Aggregated News
BURLINGAME, Ca. -- Directors of the California stem cell agency today mulled over a recommendation that they focus intensely on a handful of research projects that are most likely to result in commercializing a stem cell therapy.
No decisions were made, but directors raised questions about whether such a move would mean a reduction of funding for other research efforts or affect other projects in a negative way.
The recommendation and others came from agency's new scientific advisory board (SAB), appointed by CIRM President Alan Trounson at the behest of an Institute of Medicine study. The agency received the panel's report only on Monday and cobbled together staff responses for today's directors' meeting.
The SAB proposals were bad news for the agency's shared labs program, which costs CIRM $7.5 million a year and is set to expire in 2014. The panel recommended an end to the program after that date. CIRM agency staff agreed, declaring that the original rationale was no longer valid and that the program could be wrapped into the recipient institutions' budgets, if they wished to continue...
No decisions were made, but directors raised questions about whether such a move would mean a reduction of funding for other research efforts or affect other projects in a negative way.
The recommendation and others came from agency's new scientific advisory board (SAB), appointed by CIRM President Alan Trounson at the behest of an Institute of Medicine study. The agency received the panel's report only on Monday and cobbled together staff responses for today's directors' meeting.
The SAB proposals were bad news for the agency's shared labs program, which costs CIRM $7.5 million a year and is set to expire in 2014. The panel recommended an end to the program after that date. CIRM agency staff agreed, declaring that the original rationale was no longer valid and that the program could be wrapped into the recipient institutions' budgets, if they wished to continue...