A facility or organisation that collects, processes, stores, and distributes biological materials and their associated data for research, encompassing both human and non-human samples, distinguished from a 'biobank' by usage in some communities to denote broader scope or specific research projects.

ByCASRAI Editorial Board

· Last updated 10 Jul 2026

Examples

Worked examples

Is an instance
A university's biorepository holding patient-derived xenograft mouse models and matched tumour specimens.
Is an instance
An agricultural biorepository holding seed lines from crop-genetics research programmes.

Counter-examples

Looks similar, but isn't

Not an instance
A clinical-care pathology lab is not a research biorepository.
Not an instance
An archive of published research papers is not a biorepository.

Editorial commentary

The terms biobank, biorepository, and sample repository are used interchangeably in many communities; in others, ‘biorepository’ carries a broader connotation including animal models, plant material, microbial cultures, and environmental samples, while ‘biobank’ is reserved for human-focused collections. ISBER (International Society for Biological and Environmental Repositories) maintains the most widely used best-practice document. Biorepositories typically issue accession numbers and, increasingly, IGSN-style PIDs for samples.

References

ISBER, 'Best Practices for Repositories' (current edition).

Machine-readable encodings

Use in your systems

JATS XML <role> element

xml

<role vocab="credit"
      vocab-identifier="https://casrai.org/dictionary/"
      vocab-term="Biorepository"
      vocab-term-identifier="https://casrai.org/dictionary/term/biorepository" />

Schema.org DefinedTerm (JSON-LD)

json

{
  "@context": "https://schema.org",
  "@type": "DefinedTerm",
  "@id": "https://casrai.org/dictionary/term/biorepository",
  "name": "Biorepository",
  "identifier": "https://casrai.org/dictionary/term/biorepository",
  "description": "A facility or organisation that collects, processes, stores, and distributes biological materials and their associated data for research, encompassing both human and non-human samples, distinguished from a 'biobank' by usage in some communities to denote broader scope or specific research projects.",
  "inDefinedTermSet": "https://casrai.org/dictionary/domain/data-infrastructure#set",
  "url": "https://casrai.org/dictionary/term/biorepository",
  "sameAs": [],
  "license": "https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/",
  "publisher": {
    "@id": "https://casrai.org/#organization"
  },
  "dateModified": "2026-07-10T02:06:21",
  "inLanguage": "en"
}

Referenced across the research world

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