Standing in a laboratory over a microscope might sound dull to some, but San Diego’s scientists and biotech executives are nearly doing cartwheels over the prospect of a new wave of research that soon will hit the shores of the Golden State. The hubbub is all about Prop. 71, the landmark stem cell research initiative passed by Californians in November. The new law — approved by 59 percent of voters — will provide $3 billion in funding for basic stem cell research over the next 10 years, including the study of embryonic stem cells, an area that has lagged because of federal funding restrictions.

San Diego’s biotech and research communities see the proposition as a way to boost the region’s already high profile in the life sciences, which can in turn be useful in luring scientific talent, convincing companies to move here and creating a fertile seeding ground for new ventures.

“This is almost like having the Super Bowl here,” says Julie Meier Wright, president and chief executive of the San Diego Regional Economic Development Corp. “It puts San Diego front and center as we seek to recruit companies to be in California and in San Diego specifically. Other states are very threatened by what we’ve done.”

By mid-December, the full slate of 29 members had been appointed to the oversight committee that will launch the California Institute for Regenerative Medicine and decide which research projects get funding. Robert N. Klein, the Palo Alto real estate developer who chaired the Prop. 71 campaign, was selected as chair of the oversight committee. Klein has said he wants the first grants to go to researchers by May.

That creates a sense of urgency for San Diego scientists who want funding for their projects.

“The research institutions in San Diego, including UCSD, are going to benefit in the immediate future,” says Joe Panetta, president and chief executive of Biocom, San Diego’s biotechnology industry association. “I think potentially, there is the opportunity down the road to take the work that comes out of these research institutions as a result of obtaining grant funding and potentially building products and companies in the future out of it.”

Proponents of stem cell research say this line of scientific inquiry has the potential of offering new treatments or cures for a variety of conditions, from cancer and diabetes, to Lou Gehrig’s and Parkinson’s diseases, as well as paralysis caused by spinal cord injuries. One controversial area of research involves the use of embryonic stem cells, which develop in a fertilized human egg within five to seven days of conception. Such cells can potentially grow into any type of cell in the human body, but some object to their use on religious or ethical grounds because it involves the destruction of an embryo.

Prop. 71 would allow funding of embryonic stem cell research, which is restricted under federal government policy. The proposition’s language favors research projects that do not qualify for federal funding, giving embryonic stem cell research an edge. Adult stem cells, which come from various parts of the body and are generally limited to becoming the cell type of their tissue of origin, also are the subject of promising avenues of research.

Business and science leaders are busily working to ensure that San Diego gets its share of the Prop. 71 funding, and they are also putting together a proposal for the state headquarters, the Institute for Regenerative Medicine, to be located here.

Biocom’s Panetta says San Diego has compelling arguments for locating the institute here, such as its pool of highly skilled workers, its world-renowned researchers and institutions, and the collaborative relationships between public and private entities.

Having the stem cell institute here, he says, would put San Diego in the spotlight, attracting further scientific talent and companies interested in transforming laboratory successes into commercial products. The final decision, he says, will depend on where the oversight committee’s leaders want the institute to be located. Even if San Diego doesn’t become the institute’s home, Panetta says, there is talk of building a stem cell research facility in San Diego.

UCSD is one of the local research institutions that stands to gain from Prop. 71. The university also has land available that could be provided as an incentive to win funding for a new stem cell research lab in San Diego, says university chancellor Marye Anne Fox.

“There isn’t space existing right now” for a major expansion of research projects, she says. “It’s our anticipation that probably there will be a facility of some sort that would be involved in the proposal that the Southern California coalition would make.”

Fox says Prop. 71 will foster larger and more complex collaborations between public and private research facilities than in the past, and UCSD plans to take advantage of the opportunity. “This is a watershed event,” she says. “We’re just really excited about all these opportunities that simply didn’t exist before.”

The EDC has a number of initiatives in the works related to Prop. 71. Meier Wright says her agency has identified every company in the world that professes to be involved in stem cell research, which amounts, surprisingly, to fewer than 100 firms. The companies will be contacted and asked if they would consider moving or expanding to San Diego.

“We will be communicating with them to make sure they know San Diego has the welcome mat out, that we are prepared to work with them to help them move here,” she says.

The EDC also is involved with identifying scientific conferences and local efforts to recruit scientific talent to expand the base of scientists who are already here and working in the field.

San Diego’s wealth of research talent isn’t the only thing that sets it apart, says Duane Roth, executive director of UCSD Connect, which brings scientists and entrepreneurs together. The concentration of research institutions within walking distance of each other in La Jolla doesn’t exist anywhere else.

“That’s why San Diego is so different than anyplace on earth,” he says, and that advantage allows more productive, and even spontaneous, brainstorming meetings between researchers and business executives.

As the Prop. 71 juggernaut moves forward, Roth and others will be looking to take new ideas and breakthroughs to the next step, by finding capital and starting new companies.

“I think this is a way for the state of California to get an awfully good return on its investment,” Roth says. “It’s not about the money, it’s about the intellectual energy that this money creates that lets ideas be explored that never would without this.

“Is this overall a good thing” Sure it is. Will we do well in San Diego as a result“ Yes. And will we help people with diseases? Yes, certainly.”

Next month: The state of San Diego stem cell research and expert analysis of the road to commercialization.