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Riso, B. (2016). Before pharma: transforming samples into bio-objects in biobanks. Third ISA Forum of Sociology "The Futures We Want: Global Sociology and the Struggles for a Better World".

B. A. Riso,  "Before pharma: transforming samples into bio-objects in biobanks", in 3rd ISA Forum of Sociology "The Futures We Want: Global Sociology and the Struggles for a Better World", Vienna, 2016

@misc{riso2016_1714758113786,
	author = "Riso, B.",
	title = "Before pharma: transforming samples into bio-objects in biobanks",
	year = "2016",
	howpublished = "Outro",
	url = "http://www.isa-sociology.org/forum-2016/"
}

TY  - CPAPER
TI  - Before pharma: transforming samples into bio-objects in biobanks
T2  - Third ISA Forum of Sociology "The Futures We Want: Global Sociology and the Struggles for a Better World"
AU  - Riso, B.
PY  - 2016
CY  - Vienna
UR  - http://www.isa-sociology.org/forum-2016/
AB  - Biobanks are important infrastructures for biomedical research and they are being used, as material for pharmaceutical testing and development. The frenetic sample’s collection taking place worldwide is a good example of the importance of having well-organised sample’s collection associated with biomedical data. These processes require a set of physical structures and organised practices, under a political a legal framework, which enable and regulate the collection and storage.
The collection of samples addresses not only illness related samples but also the healthy ones. From the collection to storage, the sample is transformed through sophisticated technology in an independent and autonomous identity sharing with the donor the unique and individual genetic information. The sample identity is given by submitting samples to quality tests and criteria; forcing impurities elimination and dangers abolition in samples manipulation. Then, samples are classified into biomedical categories. Even the clinical waste could be stored with a noble purpose of developing medical research and deliver new therapeutic solutions. 
Nowadays, medical gaze is a molecular gaze centred in genetic and cellular processes: looking into individual bodies as a sample and information providers. These samples even they allow identification of the original body they turn impossible the reconstitution of the body and his identity. The corporeal reality is challenged: is possible to “exist” in different times and different places as the collection of samples could be performed before birth, plus is also possible to preserve and use them for years after individual’s death. 
Using ethnography as a research method in a Portuguese biobank, turn possible to follow the samples path from the collection to storage, enlighten how these processes of sample’s bio-objectification are reshaping health, illness and body conceptualisations.
ER  -