Denny Sanford pledges $100M to UC San Diego for stem cell study SAN DIEGO, Nov. 4 (UPI) -- A South Dakota billionaire has pledged $100 million to help speed stem cell research at the University of California, San Diego. Denny Sanford, a South Dakota business tycoon who maintains a home outside San Diego, said he's putting up the bulk of a planned $275 million push to build the Sanford Stem Cell Clinical Center at UC San Diego. School officials hope it will be the first research center to perform clinical studies on stem cell therapy in humans. The treatment possibilities of stem cells are vast because they are the earliest form of human cells and eventually grow into specific types of cells. The implications could have a significant effect on cancer, Alzheimer's and heart disease treatments, among other illnesses. U-T San Diego said Sanford's donation is the second-largest in school history, behind a $125 million donation made by Qualcomm founder Irwin Jacobs to build up the school's engineering department. Sanford's donation is one of the 15 largest charitable contributions this year and brings him to more than $1 billion in lifetime charitable donations, tax records show. "[Patients] desperately need us to speed up what we're doing, and Mr. Sanford's gift is going to accomplish that," said Larry Goldstein, director of the UC San Diego stem cell program. We need to do experiments on people. We're not just big mice. ... This center will set up the pipeline, set up the methods, help us recruit patients and begin testing.