Stem cell starters in Connecticut

by Lucy Caldwell-Stair
February 1, 2008

University of Connecticut scientist David Rowe heads one of the largest research teams funded by the state's new stem cell research grants that began last year. Rowe manages a $35 million, nine-project, multiyear grant to tackle understanding of some of the most basic aspects of stem cells.

Connecticut, like several other states, is stepping in to compensate for the limited federal dollars to investigate human embryonic stem cells, seen to be particularly promising for growing new cartilage, heart vessels and nerve cells -- essentially any type of cell -- to treat disease and disability.

Rowe's group is studying cartilage and skin cells. Its first steps are to figure out how to make pure stem cell populations, spot them in tissue samples, and see how they progress into their final tissue type.

"No one group can handle the whole thing, so we have a very mixed group of genetic and developmental biologists, clinicians, tissue engineers and computer scientists," Rowe said.

With stem cell research still in its infancy, all $21 million awarded last spring out of the $35 million went for basic research in labs at Yale University, the University of Connecticut, and Wesleyan University, said Warren Wollschlager, chief of the office of research and development in the Connecticut Department of Public Health. The program aims to give out a total of

$100 million over 10 years.

"Our priorities are human embryonic stem cell research and economic development," said Wollschlager.

Some grants are for setting up facilities and equipment that must be entirely separate from federally funded labs. That is because the Bush administration restricted federal funding for any lab doing embryonic stem cell research to those willing to use only the stem cell lines created from embryos destroyed before the administration's ruling in 2001 -- about 27, of which only about 11 are useful.

"Stem cells are very finicky about how they grow. We need to have the capability to use new, unapproved stem cell lines to see if what we find in one line can be seen in others," Rowe said.

For 2008 funding, 87 researchers are requesting $41 million, with more seed-grant proposals from young researchers this year.

Artificial Cell Technologies Inc. in New Haven, Conn., is one of seven biotech applicants for the funding. The company is seeking $475,000 to make biopolypeptide films to control the growth of human stem cells.

"We take solid materials such as Petri dishes or 3-D scaffolds and apply films or coatings to manipulate the behavior of cells in tissues. Stem cells are really influenced by the surface they grow on," said founder Don Haynie.

Bay State's bid

Massachusetts has also started to fund stem cell research. The Massachusetts Life Sciences Center, a quasi-public agency, recently gave $8.2 million to establish a stem cell bank and registry at the University of Massachusetts Worcester campus. The registry catalogs more than 425 stem cell lines, both the 27 that are approved for study with federal funds and the other lines that can only be studied with private or state funds.

"The registry is a single source that ties together information about what research has been done on each line, the properties of the lines, and even anecdotal information so researchers can understand what the lines are capable of doing," said Gary Stein, chair of cell biology at University of Massachusetts Medical School.

"The bank and registry is an investment in infrastructure that credentials the state," he said.

The Life Sciences Center also wants to give grants for stem cell research. A $12 million matching grant program begins in February 2008 for stem cell and other research in the first round of a much larger appropriation.

Opinions differ on the value of state-funded stem cell research.

"It has been economically beneficial," said Wollschlager. "UConn and Yale have had success at bringing in top-notch researchers who brought along their own teams from Duke and Wisconsin. To the extent there was a brain drain in Connecticut, we've reversed that," he said.

"Any intellectual property that comes out has to be close to the market," said Artificial Cell Technologies' Haynie. "A patent good for 20 years takes three years to get, and if you can't license it to others within 10 years of getting the patent, it's almost not worth it," he said.

"States see it as a hot new thing, and that's debatable," said Stephen Bernstein, an attorney at McDermott Will and Emery LLP. "But in Massachusetts we have all the raw expertise and can use legislation to springboard what's already here."

State programs can clarify legal aspects, said Jennifer Geeter, Bernstein's colleague.

"It's an opportunity for states to clear up any state regulations which may impede stem cell research. State privacy laws are a patchwork, and you can get tangled in ways the legislation didn't intend," Geeter said.

To address the need to standardize, Wollschlager has formed the Interstate Alliance for Stem Cell Research, bringing together representatives from California, Illinois, New York, Massachusetts, New Jersey, Maryland, Rhode Island, Wisconsin, and Connecticut.

"Absent a unified federal scheme, states have had to go on their own," he said. "For a researcher in California to use cell lines from Harvard (University), the states would have to have the same procedures for issues like informed consent of embryo donors."