In times of increasing numbers of methods and tools for
the molecular identification of organisms, it is inevitable that
researchers have to deal with an additional flood of samples: the
extracted DNA of organisms which are in the researcher’s focus.
Today, voucher specimens – the specimens from which DNA was
extracted – have to be placed in adequate biological collections and
organisms’ sequence data can officially be deposited in online
databases such as Genbank, often a prerequisite for publication of
results in peer-reviewed journals. DNA extracts do not underlie such
rules, but adequate housing of DNA extracts, especially of rare or
difficult to obtain species, will be a major task in the near future.
The DNA Bank Network bridges the gap between natural history
collections and molecular sequence databases by providing online
references to analysed specimens and inferred molecular data.
DNA samples are linked to their respective vouchers and inferred
molecular data are stored in public sequence databases, facilitating
taxonomic verification of molecularly analysed organisms.
We provide the opportunity for long-term storage of DNA in the
DNA Bank Network, giving other reseachers the opportunity to
access DNA for further projects dealing with the same organisms.
In this way, multiple sampling can be avoided and there is a direct
link between the three main sources of information, i.e. the sampled
organism, the DNA, and the sequence data. Here we present the
functioning and layout of the DNA Bank Network, which currently
connects DNA banks of four research museums in Germany: the
Bavarian State Collection of Zoology (ZSM), the Botanic Garden and
Botanical Museum Berlin-Dahlem (BGBM), the German Collection
of Microorganisms and Cell Cultures Braunschweig (DSMZ), and
the Zoologisches Forschungsmuseum Alexander Koenig (ZMFK).
Presently, the DNA Bank Network allows to access DNA samples of
more than 35.000 DNA samples and 11.000 taxa.
