WIKIMEDIA, KUEBIAt the written request of Texas governor Rick Perry (R), the state’s embattled $3 billion dollar cancer research funding agency this week announced a moratorium on new grants, reported ScienceInsider. The agency will award no more grants until it properly addresses continued concerns about the legitimacy of its review procedures.
The Cancer Prevention and Research Institute of Texas (CPRIT) has been in trouble since May 2012, when its chief scientific officer, the Nobel Prize-winning biochemist Alfred Gilman, announced he would quit over grave concerns about the integrity of the agency’s peer-review procedure. Gilman stepped down in October, and was quickly followed by the chair of the review council and scores of peer reviewers.
Two more top officials, including the agency’s executive director, Bill Gimson, have resigned in the past few weeks amid allegations about possible criminal activity involving a round of grants awarded to companies owned by Dallas businessman David Shanahan, a major campaign contributor to Texas Governor Perry and Lieutenant Governor David Dewhurst.
Following the commencement of a civil investigation, CPRIT this week received ...
