Year 1
The goal for the first year was to establish a totally new laboratory from the ground up at the recently opened new UC Santa Barbara Center for Stem Cell Biology and Engineering funded by CIRM. This involved equipping the whole laboratory from small to large equipment items. This was made possible by the recruitment of three excellent scientists: a senior scientist, a research technician and a PhD student. This enabled the laboratory to quickly get established and running some initial experiments to ensure processes were working. We have run a number of preliminary experiments the results of which will be presented at conference later this year. The goal of the initial experiments was to establish techniques to improve cell transplantation for eye diseases.