By Mary Woolley

In the United States, human embryonic stem cell research has provoked great controversy. Yet, even when the political and media debate was most heated, public opinion was solidly in favor of federal funding for such research. This article examines public opinion, reflected in national and state polls commissioned by Research!America between 2002 and 2010, in the context of evolving U.S. public policy for taxpayer-funded research involving embryonic stem cells. As advocacy and public education efforts took effect, the controversy subsided and public support further strengthened. With President Barack Obama’s 2009 Executive Order and the subsequent National Institutes of Health guidelines governing this field of study, U.S. federal funding is now supporting research involving a growing number of human embryonic and other pluripotent stem cell lines, and the U.S. policy now more closely aligns with public attitudes and the scientific community’s views of this promising field of science.