Once again, the headline has written itself.
The journal Animal has retracted a 2010 paper on cloning pig embryos after it became clear that there were “close similarities” between it and a 2009 paper by some of the same authors. Here’s the notice:
The manuscript ‘Development of cloned embryos from porcine neural stem cells and amniotic fluid-derived stem cells’ by X. E. Zhao and Y. M. Zheng was submitted to animal on 06 December 2008. After peer review and revision, it was accepted for publication on 24 December 2009 and published online on 03 February 2010 (Zhao and Zheng, 2010).
Recently, we have been alerted to a similar publication originally published in Reproduction (Zheng et al., 2009). Comparison of the two papers revealed close similarities in parts of the text and in some of the Figures, including different labelling of some parts of Figures. The Reproduction paper was submitted on 11 November 2008 and published online on 04 March 2009. There is no reference to the article by Zheng et al. in the animal paper.
Based on the results of our investigations and the duplication of text and Figures, we have decided to retract the article.
The study has been cited four times, according to Thomson Scientific’s Web of Knowledge.
Shouldn’t both papers be retracted? From the dates, it looks as if they could have been submitted simultaneously. I’m just saying.
Pigs will fly when that happens 🙂
Well, you know, I was at a Pink Floyd concert once, and I saw a flying pig…heehee