TRENTON, Jan. 14 - While the
federal government has sharply limited research on embryonic stem cells,
casting it as a moral issue, governors around the country are moving
aggressively to push the research forward, spending millions, seeking to
lure top scientists to their states and planning state-of-the-art
research facilities.
Last fall, California stepped to the
forefront when voters there agreed to borrow $3 billion over 10 years to
finance stem cell research. And in New Jersey last week, Acting Gov.
Richard J. Codey entered what he called "the race for the cure" by
proposing to spend $380 million on research. New Jersey's planned
spending gives the state a lock on second place in the stem cell
research race, behind California, but Mr. Codey warned it might not
last.
"We have to act aggressively," he said,
"because other states like Wisconsin and Illinois are right behind us."
In fact, everyone is chasing California in
the competition for talent, money and recognition.
"There are more dollars now going into the
field than there would be if President Bush in 2001 had thrown the gates
wide open," said Daniel Perry, the president of the Coalition for the
Advancement of Medical Research, which according to its Web site
includes some 90 research universities and medical advocacy groups,
including Harvard, Johns Hopkins and the Juvenile Diabetes Research
Foundation International. "What he sought to starve has turned out to be
very well fed."
At the very least, competing states are
trying to keep their own researchers from joining a migration to the
West Coast. At the most, they are cultivating their own biotech valleys,
already thriving in ZIP codes around Boston, San Francisco and the
Research Triangle in North Carolina, to name a few.
The Illinois legislature is considering a
tax on elective cosmetic surgery to raise $100 million a year for stem
cell research. In Wisconsin, Gov. Jim Doyle has pledged a $375 million
institute for biomedical research, including stem cell projects.
Connecticut's governor, M. Jodi Rell, wants to allocate $10 million to
$20 million to stem cell research. About 10 other states have similar,
if less specific, proposals.
In Albany, several legislators are
advocating proposals for state support of embryonic stem cell research,
although others want to join a handful of other states that ban
embryonic stem cell research altogether.
Dr. Wise Young of Rutgers, a founding
director of the New Jersey institute, mentioned the possibility of
poaching scientists from New York. "Right in the middle of Manhattan is
the highest concentration of scientists anywhere in the world in biology
and life sciences. New York would be well advised to start a program, or
else they will start moving," he said.
New Jersey has an advantage,
even over California, in its timetable. Construction of the Stem Cell
Institute of New Jersey is to start this summer in New Brunswick, state
officials said, and the directors of the project are already recruiting
its staff of 150 researchers.
In his State of the State address, Mr.
Codey pledged $150 million in unspent bond money to finance
construction. He is seeking voter approval this fall for $230 million in
bonding for grant money.
Mr. Codey's predecessor, James E.
McGreevey, made New Jersey the first state to commit public funds to
stem cell research and won legislative approval for the institute last
year with seed money of $9.5 million.
At the time that figure drew grateful
attention from researchers around the country. Less than a year later,
the spending has risen exponentially. Adding up expected commitments by
state governments, "you're talking $400 million or $500 million a year
in stem cell research," said Mr. Perry of the Coalition for the
Advancement of Medical Research.
The surge comes in part because of
President Bush's ban on federal financing for research involving
embryonic stem cells, except for a few colonies that were in
laboratories when he issued the order in 2001. Since stem cells are
ordinarily taken from embryos discarded by fertility clinics, abortion
opponents had raised objections.
California's billions have
already skewed the market for talent.
Michael Manganiello, the director of
government relations for the Christopher Reeve Paralysis Foundation,
which is based in New Jersey, said that young scientists and
postdoctoral students "can set up in California in a minute."
He added, " I know I would."
"If New Jersey can come up with the $400
million, I think it makes them a player," Mr. Manganiello continued. "It
definitely encourages scientists to stay and young scientists to come."
One stem cell scientist who moved to
California, Dr. Evan Snyder of the Burnham Institute in La Jolla, said
state support moves institutions before the institutions draw people.
Dr. Snyder was at Harvard University in 2002, when California became the
first state to enact a law protecting stem cell research. Though no
state money was attached, Dr. Snyder said "several institutions made
decisions they were going to start Manhattan Project-type programs."
Burnham did, and hired Dr. Snyder as the program's director.
Others have followed, many researchers
say, although the only reports they can offer are anecdotal. But Dr.
Snyder said, "I don't think it's going to be a brain drain like a vacuum
cleaner sucking people out of the East."
California already had the
biggest pool of private biotechnology companies and several academic
medical centers, which will now compete for $300 million a year in state
funds. New Jersey's model is different, bringing most of the researchers
under one roof, affiliated with Rutgers University and the University of
Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey.
What every state covets, of course, are
the clusters of private companies that grow up around medical centers
and the investment they bring. It is hard to forecast investment in
private stem cell ventures, however, said G. Steven Burrill, the chief
executive officer of Burrill & Company, a biotechnology investment firm
in San Francisco. Last year, Mr. Burrill said, about $5 billion in
venture capital went into biotechnology, but only $30 million to $50
million to companies specializing in stem cell work.
"Over time it will be going up," he said.
"Immediately, no."
The trend to public research by the
states, while fostering innovation, may also cause duplication and
splintering in research, Mr. Perry said.
"It's going to create a crazy-quilt
pattern across the U.S.," he said. In some states, stem cell research
will flourish, he said. Other states, he added, "are going to
criminalize the same research, where you could get thrown in jail for
moving a cell nucleus to the wrong place."
