The California stem cell agency is slowly beefing up and improving its web site, posting additional information that is helpful to folks seeking to know more about how $3 billion in taxpayer funds are being spent.
One of the features added to the site recently is a list of all 206 grants (worth $554 million), their subject areas, institutions and the names of the principal investigators with links to the summary of the proposal by reviewers.
CIRM has also posted a ranking of institutions by the dollar value of CIRM grants that they have received. That list includes the type of grants awarded to each institution and the total dollars in each grant round.
Much, if not all, of this information was previously available on the CIRM website. But it took a lot of digging to ferret it out. The material is basic information, but it takes considerable work and care to compile it in a readily accessible format, not to mention updating it as warranted. And as we mentioned earlier, CIRM has also begun an "alert" service that provides automatic email notification to interested persons about a variety of events and information.
John M. Simpson, stem cell project director for Consumer Watchdog of Santa Monica, Ca., recently singled out the list of all 206 grants for praise, calling the summary "user friendly and handy."
Don Gibbons is the chief communications officer for CIRM and oversees the content on the website. He is to be commended for pulling all this together. It is a valuable resource for the public and interested parties. We look forward to other features that he may add to the web site.
You can sign up for the CIRM alerts by going to its home page and clicking on the sign-up button.
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