Pluripotent Possibilities at Interstate Conference on Stem Cell Research

A California watchdog organization is calling for national guidelines on government-funded stem cell research that would ensure openness, transparency and accountability in the multi-billion dollar state programs.

The appeal came from John M. Simpson, stem cell project director for the Foundation for Taxpayer and Consumer Rights (FTCR) in Santa Monica, Ca. The organization's recommendations came as the Wall Street Journal reported on a Congressional inquiry into transparency and conflict issues in another area of government-funded science – this one involving lung cancer research.

Simpson said in a letter to the Interstate Alliance for Stem Cell Research, which begins a meeting Wednesday(Oct. 24) in Boston, that it should commit to holding public meetings for all future sessions. Simpson was ousted from a meeting of the interstate group last May in California, although he had been invited to its first session. A representative of the National Academy of Sciences, which is backing the meetings of the interstate group, told Simpson the meeting was not open to the public despite the fact that it involved public officials and public money.

Simpson commended the group for holding a public session in Boston. He said,

"I fully expect the Interstate Alliance will have a major influence on rules and regulations in all the states that are represented. That means it is imperative that the public have access to your deliberations and the ability to offer input and comments. Given the potentially contentious nature of publicly funded stem cell research, the need for the utmost transparency is even greater than would otherwise be the case."

Simpson urged the alliance to create a working group to draft model regulations to ensure openness, transparency and accountability in the various state stem cell programs. He said,

"Such a working group should go beyond members of the state stem cell agencies and include representatives of organizations committed to public access in government operations."

Simpson's letter was directed to Warren Wollschlager, chairman of the interstate group. Simpson told the California Stem Cell Report that Wollschlager said he would bring up the openness issue at the Boston meeting.

The Wall Street Journal article highlighted some of the issues involved in openness and transparency in even relatively non-controversial research, much less the heated debate over human embryonic stem cell research.

The piece by David Armstrong said that the House Energy and Commerce Committee, which oversees medical-research issues,

"...was concerned that potential conflicts of interest 'could damage the credibility' of the decade long, $200 million National Lung Screening Trial. The results are expected to have a significant impact in standards for lung-cancer screening and who will pay for it.

"Two of the trial's principal investigators have testified as paid experts for tobacco companies facing lawsuits seeking to force them to pay for smokers' annual CT scans."

Our comment: The interstate alliance has an extraordinary opportunity to influence the ESC research activities across the country. National standards are needed. And for the foreseeable future, they are not likely to be forthcoming from our friends at the federal level. Embryonic stem cell research IS pluripotent. As it exists today with the many states involved, major opportunities exist and changes are possible in non-productive grant review processes that currently hobble creative endeavors. The growth of the state research efforts has great promise. It also has great peril -- if the state endeavors become closed-door, secret activities that enable anti-science forces to foster suspicion and fear. It would be a shame for the Interstate Alliance and the states involved in stem cell research not to take advantage of what is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to begin to chart new and better courses.

No Support From CIRM Group on Public Disclosure on Lab Grants

A move to reveal the identities of the major universities and research institutions seeking $227 million in California taxpayer funds for stem cell lab construction was turned aside today by a key committee of the state's stem cell agency.

The Foundation for Taxpayer and Consumer Rights of Santa Monica, Ca., and the California Stem Cell Report appealed to the Grants Working Group to make an expression of support for public disclosure of the names of institutions and for opening review of their applications to the public.

The group took no action on the requests. Only two members of the group responded. Marie Csete(see photo), a scientist from Emory University, said the most important elements of the review involve the work that is proposed at the facilities – not the labs themselves, which she described as "tools." She also noted that the reviewers are funding the work of their "competitors." California stem cell Chairman Robert Klein endorsed Csete's remarks in a brief comment.

Our comment. One of the stronger arguments for public disclosure and review is the fact that the scientific reviewers are dealing with the livelihoods of their professional competitors. While the reviewers are all from out-of-state, the stem cell world is truly global. It is also small and intensely competitive. We should also note that the reviewers are not eligible for funding from California. That contrasts with the NIH, whose grant reviewers are eligible for funding from that agency. At the California stem cell agency, scientific reviewers receive only a small stipend and expenses for the time they spend away from their own work. They basically do it for free with perhaps the major benefit coming from a chance to see interesting proposals from California scientists and meet with their peers at CIRM expense.

Below are the statements read to the grants group this morning.

Text of Statement by CSCR on Open Review of Lab Grants

Here is the statement by the California Stem Cell Report at the Oct. 23, 2007, meeting of the Grants Working Group of the California stem cell agency.

By way of introduction, my name is David Jensen and I publish the California Stem Cell Report on the Internet. I have followed the affairs of the California stem cell agency since December 2005 and have published nearly 1,400 items involving CIRM.

First, I want to express my appreciation for the work you are doing here today and tomorrow, especially to those of you from out-of-state. Spending two days in a hotel reviewing complex grant proposals – taking time away from your own work and families – is not a minor matter. Thank you.

My main point today involves the openness and transparency of the proceedings of the California Institute for Regenerative Medicine, an agency unlike any state department in California history. As a result of the enactment of Proposition 71, CIRM operates outside of much of the normal state government oversight and is virtually independent of the governor and legislature. At the same time, it is overseen by a board that includes employees of institutions that stand to benefit financially from the CIRM actions. In the case of the upcoming round of $222 million for lab construction, 17 of the 27 current members of the Oversight Committee could see their connected institutions benefit from a facilities grants.

Currently, review of applications from individual researchers is conducted behind closed doors. CIRM has decided to keep the discussions private in order to encourage maximum candor and frankness about the work of individuals, which would be discouraged if the reviews were conducted in a public.

However, applications for the major lab grants – which you will be reviewing in the not-too-distant future – are much different than those from the men and women who direct stem cell research labs. The applications for lab construction funds will come from huge institutions such as the University of California and other major educational and research enterprises. Their names and applications should be part of the public record. And your review of those applications for $222 million in public funds should be conducted in public.

It is hard to see a justification for a closed-door review of a lab grant application, for example, from UC Berkeley. In fact, the review of the lab grants will become public – but only after your group performs the most critical segment of the review. And that is where the public's interest is the greatest. One can argue that individual researchers and their applications should be discussed behind closed doors to avoid embarrassment and to encourage frankness. But that hardly applies in the case of an institution such as Berkeley, which regularly comes under the harshest form of public criticism with nary a flesh wound inflicted. Equating the sensitivities of UC Berkeley or other likely institutional applicants for lab grants to the sensitivities of an individual researcher would seem to defy common sense.

The California stem cell agency has a special public trust. One of its missions is to encourage public support and understanding of human embryonic stem cell research. And it should not hand the foes of good science additional weapons that can be used to attack such research. Conducting grant reviews unnecessarily behind closed doors only feeds suspicion and the worst sort of speculation. Openness and transparency inspire public confidence and make it clear to all that no mischief is afoot.

I urge you to consider making an informal expression of sentiment to CIRM and the Oversight Committee in favor of publicly identifying applicants, publicly releasing their applications and conducting the scientific review of the lab proposals in public. If there are segments of the applications that must be examined in private, that can easily be done in an executive session, just as the Oversight Committee does when it considers applications after your work is done.

Opening the doors on the lab grant review would reflect well on the agency and be an important step in fulfilling CIRM's promise of adherence to the highest standards of openness and transparency. Thank you.

Text of FTCR Statement on Open Review of Lab Grants

Here is the statement by the Foundation for Taxpayer and Consumer Rights presented at the Oct. 23, 2007, meeting of the Grants Working Group of the California stem cell agency.

First, I’d like to apologize for not being able to be present today and thank David Jensen of The California Stem Cell Report for reading this on my behalf. Second, I’d like to thank all of you for serving on the Grants Working Group. We truly appreciate your efforts.

By way of introduction, I’m John M. Simpson director of the Foundation for Taxpayer and Consumer Rights Stem Cell Oversight and Accountability Project. Funded by the Nathan Cummings Foundation since December 2005, the project seeks to ensure that the taxpayers funding California’s landmark $6 billion stem cell research program have affordable access to any of the discoveries they have funded. As part of the project we have challenged the validity of the stem cell patents held by WARF.

In a few minutes you will enter closed session to review the scientific merit of applications for New Faculty Awards. While I don’t agree, I understand the argument that the applicants’ names and the deliberations should be confidential to protect individual researchers from possible embarrassment.

I don’t intend to reargue that issue now. Rather, I’d like to ask you to look ahead a bit. Soon you will be weighing the scientific merit of requests from various California universities and research institutions for their share of $225 million in grants to build laboratories. As it now stands those institutions are not being identified and the reviews will be done in secret.

Ironically, the applications will be publicly reviewed later in the process by the Facilities Working Group when it weighs the proposals on their technical merits of design, construction and such.

To this outside observer that means it's OK to embarrass an institution because it can't design and build a decent building, but it's not all right to embarrass its scientists.

Sadly the public will inevitably view this as a remarkable self-serving, in-bred club that is doing scientific reviews. That's the real embarrassment. If scientists’ egos are so fragile they can't stand public scrutiny, they ought not to have a shot at public money. Nor should the institutions that employ such tender souls.

I ask you to please strike a blow for transparency that publicly funded stem cell research requires. Take the opportunity to show the public how the scientific review process works. Please take a vote amongst yourselves that urges the facilities applicants be identified and the scientific review be public.

Thank you.

More on Floyd Bloom

We have run across some additional details on Floyd Bloom, the latest appointee to the CIRM Oversight Committee, that are of some interest. He fills the position once held by David Baltimore, a Nobel Laureate and former president of Caltech. Bloom, in addition to being professor emeritus at Scripps, is executive director for science communications at that institution. Our earlier item on Bloom also mentioned Neurome, a firm he co-founded. Bloom told us that firm went out of business in September 2006.

Hitching Up Down Under

Alan Trounson, the incoming president of the California stem cell agency, says it will be a "very low key affair" with a few friends and a small reception.

You might call it a stem cell wedding. But not exactly one contemplated six months ago.

Trounson (see photo) and his partner for the last 19 years, Karin, will be getting married. As we all know, Trounson has taken a job in the United States. But Karin – not to mention their children -- will not be able to come along with him unless they perform the nuptials. So say US immigration authorities, despite Karin's Swedish and Australian citizenship and dual passports.

The couple have two boys: Karl, 16, and Alex, 6. Trounson has two other children, Kylie, a 30-year-old lawyer, playwright and actress, and Justin, 27, who has international interests in the tourist industry.

Trounson said Karin has a Ph.D. in women's health and would like to continue her career in California.

He told the California Stem Cell Report:

"We are very comfortable and supportive partners and have no problem in getting married."

He added,

"Karin thinks the event is worth celebrating but our commitment to each other is larger than this ceremony. The kids are joining in on the fun."

We figure the wedding feast will include roasted koala and aquavit. And the music? Well, probably didgeridoos and accordions.

Our congratulations to them both. Actually, congratulations to all four or is it six?

Rose Petals vs. Stem Cells

The case of the embryo vs. the California stem cell agency has been kicking around a couple of years or more – one of the reasons we did not pay much attention to it when it surfaced again recently.

But Kristen Philipkoski of Wired.com demonstrated the bizarre nature of the suit in an item last week.

Among other things, during a hearing in Pasadena, Ca., Philipkoski wrote that the attorney for the embryo "proceeded to scatter rose petals on the courtroom floor, saying they represented the California Institute of Regenerative Medicine destroying life." Philipkoski said that the judge "rolled her eyes."

CIRM Praised on California Political Blog

The New West Notes blog has taken a brief look at the life and times of the California stem cell agency – a largely laudatory review accompanied by a 9-minute video of California Attorney General Jerry Brown.

Bill Bradley, author of the blog and a longtime observer of California politics, uses the stem cell program as an example of how things can actually be accomplished in state government, as opposed the impasses on health care and water policy, among other issues.

Brown (photo above) is seen on a YouTube taken at what appears to be a campaign appearance last year at Advanced Cell Technology in Alameda. The video, although lengthy, has been edited to focus on Brown's stem cell remarks. In the video, he promises to be a "champion" of stem cell research in California and nationally. "I will do whatever I can to alleviate suffering," he says.

One of the interesting aspects of Bradley's item are the numerous comments on it from readers.

One, NickM, said,

"The embryonic stem cell research bond was one of the biggest special interest giveaways in history.

"Companies that stood to make hundreds of millions or billions APIECE by having the taxpayers fund their R&D (and their investors)donated millions to convince the taxpayers that this research wouldn't happen without billions in taxpayer support. It worked.

"So now the biotech conglomerates and VC firms have a huge subsidy, and we're all supposed to feel good about it.

"It's the Donald Trump model: convince someone else to pay your costs while you reap the benefits."

New CIRM Director No Intellectual Shrinking Violet

Consider the following from Floyd Bloom, the latest appointee to the board of directors of the largest single source in the world of funding for human embryonic stem cell research.

"A growing problem of major proportions has been staring us in the face for many decades. Until solved, this long-neglected problem presents a gigantic obstacle to the application of the discoveries flowing from biomedical research into deliverable standards of medical practice that could benefit all of society, both in the United States and globally. This problem is the imminent collapse of the American health system. Unless steps are taken soon to undertake a comprehensive restoration of our system, the profound advances in biomedical research so rapidly accruing today may never be effectively transformed into meaningful advances in health care for society.

"Today's term for such evolutions of discovery into application has been dubbed 'translational research'. The appealing notion that research advances travel from bench to bedside is laudable, but conceptually flawed."

Bloom made the statement in 2003 when he was was president of the American Association for the Advancement of Science. While some on the Oversight Committee of the California stem cell agency may share his sentiments, few have expressed them so publicly and eloquently. Indeed, Bloom's views seem, in many ways, a departure from the standard operating procedure at CIRM, which is somewhat wary of flying in the face of established scientific and medical culture.

Bloom (see photo) was appointed this month by state Treasurer Bill Lockyer to fill a vacancy on the 29-member CIRM Oversight Committee. Lockyer said that Bloom has "dedicated his life to biological science research and is responsible for numerous breakthroughs in neuroscience understanding."

Bloom retired in 2005 as chairman of the Scripps Research Department of Neuropharmacology in La Jolla, Ca. At the time, he said he planned to devote more time to Neurome, Inc., a La Jolla biotechnology firm involved research into human neurodegenerative diseases. Bloom co-founded the firm in 2000.

At one stage in his youth, according to an article on Molecular Interventions, Bloom was encouraged to go into journalism because of his penchant for telling stories. In 2002, he became editor-in-chief of Science, the AAAS journal. He spoke with Molecular Interventions about his views on running a magazine:

"The best thing is to have controversy in an intellectual manner because people read it. They like to see the Christians fight the lions, right? And so if you can engage in an intellectual discussion, then you attract readers and at the same time people get informed from the debate because they'll learn parts of alternative arguments."

Bloom, who also served both as president and chairman of the AAAS, carried his views beyond the pages of scientific media. A few years ago, he told the New York Times:

"I'd like for us to consider health care to be regarded as something like a public utility. To me, if we agree that universal coverage is something to be desired, is that really much different than the fact that we've all agreed that everyone in the country is entitled to have electricity, water, telephone connections, if they can pay for it. We have all kinds of ways to help people get those basic provisions of life.

"And health benefits could be viewed in exactly that same utilitarian way. It could be a corporate network like water power and electricity, with regulatory agencies that set the rates for profit."

Position Change: CIRM Now Permitting Public Comment at $85 Million Hearing

The California stem cell agency today reversed itself and decided to permit public comments prior to two days of closed hearings next week on requests for $85 million in grants to California researchers.

The change in position came quietly today as the agency posted a new agenda for the hearings on the CIRM web site that did not mention that it had been revised. The new posting specifically stated that public comment would be allowed. It also removed this sentence from the agenda::

"An open session will not be held for the meeting of October 23-24, 2007 as business will be limited to review of grant applications."

The change in public access followed disclosure earlier today by the California Stem Cell Report of the ban and subsequent complaints by at least one member of the CIRM Oversight Committee, David Serrano Sewell (see item below).

Comment on Ban on Public at $85 Million CIRM Meeting

David Serrano Sewell, a member of the CIRM Oversight Committee, sent the following on the "Public Barred" item below.

"Just read your item regarding the public being barred from the upcoming Grants Working Group meeting. To my recollection, those agendas have always included an opportunity for the public to address the working group. The failure to include such an item for this agenda was probably a honest mistake that must be corrected. I (and the the patient advocate working group members) support the public attendance at working group meetings. Thanks for catching this!"

Our comment: The agenda for the meeting in question contains a sentence that we cannot recall ever seeing before on a CIRM agenda:

"An open session will not be held for the meeting of October 23-24, 2007 as business will be limited to review of grant applications."

Interstate Stem Cell Issues Coming Up in Public Session Next Week

The Interstate Alliance for Stem Cell Research, which once ousted a member of the public from a meeting in California, will hold two days of open public meetings in Massachusetts next Wednesday and Thursday.

The agenda (see item below) for the group, operating under the auspices of the National Academy of Sciences, includes a host of major issues that states are grappling with across the country. They include model language for the term "acceptably derived," payment issues and health care for egg donors, certification of stem cell lines from other states and countries and the grant review process.

We applaud the decision to make the meeting public. Billions of dollars in public resources are involved along with the need to maintain confidence in embryonic stem cell research. Closed door meetings and secret processes generate suspicion and encourage the worst sort of speculation.

John M. Simpson, stem cell project director for the Foundation for Taxpayer and Consumers Rights, was the man ousted from last May's meeting. He says,

"I'm glad to see the change of heart. Too often the scientific establishment has displayed a paternalistic 'trust-us-we-know-best' attitude that in fact undercuts public support for science. Scientists need to engage and educate, otherwise we end up with the know-nothing attitude too often exemplified by the current administration."

Agenda for Public Meeting on Interstate Stem Cell Issues

Here is the agenda for next week's public interstate stem cell meeting.

Interstate Alliance for Stem Cell Research

British Consulate
Cambridge, MA
October 24-25, 2007
Agenda


October 24

12:00 pm Lunch (at Consulate)

1 pm Welcome and Introductions
Warren Wollschlager, Chair, Office of Research and Development, State of Connecticut and Fran Sharples, National Academies’ Secretariat for IASCR

Introduction of other participants

The purpose of this meeting is to review progress on the working group assignments made at the May 23-24 Irvine, CA meeting and to identify additional issues the IASCR needs to address.

1:15 pm Governance Issues - preliminary discussion: Warren Wollschlager

1:30 pm Report of Working Group on the development of a Glossary of Stem Cell Terms: William Lensch (Tab 1)

2:15 pm Report of Working Group on an IASCR Website: Fran Sharples, Susan Stayn, Eli Zupnick (Tab 2)

3:00 pm Break

3:15 pm Report of Working Groups on Developing Model Language for “Acceptably Derived;” Payment Issues and Health Care for Donors; and Certification of Stem Cell Lines from Other States and Countries (formation of standing committee): Marianne Horn, Geoff Lomax, Melissa Lopes, Susan Stayn, Ann Willey, Eileen Naughton, and Alta Charo (by phone) (Tab 3)

5:15 pm Adjourn meeting for the day

6:00 pm Reception (on site)



October 25

8:30 am Breakfast (at Consulate)

9:00 am Report of Working Group on Grant Reviews: Marianne Horn, Warren Wollschlager (Tab 4)

9:45 pm Report of Working Group of Legal Counsels on Role of Regulations vs. Guidelines and Policy Documents: Marianne Horn (Tab 5)

10:30 am Break

10:45 am Summary discussion of Working Group next steps

12:00 pm Working Lunch: Roles of International Society for Stem Cell Research: Jonathan Auerbach and Heather Rooke (Tab 6)

1:15 pm Governance Issues
Officers
Membership in IASCR
Budget
Roles of IASCR: information resource vs. policy development
Product branding

2:00 pm Recruitment of additional states and other members: discussion

2:30 pm Break

2:45 pm Working Group breakouts

3:30 pm Other agenda items TBD

4:00 pm Adjourn

Public Barred from Any Comment at $85 Million CIRM Meeting

Two days of closed-door meetings will be held in the San Francisco Bay area next week to consider the 59 applications for $85 million in faculty award grants to be handed out in December by the California stem cell agency.

The agency's Grants Working Group will meet next Tuesday and Wednesday at the Sheraton Gateway Hotel in Burlingame to make decisions on which grants to recommend to the Oversight Committee.

The agenda explicitly states there will be no open sessions at which the public can comment. That bars the public from even appearing to protest or comment on the lack of public access, which seems to be the first such ban by CIRM, an agency that has vowed to uphold the highest standards of openness and transparency. Previously, such meetings, including the very sensitive meetings involving the search for a new president, have included at least a brief session during which the public could comment.

Here is a list of the members of the Working Group, whose economic and professional links to applicants are secret. Also being withheld by CIRM decree are the names of the applicants for the state funding and even the institutions (including state-funded universities) where they are employed along with a general summary of the research they are proposing.

The Oversight Committee is scheduled to give out as many as 25 awards, making the odds pretty good for the 59 applicants. The awards could total as much as $3 million a year. Twenty-eight unnamed organizations are represented among employers of the individual applicants.

Aussie Stem Cell Probe Highlights Need for Maximum Openness at CIRM

John M. Simpson, stem cell project director for the Foundation for Taxpayer and Consumers Rights of Santa Monica, Ca., is one of the more diligent watchdogs of the California stem cell agency, which is funded by taxpayers to the tune of roughly $6 billion (including interest).

Simpson (see photo) and his organization support human embryonic stem cell research, but they also have concerns about CIRM, an organization unlike any other in California history. It is virtually untouchable by the governor or the legislature, a distinction enjoyed by no other state agency.

CIRM is also an organization with built-in conflicts of interest, all legal because they were approved by California voters in Prop. 71, which created the stem cell agency.

We believe that means that CIRM should operate with more disclosure and openness than any other state agency. Such openness is in CIRM's own best interest, given the impact that even a minor scandal might have.

All that is a preface to Simpson's comments below, carried verbatim, on the Australian-Trounson stem cell research inquiry(see the several items below). Here is what Simpson sent exclusively to the California Stem Cell Report.

"As word makes its way from Australia to the United States about an investigation of a researcher in Alan Trounson's Monash Immunology and Stem Cell Laboratories, one point is already clear.

"There must be complete transparency and accountability in publicly funded research.

"Trounson, who is to assume the presidency of the California Institute for Regenerative Medicine, is by all accounts not under investigation. A report from a panel of academics who examined the evidence of wrongdoing is 'imminent.'

"Everyone interested in California's stem cell program is waiting for that report to see what degree of culpability -- if any -- Trounson had for things apparently done by others in his laboratory.

"Even before the report's release, the situation once again demonstrates the need for oversight, transparency and accountability in scientific research. Time and time again around the world, too many scientists have bent the rules for their own personal gain. Research simply must not be funded without the highest degree of public scrutiny.

"CIRM staff demonstrated the necessary high standards when after its vetting process, two ICOC-approved research awards were not granted.

"I suspect Trounson will emerge from the Monash probe unscathed, and I hope it will be with an even stronger commitment to the standards of accountability and transparency required by CIRM.

"Nonetheless, the ICOC should review closely the Monash University report when it is available and not allow itself to be blinded by the glitter of a world-class researcher. Even before the report's details emerge, however, the need for transparency and openness in all aspects of publicly funded research is demonstrated yet again."

Does the Trounson Story Have Legs?

The Australian stem cell research flap involving Alan Trounson made its North American debut today in a story in the San Francisco Chronicle. It also surfaced in one of the more serious scientific magazines, the Scientist.

Stephen Pincock of the Scientist added some details on the research. He also indicated a conclusion to the investigation is imminent. Sabin Russell's story in the Chronicle pretty much recapped previous material.

A reader on the Scientist web site, only identified as Leah, commented, "Why are there so many scandals around stem cell research? What a waste of money."

A quick resolution of the investigation is in the best interest of the California stem cell agency and Trounson, the incoming president of the $3 billion enterprise. As the saying goes, justice delayed is justice denied. The other important point is whether this story has legs. Trounson is not the subject of the investigation, but his name is really what makes it newsworthy. And it is mentioned in every story. The longer the story lingers, the more often Trounson's name will be associated with allegations of dubious activity. Not good for either the agency or Trounson.

Trounson Reports Not Appearing in American Mainstream Media

For the California stem cell agency, the good news is that the Australian stories about an investigation linked peripherally to its incoming president, Alan Trounson, have not really surfaced in the United States.

The usual online searches today failed to turn up any significant stories on the matter in the mainstream American media.

The not-so-good news is that the stories have handed another cudgel to those who would batter embryonic stem cell research. The case in point is an item by J. Wesley Smith(see photo), whose piece was headlined, "New CIRM Director's Research Under a Potential Cloud."

However, after some initial fumbling, the Australian stories have made it clear that Alan Trounson is not under investigation. Rather, another senior scientist involved in the $1.2 million project is the target, according to Australian officials.

The Australian, in a story by Leigh Dayton quoted California stem cell Chairman Robert Klein on the matter.

"I am fully aware of this and it is not Alan's work that is being questioned. My understanding is that this is a data issue that relates to the science carried out by a specific researcher."

Dayton wrote that Klein "solidly backed" Trounson. Dayton reported that Klein said that Trounson discussed the matter with the presidential search committee prior to his appointment.

One report from Australia quoted a CIRM spokesman as saying, "We're aware of the situation and have it under careful review." Interim CIRM President Richard Murphy confirmed, for the California Stem Cell Report, that was the agency's position.

Reporter Dan Box of the Australian wrote that Monash University is tossing out all the data from the experiment. He also quoted Monash officials as saying it is not known when the nine-month-old investigation will be finished.

Dayton wrote this about the details of the project.

Specifically, "benchmarking" reports claimed the group had developed a designer mouse that mimicked lung damage from smoking.

The reports also claimed the team had experimental results showing that treatment with adult stem cells reversed respiratory damage in the mouse.

According to the ASCC investigation, neither claim was supported by documentation in the lab's notebooks.

Fresh Comment

David Hamilton has posted a comment on the "Buried News" item below. You can read it by clicking on the word "comments" at the end of the item.

Buried News: William Bowes, UCSB and Jamie Thomson

In the increasingly rarefied atmosphere of stem cell philanthropy, a $3 million gift does not necessarily make big headlines. Especially when it goes to a school outside of the small circle of stem cell stars.

So last week when one of the founders of Amgen, William Bowes(see photo), gave that amount to the University of California campus at Santa Barbara(UCSB), it hardly caused a ripple in the media.

Something similar occurred earlier this year when renown University of Wisconsin stem cell researcher Jamie Thomson became affiliated as an unpaid, adjunct professor with UCSB. It was nearly a non-announcement and received little initial attention. But the school put together a $1 million package for him and is building a lab.

All of which reflects very much on the way the California media works. If it doesn't happen in Los Angeles or San Francisco, it is not likely to receive much notice.

But more particularly none of the news reports on the donation put it together with Thomson's presence at UCSB, which is very much a part-time thing. But it is hard to resist speculating that Thomson and UCSB could draw ever closer.

The press release from school, which stands on the cliffs overlooking the Pacific just north of Santa Barbara, quoted Michael Witherell, UCSB vice chancellor for research, as saying:

"UCSB is bringing to stem cell research its characteristic approach of integrating science and engineering in a single center. The Ruth Garland Chair is central to this approach, because it allows us to attract a researcher of national stature to lead the new center."

The $3 million donation was given by Bowes in memory of his mother, Ruth Garland. She was born in Santa Barbara and raised in nearby Ojai. Her grandparents settled in Santa Barbara in 1855. Educated as a physican at Stanford , she participated in a major diabetics study with William Sansum in Santa Barbara. A nonprofit research facility in Santa Barbara bears his name. It was one of the first places in the United States to do studies on insulin after it was discovered.

We asked Dennis Clegg, chairman of the Department of Molecular, Cellular and Developmental Biology Department and director of the Training Program in Stem Cell Biology at UCSB, about the donation. He replied,

"The gift will allow us to bring in senior talent in the stem cell field to be director of a new center, which will allow us to build on our rapidly growing program in stem cell research, and we are really excited about it. We have had interest in the position from the US and abroad. We have already formed a search committee and will be inviting candidates for interviews in the near future."

Incidentally, UCSB has received nearly $3.5 million in funding from the California stem cell agency during the past two years. You can see Thomson's talk that he gave at UCSB last spring by going to this web page.

Australian News Story Erring on Details

An Australian news report about an investigation involving Alan Trounson and a stem cell research project is apparently not entirely correct on some of the details.

Here is what we have been told concerning Trounson's role on the project (see item below). Trounson was the leader of the respiratory research program, which had three principal investigators (PI) and 16 scientists. The person being investigated was a PI (senior research fellow).

The story in the Daily Telegraph did not make it clear that there were three PIs and as many 16 scientists.