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| Stem cell researcher Haruko Obokata--Courtesy of the RIKEN Center |
Following controversy over irreproducible results in a paper that detailed an easy way to create embryonic-like stem cells by shocking adult cells with an acid bath, the Japanese RIKEN Center for Developmental Biology said it is scaling down its stem cell research.
The research institute, located in Kobe, Japan, has been at the center of a scandal involving two studies that appeared earlier this year in the journal Nature. The studies, published in January, unleashed a wave of criticism and allegations of irregularities in the research almost immediately.
Nature and the RIKEN Center launched their own investigations, and in April, a committee assembled by RIKEN reported that it found inconsistencies in the research as well as manipulated or falsified images of DNA fragments used in the studies. The committee found lead researcher Haruko Obokata guilty of research misconduct while clearing the studies' co-authors, which included researchers at Brigham and Women's Hospital in Boston, of the same charge.
The authors retracted the papers on July 2, but Obokata has maintained that the stimulus-triggered acquisition of pluripotency, or STAP, approach outlined in the papers is real. Following the retraction, Yoshiki Sasai, the research center's deputy director and a co-author on the STAP paper, was found dead by apparent suicide in August.
In its latest announcement, the RIKEN Center says it has been unable to reproduce the stem cell method described by Obokata, which involves stressing mature adult cells close to death by exposing them to an acidic environment. But a team of researchers is still investigating and says the findings are only interim results.
Meanwhile, the institute said it will cut its stem cell research unit by half and choose a new director with input from non-Japanese scientists. The new center will relaunch with a new name and new management in November.
Science notes that the reorganization will also "establish a new research compliance office, improve awareness of research ethics, and provide guidance in properly recording and managing research data all to prevent a recurrence of misconduct and to regain the trust of the Japanese public."
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