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Medical U. of South Carolina Researcher Is Arrested in Scheme to Sell Stem Cells

December 29, 2011, 12:38 pm

An assistant professor at the Medical University of South Carolina is one of three men arrested in the last week for their alleged roles in a scheme to “manufacture, distribute, and sell to the public stem cells and stem-cell procedures that were not approved by the Food and Drug Administration,” according to a news release issued on Wednesday by the Federal Bureau of Investigation.

The South Carolina researcher, Vincent Dammai, is alleged to have used university facilities to create stem cells from umbilical-cord blood that one of the other defendants, a midwife, obtained from birth mothers. The stem cells were then sold to people with cancer and other incurable diseases under the illusion that the cells were part of an FDA-approved treatment. The scheme netted $1.5-million for the defendants, the FBI said.

The university released a statement saying that Professor Dammai had been placed on administrative leave and that it was cooperating in the investigation. Nature reported that he could not be reached for comment.

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  • http://profiles.google.com/aspatriarca Ashley Patriarca

    I occasionally use Stereomood.com for this purpose. You pick whatever mood you’re in (or a task you need to complete), and the (free) site streams a preselected playlist for you based on that mood/task. It’s a relatively limited collection of songs compared to Spotify or even what I have available in my personal collection, but it’s helpful when you’re burned out on everything you listen to frequently. I’ve also found that the simple act of having headphones in – whether I am in my office at home or at the library – helps me shut out external distractions and focus on a task. 

  • http://twitter.com/hcgoldsmith hcgoldsmith

    I’ve found the “Music for Programming” mixes (http://musicforprogramming.net/) to be excellent to work to—they “provide just the right amount of interest to occupy the parts of your brain that would otherwise be left free to wander and lead to distraction during your work.”

  • electronicmuse

    Maybe this book should be kindling, not a “Kindle single.”

    With so many “self-help” books around, how is it that there are still so many people who need to be told how to take every step in their lives?

    Buck up me hearties! Listen to music just to do so, not to “better” yourselves!

  • austinbarry

    Use iTunes ratings? How? One unfortunate thing about iTunes is it has no keyword feature. You get one genre, and a 1-5 rating. I’ve resorted to using bpm as a coding scheme.

  • http://twitter.com/DrBobHealth Dr. Bob Health

    I found Your Playlist Can Change Your Life to be informative about how music affects your brain and it has several tools that you can use to make playlists for specific purposes, like calming down in traffic and getting ready for a test or important business meeting.  There are lots of sample playlists and music to try out at the books website http://www.yourplaylist.co/playlists. 

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