Shigeaki Kato, the former University of Tokyo endocrinology researcher who resigned in 2012 and has retracted at least ten papers, by our count, has five more retractions.
Here are the papers, all in the Journal of Biological Chemistry (JBC):
- Positive and negative modulation of vitamin D receptor function by transforming growth factor-β signaling through Smad proteins (cited 84 times, according to Thomson Scientific’s Web of Knowledge)
- Ligand type-specific interactions of peroxisome proliferator-activated receptor γ with transcriptional coactivators (cited 163 times)
- The tamoxifen-responsive estrogen receptor α mutant D351Y shows reduced tamoxifen-dependent interaction with corepressor complexes (cited 49 times)
- An hGCN5/TRRAP histone acetyltransferase complex co-activates BRCA1 transactivation function through histone modification (cited 25 times)
- Phosphorylation of Williams syndrome transcription factor by MAPK induces a switching between two distinct chromatin remodeling complexes (cited 15 times)
Despite the investigations, unfortunately, as we have often sees at the JBC, the notices are scant, all saying simply:
This article has been withdrawn by the authors.
This isn’t likely the last you’ll hear of Kato on Retraction Watch. Five of his papers are subject to an expression of concern, and a University of Tokyo panel recommended that 43 of his papers be retracted.
Thanks to “DK” for recently linking to the Tokyo U results on an earlier Kato entry.
“Tokyo University released the Interim Report on Kato Lab on Dec 26, 2013.”
http://www.u-tokyo.ac.jp/public/pdf/20131226_03_summary_en.pdf
http://www.u-tokyo.ac.jp/public/pdf/20131226_04-2_appendix1_jp.pdf
Tokyo took their time but have been commendably thorough. An awesome list of damaged figures is in the appendix.
Relief in the chromatin field at the recent retraction of the 2009 Nature GlcNAcylation paper may be tempered by the fact that the 2011 one is not on the threatened list despite building upon it and sharing the same first (and last) author. But then perhaps coauthoring US PIs RG Roeder and M Brown, who provided “support and general guidance” (Contributions text), have had time to redo key Kato lab experiments and are fully prepared to stand by the conclusions of the paper?