Welcome to The Biomarkers Consortium! The Biomarkers Consortium brings together the expertise and resources of various partners to rapidly identify, develop, and qualify potential high-impact biomarkers. The consortium was formally launched in late 2006 to identify and qualify new, quantitative biological markers (“biomarkers”), for use by biomedical researchers, regulators and health care providers. Effective identification and deployment of biomarkers is essential to achieving a new era of predictive, preventive and personalized medicine. Biomarkers promise to accelerate basic and translational research, speed the development of safe and effective medicines and treatments for a wide range of diseases, and help guide clinical practice.

The Biomarkers Consortium is a major public-private biomedical research partnership managed by the Foundation for NIH with broad participation from stakeholders across the health enterprise, including government, industry, academia and patient advocacy and other non-profit private sector organizations. In addition to the Foundation for NIH, founding members include the National Institutes of Health, Food and Drug Administration and the Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America. Other partners in the consortium include the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services and the Biotechnology Industry Organization.

Some of the most useful biomarkers took years of development to achieve the elevated status they now hold in medicine. One of the most difficult tasks facing biomarker assessment and evaluation is harmonizing the approaches of various stakeholders--government, industry, non-profits and foundations, providers, and academic institutions. Our partners recognize the critical need for a coordinated cross-sector partnership effort.

For partnership or additional information about The Biomarkers Consortium, please email us at biomarkers@fnih.org. For more information about the Foundation for the National Institutes of Health go to www.fnih.org.