Tissue and blood repositories are key infrastructures, as claimed by the main international scientific organizations, that obtain (upon informed consent by patients and health individuals), process by SOPs and store under strictly monitored conditions collections of human biological materials (tumor and adjacent normal tissues, blood, serum, plasma and buffy coats, etc) linked to personal and health information (which may include health records, family history, lifestyle and genetic information) that are dedicated to research. The objective of biobanks is to enable researchers to understand the biology of diseases, and to translate biomedical research into real improvements in health care, that allow drawing conclusions about the significance of biological differences with regard to disease progression, response to treatment or adverse effects.

Bio-specimens can be considered the essential raw material for the advancement of biotechnology, human health and R&D in life sciences. INT tissue and blood biobank include thousands of well annotated clinical specimens, of different tumor histotypes,and in 2016 collected and stored 1,037 frozen tissues from solid tumors (mainly breast and gastrointestinal tumors and soft tissue sarcomas) and 1,750 blood samples from patients and health individuals. Aliquots of these biospecimens have been attributed to individual studies after approval of IBR and specific clearance of the Ethics Committee.

Such an activity is carried out thanks to a strict collaborations with all the Clinical Departments by Experimental Oncology and Pathology Departments, with the support with the institutional Cancer Registry.