Alan Trounson is no stranger to the drama that surrounds controversial scientific research. He cut his teeth on the world's early IVF advances and now heads up a leading stem cell research centre, the California Institute for Regenerative Medicine.
Credit: California Institute for Regenerative Medicine
AS ALAN TROUNSON drove across the Golden Gate Bridge on the morning of 9 March 2009, the rising Sun peeked through fog, as it often does in San Francisco. He was headed for his office near the bay - the US$3 billion California Institute for Regenerative Medicine (CIRM), the world's best-funded centre for embryonic stem cell research, which he leads.
His staff of around 40 was gathering at 8:00 am, to watch the much-anticipated announcement that U.S. President Barack Obama would lift restrictions placed by the previous administration of George W. Bush on federal funding for stem cell research. Trounson, like the rest of his staff, was excited. To him, it was not an average Monday morning but the dawn of a new scientific era.
"It was a great, buoyant feeling," says Trounson of the mood that morning. As they watched it live from the White House, "There were lots of hurrahs and clapping and a bit of dancing."
After lunch, he bought champagne for his staff to continue celebrating a day that for them seemed as momentous as the Moon landing.
"The morale in the scientific community lifted dramatically. It was a very significant moment. It changes the way people and institutions look at our research, because the administration has embraced and encouraged it rather than discouraged it. At a time when things are pretty grim otherwise in the economy, this is a good story - not just for scientists, but for everybody. Almost everyone knows someone who could benefit from embryonic stem cell research."
For Trounson, an Australian who had left his family and an established career in Melbourne to come to San Francisco on a gamble that stem cell research would take off in the USA, the announcement was a vindication.
Since his arrival in early 2008, Trounson has been working tirelessly to realise the potential of the tiny dots that are embryonic stem cells, alongside some of the world's top scientists, celebrities and politicians, including California governor Arnold Schwarzenegger and former U.S. President Bill Clinton (a photo of the two of them sits on his desk in his brand new home north of the Golden Gate Bridge).
He's already handed out US$700 million in research grants, helped establish 70 teams of researchers to work with pharmaceutical companies, and has seen some promising results in spinal cord research, retinal repair and juvenile diabetes. He believes embryonic stem cells will deliver massive new advances in medicine that will be in clinical trials within two to four years (see end of story).
He spent New Year's Eve in Washington DC with his family, who joined him to live in California late last year, and spent New Year's Day advising the Obama transition team on stem cells. He declined the invitation to go to the White House on the day of the announcement because, he said, his travel schedule was already so hefty.
Those who know him, though, felt it was his classic self-effacement; he felt it more appropriate that other people took the spotlight. After a year of dramatic changes in his life, when the day of the announcement arrived, he admits it was a bit of an anti-climax.
"It's been magical to be part of all this. I don't get the same 'rocks off' feeling like the moments I used to get when I was in the lab, it's just different. But I'm very proud and pleased about what we've done so far."
The man who invited Trounson to apply for the job in California, Bob Klein, did attend. The trees were starting to blossom in Washington DC after a long winter on the day Obama signed the executive order ending the 7.5-year ban on federal funding. It was also a vindication for Klein, a multi-millionaire lawyer and low-income housing developer, who had dedicated much of his time, fortune and political prowess to advancing embryonic stem cell research against the enemies of the science.
He has a son with juvenile diabetes and a mother with Alzheimer's disease - both illnesses which stand to benefit from the research. Klein organised the Californian stem cell ballot initiative - Proposition 71 - which created the new state agency that Trounson now heads. In the 2004 ballot, Californians voted to allow US$3 billion (raised by selling bonds) to be used exclusively for stem cell research.
Klein first met Trounson in Australia in 2006 when the Australian was director of the Monash Immunology and Stem Cell Laboratories, a renowned centre of excellence established within Monash University.
"When I saw funding constraints for stem cell research in Australia were signifi cant, it occurred to me that there might be a tremendous opportunity for Alan to lead us in California," says Klein. "He has such an extraordinary network of researchers around the world. Alan is the global ambassador for international stem cell research."
For his part, Trounson was happy Klein was at the White House for the announcement as "he likes all that political stuff". The two - the scientist and the businessman - work together in much the way Trounson worked with Monash University's Carl Wood in the early days of IVF research, of which Wood was a pioneer. Trounson was always happy to be the backstage manager of the medical maverick, at a time when both were making astounding advances in human reproductive technology.
