$40M Establishes New Center for Stem Cell Genomics in Bay Area, SD

The California Institute for Regenerative Medicine today awarded $40 million to create a new Center of Excellence in Stem Cell Genomics, to be led by Stanford University molecular geneticist Michael Snyder and including major research groups in San Diego, Santa Cruz, and Palo Alto.

Snyder was at the center of an important paper published in 2012 that offered an outline of how the emerging field of personalized medicine could develop. In sequencing all 6 billion bases of Snyder’s own genome, scientists determined he was genetically at risk for type 2 Diabetes.

Michael Snyder
Michael Snyder

The scientists continued to track billions of Snyder’s biomarkers, and spotted a big spike in his glucose levels—an early warning signal that prompted Snyder to change his diet and increase his exercise in a successful effort that reversed his slide into full-blown diabetes.

The new center’s headquarters will be at Stanford University, according to Kevin McCormack, a spokesman at the San Francisco headquarters of the California stem cell agency.

The stem cell agency said Stanford and the San Diego-based Salk Institute will serve as joint principal investigators of the new center of excellence. Four other San Diego organizations—UC San Diego, The Scripps Research Institute, the J. Craig Venter Institute, and Illumina (NASDAQ: [[ticker:ILMN]]) will participate as scientific collaborators in the effort, and data coordination and management will be done at UC Santa Cruz.

The new center of excellence is intended to promote more scientific collaboration among research groups focused on genomics and stem cells. The goal is to share a deeper understanding of the genetic processes underlying cancer, diabetes, heart disease, and mental health—and ultimately to find ways of using stem cells in such medical research and to develop new treatments.

The $40 million award includes $19 million to fund research, such as investigating disease mechanisms and the development of new technologies for this kind of work. The data coordination and management done at UC Santa Cruz will enable the center to share its findings with scientists in California and elsewhere.

Author: Bruce V. Bigelow

In Memoriam: Our dear friend Bruce V. Bigelow passed away on June 29, 2018. He was the editor of Xconomy San Diego from 2008 to 2018. Read more about his life and work here. Bruce Bigelow joined Xconomy from the business desk of the San Diego Union-Tribune. He was a member of the team of reporters who were awarded the 2006 Pulitzer Prize in National Reporting for uncovering bribes paid to San Diego Republican Rep. Randy “Duke” Cunningham in exchange for special legislation earmarks. He also shared a 2006 award for enterprise reporting from the Society of Business Editors and Writers for “In Harm’s Way,” an article about the extraordinary casualty rate among employees working in Iraq for San Diego’s Titan Corp. He has written extensively about the 2002 corporate accounting scandal at software goliath Peregrine Systems. He also was a Gerald Loeb Award finalist and National Headline Award winner for “The Toymaker,” a 14-part chronicle of a San Diego start-up company. He takes special satisfaction, though, that the series was included in the library for nonfiction narrative journalism at the Nieman Foundation for Journalism at Harvard University. Bigelow graduated from U.C. Berkeley in 1977 with a degree in English Literature and from the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism in 1979. Before joining the Union-Tribune in 1990, he worked for the Associated Press in Los Angeles and The Kansas City Times.