Category: nature publishing group

Can’t spell Novartis without VART: Drug study retracted for conflict of interest, data issues

JHH(Cover).inddA major scandal in Japan over the Novartis hypertension drug valsartan has resulted in a retraction from the Journal of Human Hypertension. 

Frequent Retraction Watch subject Hiroaki Matsubara resigned his post at Kyoto Prefectural University in 2013, after his work on valsartan was shown to be riddled with data errors and undisclosed conflicts of interest.

Also that year, suspicions about Chiba University hypertension researcher Issei Komuro’s work were first raised by an anonymous blog, which detailed numerous image manipulations in the researcher’s published works. Komuro, who frequently collaborated with Matsubara, has been a senior author on a number of valsartan papers, including the now-retracted one, which reported the results of Novartis-sponsored Valsartan Amlodipine Randomized Trial in 2011 without reporting the Novartis funding.

The paper, which has been cited three times, according to Thomson Scientific’s Web of Knowledge, had already been subject to a correction in 2013:  Continue reading Can’t spell Novartis without VART: Drug study retracted for conflict of interest, data issues

Nature Cell Biology insulin paper retracted over antibody problems

nature cell biologyA Nature Cell Biology article on insulin regulation has been retracted after scientists noted that the antibodies used in their research were not as specific as they had previously believed.

The notice is clear on the problems with the science, which together “call into question the main conclusions of the paper.” Three of the paper’s five authors were employed at Novartis at the time of publication.

Here’s the notice for “Wolfram syndrome 1 and adenylyl cyclase 8 interact at the plasma membrane to regulate insulin production and secretion”: Continue reading Nature Cell Biology insulin paper retracted over antibody problems

Shigeaki Kato up to 33 retractions, with five papers cited a total of 450 times

Shigeaki Kato
Shigeaki Kato

Former University of Tokyo researcher Shigeaki Kato continues to put big numbers on the board.

Last month, we reported on his 26th, 27th, and 28th retractions, all in Nature Cell Biology and cited close to 700 times. Yesterday, EMBO Journal and EMBO Reports published a total of five more retractions for the endocrinology researcher, who resigned from the university in 2012 following investigations found he had faked images.

Here’s the notice for “A cell cycle-dependent co-repressor mediates photoreceptor cell-specific nuclear receptor function:” Continue reading Shigeaki Kato up to 33 retractions, with five papers cited a total of 450 times

Nature issues Expression of Concern for paper by author who threatened to sue Retraction Watch

Ariel Fernandez, via Wikipedia
Ariel Fernandez, via Wikipedia

Nature has issued an Expression of Concern for a paper co-authored by a scientist who threatened to sue us last year for writing about another Expression of Concern for one of his other papers.

Here’s the “Editorial Expression of Concern” for “Non-adaptive origins of interactome complexity:”

Continue reading Nature issues Expression of Concern for paper by author who threatened to sue Retraction Watch

Updated: Former Vanderbilt scientist faked nearly 70 images, will retract 6 papers: ORI

ori logoA former Vanderbilt University biomedical engineer committed fraud on a massive scale, according to a new Office of Research Integrity (ORI) report.

Igor Dzhura is banned from receiving federal funding for three years, and is retracting six papers, which have been cited more than 500 times. Since leaving Vanderbilt, he has worked at SUNY Upstate Medical University, and now works at Novartis.

According to the ORI, Dzhura was a busy boy at Vanderbilt, faking images and drastically inflating the number of experiments he conducted by duplicating computer files and saving them in nested folders. The total body count from his work includes: Continue reading Updated: Former Vanderbilt scientist faked nearly 70 images, will retract 6 papers: ORI

Kidney journal to retract stem cell paper for duplicated and doctored images

kidney intKidney International is in the process of retracting a stem cell paper containing plagiarized images, Retraction Watch has learned.

Here’s the notice that will appear for “Human renal stem/progenitor cells repair tubular epithelial cell injury through TLR2-driven inhibin-A and microvesicle-shuttled decorin“: Continue reading Kidney journal to retract stem cell paper for duplicated and doctored images

Shigeaki Kato up to 28 retractions, with three papers cited nearly 700 times

Shigeaki Kato
Shigeaki Kato

Former University of Tokyo researcher Shigeaki Kato has notched his 26th, 27th, and 28th retractions, all in Nature Cell Biology. The three papers have been cited a total of 677 times.

Here’s the notice for “DEAD-box RNA helicase subunits of the Drosha complex are required for processing of rRNA and a subset of microRNAs:” Continue reading Shigeaki Kato up to 28 retractions, with three papers cited nearly 700 times

Fudged figures sink breast cancer paper

oncogeneA prestigious cancer journal has pulled an article over “concerns” regarding some of the figures, which PubPeer commenters had tagged as suspect.

A few weeks after the paper was published on June 9, comments on PubPeer began accumulating. Commenters called out both potentially manipulated and repeated images. The exact timeline is not clear, because Oncogene does not list a date on the retraction notice, but by August 29 the paper had been retracted.

Here’s the notice for “IL-6 secreted by cancer-associated fibroblasts induces tamoxifen resistance in luminal breast cancer,” by researchers at Shanghai Jiaotong University School of Medicine and Ruijin Hospital, both in Shanghai, China, and the University of Michigan: Continue reading Fudged figures sink breast cancer paper

First author blamed for retraction in prestigious medical journal

jemcoverThe authors of a Journal of Experimental Medicine have retracted it, blaming the first author for data and figure manipulation.

The paper, “The requirements for natural Th17 cell development are distinct from those of conventional Th17 cells,” was initially published in September 2011 and has been cited 25 times, according to Thomson Scientific’s Web of Knowledge. First author Jiyeon Kim was an MD-PhD candidate at the University of Pennsylvania until this year, according to a LinkedIn profile.

Here’s the notice: Continue reading First author blamed for retraction in prestigious medical journal

Another Nature stem cell paper is retracted

nature 73014Another stem cell paper has been retracted from Nature, this one a highly cited 2008 study that had already been the subject of what the journal’s news section called a “furore” in 2010.

According to that 2010 news story:

The researchers behind the original work1, led by Thomas Skutella of the University of Tübingen, reported using cells from adult human testes to create pluripotent stem cells with similar properties to embryonic stem cells.

But a 2010 Brief Communication Arising called those findings into question. And now, the authors have retracted the paper. Here’s the notice for “Generation of pluripotent stem cells from adult human testis:” Continue reading Another Nature stem cell paper is retracted