Governor Spitzer has appointed Business Council President and CEO Kenneth Adams to serve on the Empire State Stem Cell Board, which will oversee a $600 million program intended to promote stem cell research and development.

The appointment reflects the growing involvement of The Business Council in the effort to build what the Governor has called "the innovation economy," focused on the infrastructure and research needed to build the industries and create the jobs of the future. Governor Spitzer said the fund "will enable the world-class academic, research, medical and scientific institutions located here to reach their full potential."

Adams was assigned by the Governor to the board's Funding Committee, which, the Governor's office said, will "make grants for basic, applied, translational and other research that advances scientific discoveries in fields related to stem cell biology," based on a scientific peer review process.

The board, chaired by state Health Commissioner Richard F. Daines, is to oversee the Empire State Stem Cell Trust Fund created in this year's state budget. The Legislature made an initial appropriation to the fund of $100 million, and committed additional annual amounts of $50 million for each of the next 10 years. In addition to the Funding Committee, there is an Ethics Committee that will, the Governor's office said, "make recommendations regarding scientific, medical and ethical standards."

Daines said that "biomedical research holds great promise for the presentation and treatment of the most devastating diseases and health conditions." Lieutenant Governor David A. Paterson said the program will be implemented "with the highest moral, ethical and scientific standards."
In addition to Adams, those appointed to the board and designated as members of the Funding Committee are:

• Robin Elliott, New Yorkers for the Advancement of Medical Research
• Gerald Fischbach, M.D., Columbia University
• David Hohn, M.D., Roswell Park Cancer Institute
• Harold Varmus, M.D., Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center

Those appointed to the board and designated as members of the Ethics Committee are:

• Samuel Gorovitz, Ph.D., Syracuse University
• David Hohn, M.D., Roswell Park Cancer Institute
• Robert Klitzman, M.D., Columbia University
• H. Hugh Maynard-Reid, D.Min, North Brooklyn Health Network
• Tia Powell, M.D., New York State Task Force on Life & the Law
• Robert Swidler, Esq., Northeast Health.