National Biobanks: Clinical Labor, Risk Production, and the Creation of Biovalue

• Published in: Science, technology, & human values Vol. 35; no. 3; pp. 330 - 355
• Main Authors: Mitchell, Robert, Waldby, Catherine
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Los Angeles, CA Sage Publications 01.05.2010; SAGE Publications; SAGE PUBLICATIONS, INC
• Subjects: Biodiversity; Bioethics; Biological specimen banks; Biologists; Biology; Citizenship; Data base systems; Data collection; Diseases; Economics; Epidemiology; Genetic diseases; Genetic research; Genetics; Genomics; History of science and technology; Human genetics; Informed consent; Life sciences; Medical genetics; Medical research; Palaeontology; evolution ; genetics; Population genetics; Predisposing factors; Professional ethics; Research programs; Risk; Scientific research; Social sciences; Sociology of science; Storage; Values; clinical labor; database; risk; biobank; biovalue

The development of genomics has dramatically expanded the scope of genetic research, and collections of genetic biosamples have proliferated in countries with active genomics research programs. In this essay, we consider a particular kind of collection, national biobanks. National biobanks are often...