An oral surgeon in Japan falsified images in several papers, granted authorship to whomever he saw fit and stored experimental data sloppily, according to an investigation by Showa University in Tokyo, where the physician was a lecturer at the time of the misconduct.
As a result of the findings, the university has recommended retracting eight papers by the surgeon, Masayasu Iwase, according to a translation commissioned by Retraction Watch of a December report from the committee that investigated the case.
The university also is discussing revoking the graduate degrees of two of Iwase’s former students whose dissertations were based on the “fraudulent” papers, the report explains.
Tadashi Hisamitsu, Showa’s president, wrote on the university’s website:
I deeply regret that research misconduct was committed, and I deeply apologize for the loss of trust in research at the university. In the future, we will implement measures to prevent recurrence, such as thorough research ethics education, and the entire university will work to prevent recurrence.
Iwase left academia in 2010. He served as chief of the Department of Dentistry and Oral Surgery at Hakujikai Memorial General Hospital, also in Tokyo, and still appears to be practicing medicine at Grace Dental Medical Clinic Hokuso Branch.
The eight articles, about oral-cancer cell biology, were published between 2003 and 2011. The university did not reveal the identity of the papers when contacted by Retraction Watch, but concerns have been raised on PubPeer and elsewhere about several of Iwase’s publications.
In September 2021, the International Journal of Cancer issued an expression of concern about one of them, noting that it had also contacted the university “but no investigation was initiated.”
The Showa report states that a preliminary committee was established on July 16, 2021, to investigate concerns raised by “a journal editor-in-chief” who had contacted the university the previous day.
The committee’s investigation focuses on papers based on research by four of Iwase’s then-graduate students. The students’ experimental data were stored on a shared computer, the report notes, but Iwase:
did not have a clear rule on how to save data. Therefore, when he used the data, he was unsure which data was from which experiment. He said the data management was sloppy.
The studies used β-actin as a control for Western blotting:
but Iwase did not consider it as important. So even though he was unsure about the link between the experiment and the β-actin image, he used it for the papers. As a result, the same image has been published in multiple papers as images of different experiments.
The report states that, at that time, another university instructor strictly emphasized the importance of the β-actin control to students, leading the committee to conclude that Iwase lacked “awareness of research integrity.”
The committee also asked a company specializing in image matching to check the images in the papers.
The company found that “what was described as different image data in the papers showed an extremely high matching rate,” leading to the conclusion that Iwase was guilty of “data falsification.”
Iwase, who, according to the report, “did not understand the authorship criteria at the time,” also appears to have wielded autocratic powers over which research was submitted for publication and who was listed as authors.
For instance, when someone gave advice on experimental techniques or the contents of a paper, he made them an author; a person responsible for the graduate program was also made an author. “However, Iwase does not recall why he chose someone in another research group as an author,” the report states.
When one student proved unable to write his dissertation in English, as required by his supervisor, Iwase himself wrote and submitted papers based on the student’s work, without offering further guidance to the student. As a result, the student “could not complete” his dissertation, according to the investigators, who add:
Masayasu Iwase sometimes showed the manuscript draft to some of the authors, but he did not give authors opportunities to check the contents and he submitted [the papers] without their approval.
Iwase has been notified about the findings and has not contested them, according to the report, which does not identify any of the former students by name.
The committee doesn’t just point fingers at individuals, but also blames systemic issues at Showa University. During the period when the misconduct occurred, the institution “did not work hard” to promote research ethics and appropriate data management and authorship practices, the report states.
Another Showa researcher, anesthesiologist Hironobu Ueshima, previously was found to have fabricated data and tinkered with authorship in 142 papers.
Today, extensive ethics education is mandatory for both graduate students and faculty at the university, according to the report, and the school has established an explicit authorship policy. In 2016, Showa University also introduced a set of regulations to prevent research misconduct, and random checks are being done to ensure compliance.
We will update this post if we hear more from Showa University about which papers it recommends for retraction.
Update, Jan. 12, 2022, 1430 UTC: Showa University provided this list of papers they recommended for retraction:
- Enhanced susceptibility of oral squamous cell carcinoma cell lines to FAS-mediated apoptosis by cisplatin and 5-fluorouracil
- Accelerative effect of a selective cyclooxygenase-2 inhibitor on Fas-mediated apoptosis in human neutrophils
- Enhancement of susceptibility to Fas-mediated apoptosis in oral squamous cell carcinoma cells by phosphatidylinositol 3-kinase inhibitor
- Epidermal growth factor receptor inhibitors enhance susceptibility to Fas-mediated apoptosis in oral squamous cell carcinoma cells
- Enhanced susceptibility to tumor necrosis factor-related apoptosis-inducing ligand-mediated apoptosis in oral squamous cell carcinoma cells treated with phosphatidylinositol 3-kinase inhibitors
- Effect of combining epidermal growth factor receptor inhibitors and cisplatin on proliferation and apoptosis of oral squamous cell carcinoma cells
- Enhanced susceptibility to apoptosis of oral squamous cell carcinoma cells subjected to combined treatment with anticancer drugs and phosphatidylinositol 3-kinase inhibitors
- Proteasome inhibitor sensitizes oral squamous cell carcinoma cells to TRAIL-mediated apoptosis
Hat tip: Lemonstoism, author of World Fluctuation Watch
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