The primary purpose of an IRB is to protect the rights and welfare of human research subjects. IRBs carry out this purpose by ensuring that human research activities comply with the core tenets of the "Common Rule." The Common Rule is the ethical standard against which all government-funded research involving human subjects in the United States is expected to conform. North Star Review Baord will provide services necessary to make human subject research possible and will further public trust in human subject research activities by demonstrating to the public that such activities were independently and ethically reviewed and not marked by exploitation of poor, distressed, or underprivileged persons.