CellBank Australia is located on the premises of the Children’s Medical Research Institute (CMRI) at Westmead, NSW.  The facility is managed by Dr Joseph Pereira and operated by highly skilled and experienced cell culture scientists. Professor Roger Reddel is the Director of both CellBank Australia and CMRI.

The facility handles cells in two purpose-built culture rooms, one for cells entering the cell bank that have not yet passed quality control, and the other for tested cell lines. Both culture rooms are positively pressured and function as cleanrooms (ISO14644 class 7). Cultures are grown in separate incubators, handled using set standard operating procedures, and tracked using an extensive database that records all culture-related events.

CellBank Australia is a member of the Australasian Biospecimen Network (ABN) and the International Society for Biological and Environmental Repositories (ISBER). As such, the facility is aware of best practice in repository management worldwide and strives to meet, or exceed, such best practice guidelines.

CellBank Australia is currently funded by the National Health and Medical Research Council, the Cancer Institute of NSW and the CMRI, while the Cure Cancer Australia Foundation (CCAF) and the National Breast Cancer Foundation (NBCF) provided support for the establishment of CellBank Australia. We gratefully acknowledge the partnership of these organisations, which has been essential for CellBank Australia’s development.