Biological Resource Centers are the pinnacle of evolution from private strain collections to internationally recognized repositories of ex situ living microbial germplasm. Holding the world's catalogued diversity of microbial life, they provide a formal context in which to mine for valuable and useful traits while at the same time ensuring that materials will be exploited in harmony with developing international norms on access to biological samples. Collections exist in a variety of scales and with differing emphases. Medical and genetic collections exist alongside taxonomic and agricultural or industrially relevant collections. Recent estimates suggest that in addition to one million prokaryotic strains and viruses, there are more than half of a million fungal isolates in collections, and these are generally available to clients for research and development. The development of whole genome sequences for isolates in culture collections presages an era when strains will be selected based on their genetic traits rather than by phylogenetic or physiologic criteria.
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