Stanford Report, October 4, 2006

Media monitor

"The egg bottleneck will be overcome. But it will take time." —Irv Weissman, MD, director of the Stanford Institute for Stem Cell Biology and Regenerative Medicine, on how stem cell researchers are grappling with a shortage of eggs needed to create stem cell lines. Los Angeles Times, Sept. 13.

"We are talking about a potentially very, very expensive therapy for a very common disease." —Alan Garber, MD, PhD, the Henry J. Kaiser Junior Professor, on the first fully implantable artificial heart for use in dying heart failure patients who are not eligible for a transplant. The device was approved by the FDA this summer. Washington Post, Sept. 6

"Children used to be borderline tortured in emergency rooms." —Bernard Dannenberg, MD, director of pediatric emergency medicine at Lucile Packard Children's Hospital, on the efforts at Packard and other children's hospitals to create specialized pediatric emergency rooms and other emergency services for children. Wall Street Journal, Sept. 20.

"We can't imagine life without this tool anymore." —Ben Barres, MD, PhD, professor of neurobiology, of developmental biology and of neurology and neurological sciences, on the Allen Brain Atlas, which provides a 3-D map of the entire 21,000-plus genes active in the mouse brain. The map is now available online without cost for research on brain circuits and chemistry. Associated Press, Sept. 26.