"I’m making you and offer you can’t refuse," said Robert Goldstein. "Free money to do good things."
Goldstein, chief scientific officer for the Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation, was speaking to last week’s Interstate Alliance on Stem Cell Research (IASCR)meeting at the National Academy of Sciences in Washington, DC.
In fiscal 2007 JDRF research funding around the world totaled $138.4 million. Of that $7.2 million was for stem cell research
The IASCR is comprised of representatives of state stem cell research funding agencies. Most agencies can only fund research within their state.
Goldstein told the meeting that his organization would fund qualifying research that might be partnered with a project in a state, but that didn’t get state funding because it was outside the agency’s jurisdiction. "We want to give you a way to extend your envelope," he said. Goldstein said he was interested in removing barriers to research.
After the meeting he told me that JDRF would expect to be part of the scientific review process in any grants it awarded jointly with state agencies because it was bringing its money to the table.
I don’t fault his logic. In fact, I’d say that because California taxpayers are kicking in $6 billion to our stem cell research program, our agency’s scienitific review should be open to the public.
