BOSTON — Harvard University is set to launch an institute that will provide embryonic stem cells to researchers blocked from using them by President Bush's ban on federal funding of such destructive research.

Embryonic stem cells are taken from unborn children, who are killed in order to harvest the cells in theory, the cells could be used to grow any kind of adult tissue, such as kidneys or brain cells.

While Harvard would say only that it was “proceeding in the direction” of establishing the center and that “final details have not been completed,” media reports indicate the fund-raising goal is set at $100 million — an enormous undertaking, even for Harvard.

The purported aim of the new institute — really an institutional initiative rather than a centralized research center — is to provide human embryonic stem cells to researchers hoping to use them to devise treatments for a variety of ailments. Proponents of the research claim they could provide amazing breakthroughs in medicine.

However, in summer 2001, Bush declared a federal law banning research involving cells taken from aborted children should also apply to most embryonic stem-cell research. The decision did exempt *****************page 10 missing************