Frequently Asked Questions

Human Heredity and Health in Africa (H3Africa) consortium facilitates fundamental research into diseases on the African continent while also developing infrastructure, resources, training, and ethical guidelines to support a sustainable African research enterprise – led by African scientists, for the African people. The initiative consists of 48 African projects that include population-based genomic studies of common, non-communicable disorders such as heart and renal disease, as well as communicable diseases such as tuberculosis. These studies are led by African scientists and use genetic, clinical, and epidemiologic methods to identify hereditary and environmental contributions to health and disease. To establish a foundation for African scientists to continue this essential work into the future work, the consortium also supports many crucial capacity building elements, such as: ethical, legal, and social implications research; training and capacity building for bioinformatics; capacity for Biobanking; and coordination and networking.

The H3Africa Biorepository Program manages Biospecimen collections from the Human Heredity and Health in Africa (H3Africa) Consortium. H3Africa Biorepositories (IBRH3AU, CLS and IHV-N) are facilities set up by NIH and collaborating institutions in Africa to; develop, maintain and sustain state-of-the-art world class Biorepositories for the responsible storage, maintenance, and custodianship of well-annotated high-quality Biospecimens and to make these specimens available to researchers for genomic discovery and other biomedical research. These biorepositories have now developed capacity to conduct training and research in biorepository science and management.

To develop, maintain and sustain state-of-the-art world class Biorepositories for the responsible storage, maintenance, and custodianship of well-annotated high-quality Biospecimens and to make these specimens available to researchers for genomic discovery and other biomedical research.

H3Africa Biorepositories have various sample types including, DNA, RNA, Plasma, Serum, PBMCs. These samples have corresponding participant phenotype data and sometimes genomic data as well. Visit the Catalog for more.

The H3Africa Biorepository program currently supports three Biorepositories in Uganda, Nigeria, and South Africa through funding from the National Institutes of Health in the United States.

H3Africa biorepositories are available for use by H3Africa consortium researchers and the wider scientific/research community.

H3Africa samples can be accessed by applying to the H3Africa Data and Biospecimen Access Committee (DBAC) or directly contacting the PI for non-H3Africa samples. For more information read the H3Africa Biospecimen and Data Access Policy!

H3Africa datasets can be accessed by applying to the H3Africa Data and Biospecimen Access Committee (DBAC) through H3Africa Bionet or directly contacting the PI for non-H3Africa datasets. For more information read the H3Africa Biospecimen and Data Access Policy!

The H3Africa Biospecimen and Data Catalogue offers researchers the ability to search information about H3Africa studies. As part of funder requirements, H3Africa samples are deposited in three H3Africa biorepositories and genomic data is submitted to public repositories such as the European Genome-phenome Archive (EGA) or the European Nucleotide Archive (ENA). Access to data and Biospecimens is controlled by the H3Africa Data and Biospecimen Access Committee (DBAC).

The Catalogue is updated periodically with metadata from studies uploaded from the H3Africa Archive hosted by H3ABioNet and the corresponding Biospecimen metadata uploaded from the three H3Africa biorepositories. Metadata from the archive and biorepositories are submitted to the catalogue monthly to enable users to search.

H3Africa biorepositories offer sample collection, processing, storage, retrieval and shipping. Other services include training in biorepository science and management as well as Biospecimen research. Value adding services like next gen and Sanger sequencing are available as well.

H3Africa biorepositories provide extensive capacity in Biospecimen collection, processing, storage and shipping as well as auxiliary lab services that can be leveraged by researchers. This tremendously lowers the cost of doing research as a result of utilizing stored data and Biospecimen and utilizing economies of scale that biorepositories possess.

The existing knowledge/capacity from H3Africa can be used as a basis to answer more questions in human heredity and health. We believe that data/Biospecimen sharing is essential for expedited translation of research results into knowledge, products, and procedures to improve human health.

H3Africa data is quality controlled at the H3Africa Bionet and then eventually deposited at the European-Phenome Genome archive for sharing.

H3Africa Biorepositories have capacity and experience to conduct training in Biorepository Sciences and Management, Biospecimen research, QA/QC, GCP/GCLP, Sanger and Next Gen sequencing and other basic research capabilities.