The federal government can continue to fund embryonic stem cell research, a U.S. district judge ruled Wednesday.The decision from Judge Royce C. Lamberth in Washington, D.C., threw out a 2009 lawsuit challenging an Obama administration policy that expanded funding for the controversial research, which had been limited under President George W. Bush. The plaintiffs — researchers Theresa Deisher of AVM Biotechnology in Seattle and Dr. James Sherley of the Boston Biomedical Research Institute — argued that the policy ran afoul of a federal law known as the Dickey-Wicker Amendment, which prohibits government funding of research that involves the destruction of embryos.
