
tion). This storage method is appli- formation about the primary, sec- and are actively used in research.
cable to cells of organisms of all life ondary, and tertiary structures of The previously mentioned global
kingdoms on Earth. The cryostorage biological molecules. Such data- collections of biological information
protocols are elaborated to the least bases as GenBank (nucleotide se- are also used as research collections.
extent for higher plant cells, which quences of the genomes of various Commercial collections (i.e.,
lose their viability relatively quick- organisms, http://www.ncbi.nlm. collections of biological material
ly during the freeze/thaw cycle be- nih.gov/genbank/) and the Pro- that is intended for sale to exter-
cause of their cytological features tein Data Bank (tertiary structures nal consumers) have recently ac-
[3]. Nevertheless, these cells can also of proteins, http://www.rcsb.org/ quired wide usage. In fact, these

6 | ACTA NATURAE | VOL. 8 № 2 (29) 2016

 FORUM

collections began emerging sever- of a national bioresource center other country. On the other hand,
al decades ago, but the specimens by the state [8]. This collection in- it cannot be denied that nowadays
stored were intended exclusively cludes microorganisms that are the traditional measures of pres-
for research. Several collections of critically important for biotechnol- ervation of rare and endangered
baker’s yeast strains can be given ogy. We would also like to mention living species need to be supple-
as an example [5]. The later created such All-Russian collections as the mented with high-tech measures;
commercial collections most typi- All-Russian Collection of Microor- that is, the storage of cell material
cally store donated human biolog- ganisms and the Russian Cell Cul- harvested from these organisms in
ical material (sex cells, blood cells, ture Collection. cryogenic collections. This aspect
etc.) and belong to private institu- One should remember that pres- contributes most significantly to
tions. Consumers of specimens from ervation of biodiversity is also re- Russia’s lag behind other industri-
commercial collections may be both lated to national security. First alized countries. Whereas the inter-
individuals (e.g., those using in vit- and foremost, such collections national consortia preserving cell
ro fertilization) and pharmaceutical are meant for the preservation of material harvested from rare spe-
companies that use human cell ma- producer cells for industrial and cies have been operating abroad for
terial for preliminary clinical trials medical biotechnology, as well as an appreciably long time (e.g., the
of drugs. bio-objects for cattle breeding and aforementioned Frozen Ark), such
Finally, “state” collections (i.e., crop production. Under crisis condi- work in Russia has just started.
the ones that are created and main- tions, Russian industry and agricul- The beneficial use of Russian bi-
tained for the sake of the state) ture will be thrown back decades if ological resources is also far from
need to be mentioned. First of all, there are no Russian collection re- perfect. Living systems are practi-
this category includes collections positories. cally used mainly in biotechnology
intended for the preservation of Russian and foreign biocollec- and medicine. When it comes to bi-
biodiversity. Zoological and bo- tions. Table summarizes the data otechnology, it is noteworthy that
tanical gardens (although they are on the largest Russian collections of the performance of Russian biocol-
used both for research and com- biological materials. lections is rather active. This mostly
mon cultural purposes), as well as As it has been mentioned previ- relates to the collections of microor-
nature reserves and wildlife refug- ously, the main objectives of creat- ganisms (Russian National Collec-
es, are examples of such collections. ing and maintaining biocollections tion of Industrial Microorganisms,
Collections for the preservation include preservation, research, and All-Russian Collection of Microor-
of biodiversity are not necessarily the beneficial use of biodiversity. ganisms, several small collections
state-sponsored; they can be creat- Speaking about Russian biological of microalgae) that have been suc-
ed by the initiative of an academ- collections, the research function cessfully implementing the results
ic community, such as the Frozen is the best-developed. The Table of their activity for a long time by
Ark International Consortium that demonstrates that the vast ma- creating and optimizing strains pro-
has been organized on the basis of jority of large Russian collections ducing various compounds. On the
several dozen research laboratories perform research activities and an- other hand, the use of biocollections
storing frozen cell material collect- nually publish hundreds of studies in medicine in Russia is currently at
ed from rare and endangered spe- focused on a thorough investigation its lowest level. In Europe and the
cies [6]. Along with preservation of of the specimens stored. U.S., 5 years ago there were already
biodiversity, state collections can The situation with biodiversi- several dozen both global and spe-
be created to optimize the efficient ty preservation is more complex. cialized large collections of human
use of biological resources. For ex- Under the current state of tech- cell material [10] and their number
ample, the Natural Product Repos- nology development, the problem has increased since then. The speci-
itory at the National Institute of of biodiversity preservation needs mens in these collections are active-
Health (USA) [7] has over 100,000 to be solved at two levels; namely, ly used in biomedical research and
extracts from various animals and the organism and cell levels. At the pilot projects. Today, when medi-
plants that are used to search for former level, work is being carried cal cellular technologies develop in
novel biologically active agents. The out in zoological and botanical gar- explosive fashion, these collections
All-Russian Collection of Industri- dens and nature reserves; Russia is become particularly important.
al Microorganisms is an example in a rather strong position here. As Finally, it cannot go unmentioned
of this type of collections in Rus- of 2014, there were 104 nature re- that there are no large collections
sia; it is the only organization thus serves in Russia [9]; this number is related to cattle breeding in Russia.
far that has been given the status significantly larger than that in any Undoubtedly, this fact significantly

VOL. 8 № 2 (29) 2016 | ACTA NATURAE | 7

 FORUM

Table. The largest Russian biological collections (in descending order of the amount of repository items) according to
the official websites of the corresponding organizations

Amount of Purposes of
Type of speci-
Collection Organization specimens specimens Pipelines
mens stored
stored stored
Collection of Zoological Institute, Animal biomate- Research, https://www.zin.ru/
60,000,000
Zoological Institute RAS rial (non-living) museum affairs Collections/
Zoological Museum, Moscow State Animal biomate- Research,
10,000,000 http://zmmu.msu.ru/
MSU University rial (non-living) museum affairs
Dried plant and
Collection of Botanical Institute, small amounts http://www.binran.ru/
7,000,000 Research
Botanical Institute RAS of plant cell collections/
cultures
http://herba.msu.ru/rus-
Moscow State sian/departments/herbari-
Herbarium, MSU Dried plants 1,000,000 Research
University um/General_Information/
Collection/
Preservation of
N.I. Vavilov collec- N.I. Vavilov Institute
Cultivated plant the beneficial http://vir.nw.ru/otd_r.
tion of cultivated of Plant Genetic 300,000
seeds biodiversity, htm#dept
plant seeds Resources, RAS
agriculture
Institute of Delivery of http://ibpm.ru/index.
All-Russian Biochemistry and specimens to php?option=com_con-
Frozen microor-
collection of micro- Physiology of Plants 20,000 the external tent&view=arti-
ganisms
organisms and Microorganisms, consumers, cle&id=249:vkm&-
RAS research catid=4&Itemid=15
Biological Resource
All-Russian Institute
Center “Russian
of Genetics and Frozen Biotechnology, http://vkpm.org/o-bi-
National Collection 20,000
Selection of Industrial microorganisms research oresursnom-tsentre/
of Industrial
Microorganisms
Microorganisms”
The collection is
Delivery of
stored in 9 different
Frozen human, specimens to
Russian cell culture organizations. http://www.cytspb.rssi.ru/
animal and plant 3,000 the external
collection Principal organi- rkkk/rkkk_ru.htm
cells consumers,
zation: Institute of
research
Cytology, RAS

slows the development of agricul- A serious problem affecting virtual integration of research (and
ture as a key sector of the Russian modern biocollections (not only in not only research) collections into
economy. Russia but worldwide) is that they a consolidated information system
Having analyzed the current are disaggregated. This is espe- would be extremely efficient to-
state of biological collections, we cially true for the small research day, as large-scale studies using
are certain that these collections collections that most research lab- big amounts of samples of different
represent a tremendous research oratories have, as was mentioned biological objects become increas-
and technological capability which previously. It is quite typical that ingly important. Understanding of
is currently not being exploited for scientists maintaining and work- this problem also exists at the state
several reasons. So, what are the ing with their local collections do level. In 2014, a working group was
challenges that Russian special- not notify the research community established by the Ministry of Ed-
ists who organize and maintain at large of the specimens stored in ucation and Science of the Russian
biological collections face today? their collections. This happens ei- Federation to elaborate approaches
First of all, it is worth mentioning ther because the scientists lack the to creating national biological re-
once again that the cryogenic col- resources to do so, or sometimes be- source centers on the basis of the
lections of state status aimed at the cause they are oblivious to the fact existing biological collections. One
preservation and beneficial use of that their material can be extreme- of the main tasks of the working
the biodiversity of Russia are poor- ly useful to their colleagues from group was to perform a global au-
ly developed (see text above). other organizations. Meanwhile, diting of existing biological collec-

8 | ACTA NATURAE | VOL. 8 № 2 (29) 2016

 FORUM

tions in Russia, creating an inte- the close connection between bio- ratus, including its executive and
grated database that would include logical collections and the concept legislative branches, needs to con-
these collections, and elaborating a of “national biological resources.” solidate in order to overcome the
mechanism for reorganizing them This concept is similar to the term existing administrative barriers.
into national bioresource centers. In “biological diversity” but is broad- Based on the aforementioned, we
2015, a similar initiative was pro- er, since it includes genetic re- would like to suggest measures to
posed by the Russian Academy of sources of the country’s population, be taken in order to use biological
Sciences and the Federal Agency biotechnological resources, and nat- collections in the Russian Federa-
for Scientific Organizations by es- ural resources. Bioresources fall un- tion with maximum efficiency:
tablishing a working group to main- der strict legal regulations all over Auditing the existing collections;
tain and develop bioresource collec- the world; however, regulation in 2. Sharing best practices in the
tions. Its objectives include auditing Russia is weaker than in other in- field of biocollections; elaborating
research collections and elaborating dustrialized countries. Moreover, uniform protocols to work with bio-
recommendations for their central- the import and export of biological specimens of the same type;
ization, standardization, and ac- material for scientific purposes is 3. Creating a single database that
cessibility. Beyond any reasonable unregulated. Because of the lack would contain information about
doubt, the activity of these working of accurate procedures, exchange the maximum possible number of
groups will increase the output of of biomaterial – one of the key as- collections; in the long run, estab-
Russian scientists. pects of international scientific lishing a national information and
It should be mentioned that it is collaboration – either is impossible analysis system;
almost impossible to obtain funding (which closes the door on Russian 4. Establishing a research center
for work related to direct mainte- researchers’ participation in many based on large collections under
nance of biocollections. Scientific important and prestigious scientific state assignment; establishing a na-
foundations and the research pro- consortia) or forces scientists to act tional network of biocollections;
grams of the ministries do not clas- as smugglers, which is unaccept- 5. Collaboration between mem-
sify this field as research and usu- able. bers of the scientific community
ally do not consider the applications Furthermore, no laws that reg- involved in dealing with biocollec-
submitted. Neither does this activ- ulate work with human biomate- tions and state agencies to develop
ity fall within state assignments rial exist yet (in 2015, the Law On adequate measures for regulating
for higher educational institutions Biomedical Cell Technologies was the activities of biocollections and
and research institutes. As a result, adopted only in the first reading in the related fields of science and
biocollections either get whatever the Russian State Duma); the situa- technology; and
funds remain or are maintained out tion around the regulation of genet- 6. Creating a global “biocollection
of sheer enthusiasm (those are the ic modification of living organisms information space.”
two most common terms to describe is not fully clear (the correspond-
the situation around the mainte- ing draft bill is been consideration The authors are grateful to the staff
nance of biocollections). by the Russian State Duma since of the Ministry of Education and
Finally, it should not go unmen- 2015). On the other hand, Russian Science of the Russian Federation,
tioned that there is virtually no government agencies now under- I.V. Kazeev and O.A. Egorova, for
legal framework for Russian bio- stand the importance of elaborating their kind assistance in preparing
logical collections. Meanwhile, es- such documentation; work towards the manuscript.
tablishment of a legal framework it is under way, and members of the This study was supported by the
for working with biocollections is scientific community are involved. Russian Science Foundation (grant
absolutely critical, mainly due to However, the entire state appa- no. 14-50-00029).

REFERENCES J.J., Seberg O., Oste C.C. // Biopreserv Biobank. 2013. V. 11.
1. Sadovnichy V.A. // Science and Life. 2015. № 12. P. 2-13. № 3. P. 182–188.
2. De Souza Y.G., Greenspan J.S. // AIDS. 2013. V. 27. № 3. 7. Brown E.C., Newman D.J. // J. Environ. Monit. 2006. V. 8.
P. 303–312. № 8. P. 800–805.
3. Volkova L.A., Urmantseva V.V., Popova E.V., Nosov A.M. // 8. Order of Russian Ministry of Education and Science
Cryo Lett. 2015. V. 36. № 4. P. 252–263. № 982, August 11, 2014.
4. Krinitsina A.A., Sizova T.V., Zaika M.A., Speranskaya A.S., 9. The Russian Federation National Environmental report,
Sukhorukov A.P. // Biochemistry (Moscow). 2015. V. 80. 2014. Russian Ministry of Natural Resources and Environ-
№ 11. P. 1478–1484. mental Protection, 2015.
5. Scherens B., Goffeau A. // Genome Biol. 2004. V. 5. № 7. P. 229. 10. Vaught J., Kelly A., Hewitt R. // Biopreserv Biobank.
6. MacKenzie-Dodds J., Clarke A., Lermen D., Rey I., Astrin 2009. V. 7. № 3. P. 143–150.

VOL. 8 № 2 (29) 2016 | ACTA NATURAE | 9