California's $3 billion stem cell
research program this month launched the “Proceedings of the
California Stem Cell Agency” in partnership with a scientific
journal that it spawned in 2011.
The journal is Stem Cells Translational
Medicine, which was initiated at the behest of the Golden State's
stem cell agency. The California Institute for Regenerative Medicine
or CIRM, as the agency is known, subsidized the new journal for three
years with $600,000 paid to AlphaMed of Durham, N.C. (See here, here, here and here.)
The move by the state agency came as
reliance on traditional scientific journals for publication of
research findings has encountered heavy criticism in recent years for
wasting billions of dollars and costing lives.
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| Ellen Feigal, CIRM photo |
Ellen Feigal, senior vice president for
research and development for the California agency, and Natalie
DeWitt, CIRM's special projects officer, wrote in the latest edition
of the journal that the “Proceedings” would consist of a “monthly
series (in the journal) of commentaries, articles, interviews,
webinars, forums, and concise reviews on a wide range of topics in
regenerative medicine.”
The agency executives said,
“Under our direction as series co-editors, the Proceedings will create a dynamic forum for the broad international community of scientists, policymakers, and stakeholders engaged in stem cell research.”
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| Natalie DeWitt, CIRM photo |
The kickoff article dealt with the
sharing of clinical trial data, which, Feigal and DeWitt wrote, is “a
thorny issue that continues to spur worldwide debate and one for
which the regenerative medicine community can shape the discussion at
an early stage.”
They said,
“Forthcoming Proceedings will include articles such as policy and scientific considerations surrounding the creation of induced pluripotent stem cell (iPSC) banks; the global regulatory environment for developing stem cell-based therapies; and reports from various focused workshops, such as on bottlenecks in research on Parkinson's disease and ocular disorders, as well as progress in research to generate blood and liver tissues.”
The Proceedings' first offering was
authored by Feigal and DeWitt along with CIRM staffers Geoff Lomax and
Maria Millan. It said that more information sharing would speed
research among scientists but that sharing would need to
be “de-risked” by developing standards that protect proprietary
information.
The article also discussed, in two
dense paragraphs, a need to provide some provide some sort of cash
incentive for sharing data. The authors wrote,
“Consideration should be given to mechanisms for rewarding the deposit of data. For example, performance metrics for monetizing the deposit of high-quality data should be considered. Like an investigator's publication record, such a system could be weighted in peer review and progress reporting. Monetization should also be evaluated from the perspective of system quality and sustainability. If quality data can serve to reduce sponsor costs, then reasonable fees or royalties may be appropriate.
“Contract research organizations have ex tensive experience and expertise in data generation, analysis, and management, but funding constraints may not allow them to participate in data sharing. Again, reimbursement mechanisms may bridge this gap.”
The journal provides free online access to individuals but institutional subscriptions can exceed $1,000 a year.
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