Stem cell vote fails
The US Congress has again failed to muster enough votes to expand federal funding for human embryonic stem cell research. On 11 April, the Senate backed the Stem Cell Research Enhancement Act by 63 votes to 34 – short of the two-thirds majority needed to override an expected veto from President George W. Bush. The House of Representatives similarly failed to achieve a veto-proof majority when it voted in January.
Home for orphans
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A $37 million grant from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation will buy space for 21 “orphan” crops – such as cassava, yam and sweet potato – in a repository of the world’s seeds being built by the Global Crop Diversity Trust. Orphan crops are relied on by the world’s poorest farmers but are largely ignored by modern crop breeders.
Parkinson’s progress
Gene therapy that involved injecting a virus into the brains of 12 patients with Parkinson’s disease reduced symptoms by an average of 36 per cent, according to results presented on 16 April at a conference in Washington DC. The virus contained the gene for neurturin, a protein that protects cells damaged by the disease. It will now be evaluated in a further 51 patients.
Ruined river
Some 600 kilometres of the Yangtze, Asia’s longest river, are irreversibly polluted, and nearly 30 per cent of major tributaries are seriously polluted, according to a report from the Nanjing Institute of Geography and Limnology in China. Aquatic life has suffered significantly.
Space race
US astronaut Sunita Williams became the first person to run a marathon in space on Monday. “I’m done! Woo hoo!” Williams radioed NASA’s Johnson Space Center, after she finished her “Boston Marathon” on a treadmill aboard the International Space Station.
