Microbiome biobanking: Bridging technical challenges, data management and regulation
December 09, 2026
Organized in collaboration with
U.S. Culture Collection Network (USCCN)
Location
Online
Presenters
- Tanja Kostic
Head of Bioresources Unit
AIT Austrian Institute of Technology, Austria - Germana Baldi
Bioinformatician, MGnify Team
EMBL-EBI, UK - Amber Scholz
Science Policy & Internationalization Department
Leibniz Institute DSMZ, Germany
Outline
This webinar will present key outcomes and lessons learned from the EU-funded MICROBE project as it approaches completion, focusing on the integration of microbiome biobanking, data management, and regulatory frameworks.
We will begin with an overview of microbiomes as dynamic systems essential to ecosystem functioning and the health of plants, animals, and humans. The session will briefly introduce MICROBE’s mission to advance methodologies and technologies that enable reliable preservation, access, and use of microbiome samples and their associated data through collaboration with European research infrastructures.
The first talk will address microbiome preservation, highlighting technical solutions developed within MICROBE, practical challenges encountered, and lessons learned in maintaining microbiome stability, functionality, and reproducibility over time.
The second talk will focus on microbiome data management, covering approaches to handling complex, large-scale datasets, integration with existing data infrastructures, and strategies to ensure accessibility, interoperability, and long-term usability of microbiome data.
The third talk will explore regulatory and ethical frameworks, discussing current gaps, standardization needs, and legal considerations relevant to microbiome research and biobanking, as well as implications for innovation and future applications.
The webinar will conclude with a forward-looking discussion on remaining challenges, opportunities for harmonization across infrastructures, and how MICROBE’s outputs can support the broader uptake of microbiome-based solutions in science and industry.