The Stanley Foundation brain collection and Neuropathology Consortium

The Stanley Foundation brain collection is an attempt to supplement existin g brain collections for the purpose of promoting research on schizophrenia and bipolar disorder. Specimens are collected with the permission of the fa milies in a standardized manner, with half of each specimen bring frozen an d half fixed in formalin. The Neuropathology Consortium is a subset of 60 s pecimens from the collection, well-matched groups of 15 each with diagnoses of schizophrenia, bipolar disorder, major depressive disorder without psyc hotic features, and normal controls. More than 75 000 sections and blocks f rom the Consortium have been sent to over 50 research groups worldwide to c arry out a wide variety of assessments. These data will be integrated to pr ovide a more complete picture of the neuropathology of these disorders. (C) 2000 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.