Troubled stem-cell institute finally gets new leader
California’s $3 billion stem-cell agency, which has been without a permanent leader since the end of April, has named a respected Australian scientist, Alan Trounson, as its second president.
The agency, called the California Institute for Regenerative Medicine, has been controversial from the beginning. The question is whether Trounson can finally lend some stability to the agency’s mission of supporting stem-cell science and research to find new cures to disease — one of the most ambitious… Continue Reading
Legal cloud lifts from California stem-cell effort
The California Supreme Court swept away the last legal impediment to the state’s $3 billion stem-cell research program Wednesday when it declined to review two lawsuits that challenged its constitutionality.
Ideological foes of the state’s stem-cell effort, which voters approved by a large margin in a 2004 ballot initiative, have waged a two-year battle in the courts to shut it down. The opponents — a coalition of anti-tax and limited-government conservatives and anti-abortion activists — argued… Continue Reading
Health and science roundup: Amgen, generic biologics, the origins of white people and more
Amgen’s anemia rollercoaster — Biotechnology titan Amgen may have dodged a bullet when a study released Thursday showed that its anemia drug Aranesp didn’t shorten the lives of patients, after several other studies had suggested the opposite. But its anemia franchise isn’t out of the woods yet. A Wednesday report in the Journal of the American Medical Association revealed that for-profit dialysis clinics prescribe far higher doses of anemia drugs to their patients than do their non-profit… Continue Reading
Health and science roundup: Amgen, generic biologics, the origins of white people and more
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Amgen’s anemia rollercoaster — Biotechnology titan Amgen may have dodged a bullet when a study released Thursday showed that its anemia drug Aranesp didn’t shorten the lives of patients, after several other studies had suggested the opposite. But its anemia franchise isn’t out of the… Continue Reading