The Icelandic Strain Collection and Records (ISCaR) is a national repository for microbial cultures and samples from the unique Icelandic natural environment.

ISCaR contains mainly cultures of prokaryotes (bacteria and archaea) but to a smaller extent also phytoplankton, fungi, viruses and complex biomass samples of microbial communities. Samples and isolates that are stored in ISCaR were taken from a multitude of sites in and around Iceland and from a variety of environments, including marine, freshwater, hot springs, glaciers, humans, animals, food products, etc.

The cultures and samples of the collection originate mainly from Icelandic sources but isolates from other global areas are also included through deposits from collaborating colleagues, institutes or other culture collections. The biological material stored in ISCaR exists predominantly in the form of isolated and characterized microbial cultures, but isolated DNA and samples of biomass are available as well; all together with accompanying meta-data, like sampling date and location, environmental parameters, growth conditions for cultures, or any other relevant information.