News briefing: 25 February 2010 : Nature NewsPolicy|Business|Research|Events|People|Business watch|The week ahead|Number crunch|Sound bites Policy  Stem-cell lines:  The US National Institutes of Health (NIH) is considering extending the definition of human embryonic stem-cell lines eligible for federal funding, to include those from earlier-stage embryos than currently allowed. Pre-blastocyst embryos might become eligible under a revised rule proposed on 19 February. It is a trivial, small change of the wording that could have enormous scientific benefit, says Susan Fisher, a stem-cell biologist at the University of California, San Francisco, who recently submitted ten lines derived from pre-blastocyst embryos to the NIH. See go.nature.com/vmucio for more. Avandia risks:  Drug-maker GlaxoSmithKline (GSK) was aware of cardiac risks associated with its diabetes drug Avandia (rosiglitazone) years before they became public but sought to minimize the findings, said the US Senate finance committee in a report released last week. Two senators also challenged Margaret Hamburg, the commissioner of the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA), to justify an ongoing trial that compares Avandia with a competing drug.The finance committee released documents from the FDA  � where an advisory committee voted in 2007 to keep Avandia on the market  � in which two FDA safety experts called the trial unethical and exploitative. GSK says that the Senate report cherry-picked information and mischaracterized its efforts to research and communicate the risks of Avandia. Biomedical priorities:  The Wellcome Trust, Britain's biggest charitable funder of biomedical research, has for the first time explicitly set out five priority areas it wants to fund, in a ten-year strategic plan announced on 22 February. The research challenges where funding will be focused include studies into chronic diseases and the effects of ageing on cell function, and the interplay between the environment, nutrition and health. In 2008 -09 the trust spent a total of  £720 million (US$1.1 billion) on research. Business  Ethanol merger:  The large Brazilian ethanol producer ETH Bioenergia announced on 18 February that it would take over the debt-ridden Brazilian Renewable Energy Company (Brenco) to create a world-leading company to make ethanol from biomass. The combined firm aims to produce 3 billion litres of ethanol annually by 2012, ETH stated, by which time the companies will have invested 3.5 billion reals (US$2 billion) on top of existing investments of 3.8 billion reals. The move follows Shell's 2 February announcement of its joint venture with another big Brazilian ethanol firm, Cosan (see  Nature   463,  592; 2010). Nuclear guarantees:  The US Department of Energy on 16 February issued an US$8.3-billion loan guarantee for a pair of nuclear power plants in Georgia, potentially clearing the way for the first new commercial reactors to be granted permits in more than three decades. The federal support would cover debt in case of loan default, allowing a consortium led by Southern Company, based in Atlanta, Georgia, to secure lower-interest commercial loans from skittish Wall Street banks. The Obama administration hopes to issue loan guarantees for seven to ten plants country-wide, to build confidence in the industry. Business watch Enzymes that convert woodchips, maize leaves and stalks, and municipal waste to sugars are getting cheaper. At a national US ethanol conference in Orlando, Florida, last week, biotech companies Novozymes and Genencor launched new generations of enzymes that they claim will cut the enzyme-related production costs of cellulosic ethanol to less than US$0.13 a litre.Poul Ruben Andersen, global marketing director at Novozymes, based in Bagsv ¦rd, Denmark, says that a few years ago enzymes accounted for more than half the cost of cellulosic ethanol production, but now only contribute a quarter (see chart). Enzyme costs are not the number-one concern any more, agrees Aaron Kelley, a senior engineer at Genencor, based in California, which is a subsidiary of Danisco, headquartered in Copenhagen, Denmark.Despite the economic downturn, cellulosic ethanol companies such as Poet, in Sioux Falls, South Dakota, are expecting to start commercial production in late 2011 or early 2012 at a total cost of under $0.53 per litre  � roughly on a par with that of 'corn' ethanol produced from sugar-rich maize cobs. Lower enzyme costs are already factored in to these projections, notes Kelley, but their progress  � though expected  � may bring confidence to wary investors. Research  Mission choices:  Out of 52 initial proposals and a shortlist of 6, on 18 February the European Space Agency selected three medium-sized missions to continue development within its 'Cosmic Vision 2015 -2025' programme, with an eye towards launching two of them in 2017 -18. Cost-capped at  �¬450 million (US$610 million) each, the missions are: Euclid, to measure dark energy and dark matter; Planetary Transits and Oscillations of stars (PLATO), to detect extrasolar planets when they pass in front of their stars; and Solar Orbiter, which would sidle up to within 62 solar radii of the Sun. A decision on the two winners is expected in mid-2011. Pebble-bed dashed:  The company developing South Africa's pebble-bed nuclear reactor said on 18 February that it is contemplating shedding three-quarters of its 800-strong staff after losing government funding. See page 1008 for more. CryoSat delay:  The European Space Agency has postponed the planned 25 February launch of its satellite for monitoring variations in the extent and thickness of polar ice. The agency says that the Russian launch rocket that will carry CryoSat-2 into its required orbit did not have enough spare fuel in its second-stage engine. The delay could be around a month. Events  Wise delivers infrared wisdom NASA's Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer (WISE) has offered up the first pictures since its 14 December launch, including these colour-altered images of the comet Siding Spring (right) and the Andromeda galaxy. WISE will mainly seek the cool glow of asteroids and brown dwarfs, almost-stars that aren't quite massive enough to ignite. Whereas the infrared Spitzer Space Telescope honed in on specific objects, WISE, with its huge field of view, will take an infrared census. It should complete 1.5 sweeps of the sky before its cryogens run out around October. People  NIH change:  Raynard Kington, deputy director of the US National Institutes of Health (NIH), will leave the biomedical agency in late July to become president of Grinnell College in Iowa, NIH director Francis Collins announced on 17 February. Kington, a physician with a doctorate in health policy and economics, became a key administrator at the NIH over the past decade. As acting director before Collins took the helm last August, he oversaw the allocation of US$10.4 billion in economic stimulus funds and the development of new guidelines for funding of human embryonic stem-cell research. Research president:  Austrian social scientist Helga Nowotny has been elected president of the European Research Council (ERC), which funds cutting-edge research in Europe. Currently vice-president, Nowotny is based in Vienna and is an emeritus professor at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Zurich. She will take up the position on 1 March, replacing the ERC's founding president, Fotis Kafatos, who resigned last month (see  Nature   463,  407; 2010). Climate chief resigns:  Yvo de Boer (pictured), executive secretary of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, unexpectedly announced his resignation on 18 February after almost four years leading climate negotiations. I believe the time is ripe for me to take on a new challenge, he said, telling Associated Press that the failure of the climate talks in Copenhagen last year was not a factor in his decision to quit. De Boer leaves his post on 1 July, and will join consultancy group KPMG, where he will advise on climate and sustainability. Anthrax case closed:  Federal authorities in the United States announced on 19 February the conclusion of their investigation into the 2001 anthrax attacks, which killed five people. They determined that biodefence researcher Bruce Ivins was the sole perpetrator; he committed suicide in July 2008, before indictment. A National Academy of Sciences panel commissioned last year is still reviewing the scientific evidence used in the case, such as analysis tracing mailed  Bacillus anthracis  spores back to a single-spore batch in Ivins's lab at the US Army Medical Research Institute of Infectious Diseases in Fort Detrick, Maryland. The week ahead  26 February The World Health Organization reviews its Framework Convention on Tobacco Control, on the fifth anniversary of the treaty's entry into force. �� go.nature.com/RMwxIo 1 -5 March The 41st Lunar and Planetary Science Conference takes place at the Woodlands, Texas. Special sessions focus on recent findings from lunar orbiters LCROSS, Chandrayaan-1 and Chang'e-1. �� go.nature.com/QIbppz 3 -5 March The International Emissions Trading Association joins with various United Nations agencies to host the second Africa Carbon Forum in Nairobi, Kenya. The meeting aims to boost lowcarbon projects in Africa under the Kyoto Protocol's Clean Development Mechanism. �� go.nature.com/Nz7bZt Number crunch  523 Number of authors on two 2001 papers announcing the draft sequence of the human genome. 1,968 Number of authors on 2010 paper of initial results from the Compact Muon Solenoid detector at the Large Hadron Collider. Sound bites  Being able to do science live from space every day of the week is going to be spectacular. Jeff Greason, president of XCOR Aerospace, based in Mojave, California, gets excited by the promise of cheap spaceflight, at a space-research conference in Boulder, Colorado, last week. See go.nature.com/AjykOj for more on the conference.