New Jersey lawmakers gave overwhelming approval on Thursday to legislation that would devote $270-million to stem-cell and related studies at the state’s leading biomedical-research institutions, including Rutgers University and the University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey. According to today’s Philadelphia Inquirer, Gov. Jon S. Corzine, a Democrat, has vowed to sign the bill, which he said would help make New Jersey a center of the research. The research is controversial because human embryos must be destroyed to harvest embryonic stem cells for the lab work — a step that some people consider tantamount to murder. But supporters of the research say it holds the promise of developing treatments for many intractable diseases and disorders.