TALLAHASSEE — The Scripps Research Institute is forming a new center to do human embryonic stem cell research with three other leading biomedical institutes in California, a Scripps spokesman said.
Scripps has experimented with mouse stem cells in the past, but this is the institute’s first major foray in the promising but politically charged arena of human stem cells, said spokesman Keith McKeown.
Scripps is opening an East Coast campus in Palm Beach County, but for now the institute’s stem cell plans are confined to California, McKeown said. California passed a $3 billion stem cell initiative in 2004.
The Burnham Institute is joining Scripps to form the California stem cell center. Florida officials are currently in negotiations with Burnham to open a Florida campus in Port St. Lucie.
The San Diego Union-Tribune first reported the California stem cell center in Thursday’s editions. The Salk Institute and the University of California San Diego are also involved in forming the center.
In Florida, supporters of state-funded stem cell research quickly seized on the news. Supporters are seeking legislation in Tallahassee that would set aside money for stem cell research, and one group is hoping to get a constitutional amendment on the issue on the 2008 ballot.
"If Scripps is going to be seeking stem cell money from California, one day we’d like to think that funding would be available so Scripps could do similar research in the state of Florida," said Bernie Siegel, who runs the Wellington-based Genetics Policy Institute.
