For research specimen collections, not regulated biobanking
Freezer inventory, structured metadata, and sample lineage for a lab or institute collection, with the analysis those specimens feed sitting in the same project. If you need chain of custody, consent tracking, or accreditation, you need a dedicated biobank system.
Every specimen, and what came of it
One record per specimen. Its box position, its parents and aliquots, and every image and flow run made from it hang off that record, and what leaves for a collaborator is a filtered view of the same list the lab works from.
Catalog
One structured record per specimen, with typed metadata fields and no second copy to reconcile.
How most labs do it today. A spreadsheet has no record of which copy is current, so the authoritative version is whichever file was opened last.
Location
Locations modeled as they really are: facility, freezer, shelf, box, and position, with the storage conditions each location holds.
How most labs do it today. Samples move and the map is updated separately, so nothing keeps the record and the freezer in step with each other.
Provenance
Specimens link to their parents and derivatives, so an aliquot knows what it came from and what was made from it.
How most labs do it today. Lineage (parent, aliquot, passage, derivative) isn't a field in the spreadsheet, so it has to be reconstructed rather than read off the record.
History
Images, flow data, and analyses attach to the specimen they came from, so the record shows what the sample was used for and what it produced.
How most labs do it today. The collection knows a vial exists. It has no idea that the tissue in it was imaged last spring, or what the imaging found.
Distribution
Search the catalog, filter to what the request needs, and export the subset as CSV or Excel. The record of what left is the same record the lab works from.
How most labs do it today. The pull list and the inventory are separate records, so they have to be reconciled by hand after every request.
Import one freezer
Bring the spreadsheet in, put the specimens where they really are, and keep what came of them in the same place.