IN DEFIANCE of the Bush administration, stem cell research could get a big boost in California from an initiative by scientists and patient-advocacy groups. They propose the state should raise $3 billion to fund stem cell research, and Californians will vote on the measure in November, during the presidential elections.
Federal funds can only be used to conduct research on about 60 embryonic stem-cell lines created before August 2001. “The reality is that many of these lines petered out, or never grew, or were not normal,” says Evan Snyder at the Burnham Institute in La Jolla, California. “This is not…
