Title : Cloning expert faked stem cell research:
investigators
By :
Date : 23 December 2005 1059 hrs (SST)
URL :
http://www.channelnewsasia.com/stories/afp_asiapacific/view/185058/1/.html
SEOUL : South Korean investigators said on Friday that cloning
expert Hwang Woo-Suk had fabricated some of his apparently landmark
research into stem cells.
"The 2005 paper by Professor Hwang did not contain simple mistakes
but it was intentionally fabricated," a nine-member investigation
committee said.
"It is inevitable for Professor Hwang to be disciplined in light of
the evidences of fabrication that have so far been revealed," it
said in a statement, going public with the results of a week-long
probe.
It said Hwang had manipulated data and photographs of two stem cell
lines to make it appear as if his team had cultivated 11 stem cell
lines as they had claimed in the paper published in Science journal
in May 2005.
The veracity of the two stem cells has yet to be verified pending
the outcome of the ongoing DNA analysis of the cell lines which
were supposed to be "therapeutic" patient-specific cells.
"Professor Hwang admitted to having played a role in extending the
data of the two stem cell lines to those of 11 stem cells," said
Roh Jung-Hye, a key member of the Seoul National University
investigation committee.
Hwang was idolised as a national hero until TV network MBC and
young scientists publicly accused him of fabricating key parts of
his research into the production of patient-specific stem
cells.
The government had showered Hwang with honours and research funds.
Since 2002 the Science and Technology Ministry alone had given him
some US$40 million.
But Hwang's reputation began to crumble domestically when a key
co-author of the paper, Roh Sung-Il, said last week that pictures
accompanying the article and purporting to show 11 patient-specific
stem cell lines had been faked.
Roh said the patient-specific stem cell colonies had never
existed.
At a press conference last week, Hwang withdrew the paper, saying
that there were "mistakes" in the study including the photos.
But he insisted that the fundamental scientific aspects of his
paper were correct and that he had cloned
11 human embryos and cultivated patient-specific stem cell lines
from them. - AFP/de
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