Tissue blocks are organized in the Axlab AS-410 instrument at Vanderbilt Medical Laboratories. The instrument helps prepare slides. (photo by Erin O. Smith)
Vanderbilt Health has received a five-year grant renewal from the National Cancer Institute for the continued operation and expansion of the Western Division of the federal Cooperative Human Tissue Network, which procures and supplies human tissue for research throughout the country.
The Western Division, housed at Vanderbilt Health since 2001, provides a customized collection of solid tissues and biofluids with clinical annotation and a rigorous quality management system covering all aspects of the program.
Led by Principal Investigator Kay Washington, MD, PhD, Professor of Pathology, Microbiology and Immunology, the Western Division has shipped over 55,000 specimens to more than 700 investigators during the past five years.
A state-of-the-art automated biobanking system, which can store as many as 10 million biospecimens, reflects Vanderbilt Health’s commitment to manage and protect biospecimen repositories that are critical to advancing personalized medicine, cancer research and vaccine development.
The Western Division is an interdepartmental effort that includes the Vanderbilt Health Office of Research, Vanderbilt-Ingram Cancer Center, the Department of Medicine and other departments, and VANTAGE (Vanderbilt Technologies for Advanced Genomics).
The grant (UM1CA183727), which provided more than $1 million in the 2025-2026 fiscal year, will enable the Western Division to continue storing and managing human specimens that facilitate the growth of biobanks across the country.
