JCI issues mega-correction for multiple myeloma paper

The Journal of Clinical Investigation has issued a lengthy correction to a paper about the role of the immune system in the progression and treatment response of multiple myeloma.

The correction changes details from the name of an author to figure legends, and adds entire supplemental figures.

Shortly after the paper’s publication on April 20th, commenters on PubPeer pointed out duplications in multiple figure panels.

Last month, the journal issued an extensive correction note for “Immunosurveillance and therapy of multiple myeloma are CD226 dependent,” which, in part, tries to explain the multiple duplications.

It starts out noting a typo:

The name of one of the authors, Marta Chesi, was incorrect. The correct author list is above.

In the original paper, the author was listed as “Martha.”

The rest of the note lists a number of other changes:

The legend for Figure 3 did not indicate that the data on the survival of control WT mice reported in Figure 2E were duplicated in Figure 3F. The correct sentence is below.

The WT controls presented in Figure 3F are also presented in Figure 2E. All of the samples in these panels were derived from the same set of experiments.

The authors have also added Supplemental Figure 8 to clearly illustrate that the survival data in these panels were collected contemporaneously and that the statistical analyses accounted for multiple comparisons appropriately.

In addition, the legend for Figure 6 did not indicate that the data in Figure 6D on the mean γ-globulin percentages in the serum were also presented in Figure 5B. Further, the data in Figure 5D reporting the number of malignant CD138⁺CD155⁺ PCs in the BM of WT mice following cIg were also presented in Figure 6, E and H. The number of malignant CD138⁺CD155⁺ PCs in the BM of WT mice following α-CD137 treatment that are shown in Figure 6E are also reported in Figure 6H. The correct sentences are below.

The WT cIg samples displayed in Figure 6, D and E, are also presented in Figure 5, B and D, respectively. The WT cIg and WT α-CD137 samples in Figure 6E are also presented in Figure 6H. All of the samples in these panels were derived from the same set of experiments.

The authors have added Supplemental Figure 9 to clearly illustrate that the data for serum γ-globulin percentage and number of malignant CD138⁺CD155⁺ PCs were taken contemporaneously and that the statistical analyses accounted for multiple comparisons appropriately.

The authors also inadvertently presented the wrong FACS plot in Figure 7F for CD8⁺ T cells expressing CD69 following α-CD137 treatment. A label in Figure 7G has been corrected to indicate PBS treatment rather than cIg treatment. Typographical errors in Figure 7H have been corrected to indicate mice treated with α-CD137 + α-CD4 in Figure 7H. The correct panels are shown below.

 

Finally, the authors inadvertently presented the wrong panel of CTLA-4⁺ cells in Supplemental Figure 7B. In addition, the legend for Supplemental Figure 5C did not indicate that the vehicle groups were also presented in Figure 6H and were derived from the same set of experiments. The online version of the supplemental data file has been updated to correct these issues.

The authors regret the errors.

We asked Howard Rockman, the Editor in Chief of JCI, if the presence of so many errors made the journal consider a retraction, but haven’t heard back yet. We’ve also contacted corresponding author Mark Smyth, a researcher at the QIMR Berghofer Medical Research Institute in Queensland, Australia for further comment. We’ll update this post if we hear back from either of them.

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