University of Michigan researchers have received approval to begin accepting donated embryos that will be used to derive the university’s first human embryonic stem cell lines. The cell lines will be used to study the causes and progression of inherited diseases, to test potential treatments and to seek cures. The announcement was made Tuesday afternoon, Dec. 8, 2009, by Dr. Eva Feldman, director of U-M’s A. Alfred Taubman Medical Research Institute, during a speech at the Detroit Economic Club. The embryo-donation and cell-line derivation program is the first U-M project made possible by Proposal 2, the state constitutional amendment that eased restrictions on human embryonic stem cell research in Michigan. [Read more...]