"Drunken mice, venomous sea snails, elderly turtles.

It's your federal stimulus dollars at work.

The trio is part of a handful of Florida Atlantic University studies being paid for with American Recovery and Reinvestment Act money from the National Institutes of Health.

And while humorous at first blush, the research is probing the serious issues of treating alcoholism, turning poisonous venom into medicine, and studying what allows fresh water turtles to grow old without suffering cellular damage that leads to the very human afflictions of Alzheimer's and Parkinson's Disease."

Source: palmbeachpost.com

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A sea cone snail releases toxic venom into a vial in an aquarium at the Florida Atlantic Univeristy campus in Boca Raton.
Photo courtesy: www.sunsentinel.com

"Scientists say today's stimulus spending could produce medical breakthroughs of lasting value. The money will allow them to hire lab assistants over the next weeks and months. In some cases, such as the painkiller study at FAU, it could lead to commercial products that generate revenue and lots of jobs, though probably not for a decade or more.

Critics say these efforts, however worthy, are a lousy way to spur the economy or put the unemployed back to work.

'All Americans are interested in finding cures to these diseases. But the stimulus bill was sold as a way to pump money into the economy to create jobs and help communities avoid layoffs of teachers and police officers,' said Steve Ellis, vice president of Taxpayers for Common Sense, a watchdog group in Washington."

Critics say stimulus funds for FAU research are off the mark

Good studies, but I still say grant FAU $10M to jump start the entire campus housing, stadium and I-95 interchange building process. For that $10M you get $100M return in constuction projects on campus AND get I-95 moving NOW when the thousands of jobs are REALLY NEEDED!