Table 1.

Topics for developing a 5-10 year biospecimen plan for proteomics

Assessing Current Status	Recommendations for the next 5–10 years
What are the relative numbers for different biobank types? Individual Specific project Grant program Public repository	What would be the ideal balance? Individual Specific project Grant program Public repository
How well utilized are each of these different types?	Are there other types of biobanks that should be recommended?
What characteristics contribute to the successful biobanks?
What characteristics limit use of others?	Can we develop a rapid, on-demand approach to biobanks?
	From past experience, what should we avoid?
	What should we include?
What is the current proportion of cohort vs. case/control collections?	What is the ideal proportion of cohort vs. case/control collections?
What is the relative investment in cohort vs. case/control collection?	What is the ideal relative investment that should be made?
Which cohorts have been used efficiently?	For longitudinal studies, what are the overall time horizon and sampling frequency needs?
Which case/control collections have been used efficiently?	Are there important cohorts, currently not collected, that should be collected?
Which characteristics have led to successful use of case/control collections?	Which diseases should be represented in the case/control collections?
What time horizons have been necessary for successful longitudinal studies?	How can we better ensure that researchers know where to look to find specimens?
What are the burdens and advantages of different sampling frequencies in longitudinal studies?
How do researchers access samples in the current biobanks?	What are the best ways to govern future biobanks?
Are there defined processes in place?	What are the best ways to manage access to samples?
Are they efficient?	How do we balance broad access to samples with the need to preserve precious resources?
Which processes work well, which poorly?
Assess the samples currently available Which samples are available? Blood Serum Tissue – which ones? Other How have they been processed? Nucleic acid Protein Staining for microscopy Frozen Other Were they collected and processed using SOPs? Are their SOPs documented? What types of control samples are available? What types of storage are used?	Defining the sample needs Which types of samples are needed? Blood Serum Tissue – which ones? Other What kind of processing is needed? Nucleic acid Protein Staining for microscopy Frozen Other Which processing SOPs are recommended? Which control samples are needed? Ideal storage conditions?
Defining the annotation needs for future samples Clinical annotation – What is ideal? What is practical? Processing history Informed consent and usage guidelines Ability to capture follow up data Other	Defining the annotation needs for future samples Clinical annotation – What is ideal? What is practical? Processing history Informed consent and usage guidelines Ability to capture follow up data Other
Which biobanks work with commercial entities?	How should future biobanks work with commercial entities?
Which aspects have been successful and unsuccessful?	How should this be balanced?