University Times

An internal investigation of work co-authored by Pitt professor Gerald Schatten in collaboration with discredited Korean stem cell researcher Hwang Woo-Suk is expected to conclude next month. Research integrity officer Jerome L. Rosenberg is heading the Pitt investigation.

Earlier this month, an investigation committee at Seoul National University (SNU) concluded that research authored by Hwang’s team and published in the journal Science in 2004 and 2005 was based on fabricated data.

Schatten, director of the Pittsburgh Development Center at Magee-Womens Research Institute, was a senior author of the 2005 work. Schatten broke with Hwang’s team in November in the wake of ethical questions over payments to egg donors and the collection of eggs from junior members of the research team. In December, he asked that the work be retracted, amid concerns about its accuracy.

The journal has clarified that Schatten’s contribution to the article was centered on data analysis and manuscript preparation and did not directly involve research with human subjects.

The 2005 article claimed that 11 human embryonic stem cell lines had been established through somatic cell nuclear transfer. The SNU team concluded, “The research team of Professor Hwang does not possess patient-specific stem cell lines or any scientific bases for claiming having created one.”

The 2004 article, which reported the establishment of the first human embryonic stem cell line from a cloned blastocyst, also was debunked. The committee concluded that article’s claim that the stem cell line perfectly matched its donor was “a clear false report.” In addition, the committee found that photographs presented with the article were from another line, and not from cloned blastocysts.

Science, in its Jan. 12 on-line edition, retracted both articles. In the retraction, Science editor-in-chief Donald Kennedy stated, “Because the final report of the SNU investigation indicated that a significant amount of the data presented in both papers is fabricated, the editors of Science feel that an immediate and unconditional retraction of both papers is needed. ”

Three other Pitt researchers, Sun Jong Kim, Jong Hyuk Park and Eul Soon Park, are listed as co-authors of the retracted 2004 article. Kim and Jong Hyuk Park also are co-authors of the retracted 2005 article.

The retraction noted that all 25 authors of the 2005 paper and some of the 2004 authors had agreed to retract the work.

The SNU panel also investigated Hwang’s claims to have cloned the first dog, the afghan hound Snuppy. Schatten is a co-author of that work, which appeared in Nature in 2005.

The Korean panel concluded, based on DNA testing, that Snuppy is indeed a somatic stem cell clone.

—Kimberly K. Barlow