Minor News Coverage of Trounson Resignation; More Likely Later Today

So far today news coverage has been light of the resignation of Alan Trounson as president of the $3 billion California stem cell agency.

In addition to the California Stem Cell Report, which was first with the news last night, Ron Leuty of the San Francisco Business Times and scientist/blogger Paul Knoepfler carried items.

(See here for the main story on the California Stem Cell Report and here for an email from Trounson. See here for the agency's press release at 6 p.m. PDT yesterday.)

Leuty's report was a straight-forward news account, but Knoepfler, a stem cell researcher at UC Davis, weighed in with a brief analysis. Knoepfler wrote,

“A new CIRM president will find herself or himself tasked with not only running the agency, but also leading the agency to what will likely be a new kind of future. The new president will need vision as to what CIRM will do once the funding from Prop. 71 runs out in a few years and they’ll also need the know-how and management skills to make that vision into a reality.

“There aren’t that many people in the entire world who have the chops to take that on and be successful.”

Later today, more stories are likely to be seen as other media catch up with the events.
The evaluation subcommittee of the governing board of the agency has also scheduled a meeting for this morning concerning the board's evaluation of Trounson. We have queried the agency about whether that meeting will go on as scheduled.