Popular stem cell lines submitted for approval

[barbara]

The Washington Post.com

Four human embryonic stem cell lines that are popular among scientists have finally been submitted to the National Institutes of Health for approval under President Obama's new stem cell policy.

The WiCell Research Institute of Madison, Wisc., late Tuesday asked the NIH to approves the lines, including one known as H9, which is the most widely used line.

The move is significant because some scientists had complained that Obama's new stem cell policy, which was designed to ease restrictions on the field and speed research, was actually having the opposite effect. That's because although dozens of new lines had been approved under the policy, some of the lines that scientists have been using the most--especially WiCell's--had not been authorized.

Federal funding for human embryonic stem cell research have been restricted during President George W. Bush's administration. Bush sided with critics who did not want federal funding to encourage the destruction of more embryos to create new lines.

Obama lifted those restrictions, but the NIH instituted tough new ethical requirements on any new lines that could receive federal funding. Officials at WiCell had said it was taking some time to assemble the documentation needed to make it through the NIH's new approval process.


By Rob Stein | April 14, 2010

 

[barbara]

Popular hESC line approved

Posted by Jef Akst 27th April 2010
The Scientist.com

The National Institutes of Health is set to announce the approval of four human embryonic stem cell lines that were eligible for federal funding under former US President George W. Bush, but originally deemed ineligible under new rules from the current administration.

One of these lines includes the most widely used line of human embryonic stem cells, H9.

With only one Bush-approved line already on the new NIH registry, this marks a step in the right direction for the stem cell research community.

"Re-approval of these cell lines will jump start stalled research and clinical development projects that have been on hold since July, 2009," when the new rules from President Barack Obama took effect, Erik Forsberg, executive director of the WiCell Research Institute in Madison, Wisconsin, which applied for the approval, told The Scientist in an email. While the new rules opened the door for newly derived lines to be approved for federal funding, they did not "grandfather" existing eligible lines, meaning that all the Bush-approved lines had to be resubmitted for approval under the new NIH guidelines.

Together with H1 (the only already-approved Bush line), H9 has dominated the field for more than 10 years, according to a survey published in the August issue of Nature Biotechnology.

"Many people who had been working on these lines, and concerned about whether they would be able to continue to work with these lines, will now be reassured that their research can now go forward," NIH Director Francis Collins told The Washington Post.

Editor's note: Since the publication of this story, the four human embryonic stem cell lines from the WiCell Research Institute have been added to the NIH stem cell registry, as well as nine additional lines from the University of California, Los Angeles, Harvard University, and Stanford University.