Today has been a dark day of mourning for science following the death by suicide of Dr. Yoshiki Sasai. I did not know Dr. Sasai personally, but was very impressed with his work. His suicide leaves me feeling very sad and it seems like an appropriate time for reflection. (update I did a post on suicides by […]
Reflecting on Sasai tragedy, STAP, & flawed field of science Read More »
I’ve always got stem cells on the brain. What’s on your mind about stem cells? There’s a ton going on so what specifically has got your attention? What are you thinking about? What has you excited? Depressed? Angry? Hopeful? Headlines from the last few weeks: Nuclear transfer ES cells compared to iPS cells Trounson moves
TGIF stem cells on the brain: what’s on your mind? Read More »
I have been corresponding now and then with Dr. Teru Wakayama about the ongoing STAP situation. He asked me to pass along the following message from him for clarification on the STAP Nature paper retraction and the origin of the STAP stem cells (STAP-SC). I would like to take this opportunity to explain the reason for
New Message from Wakayama on STAP retraction & origin of STAP-SC Read More »
The Obokata STAP cell papers in Nature were retracted today. It feels like it’s been a long time coming in one way as for months now it has felt like retraction was inevitable, but it’s been extraordinarily fast in another way as retractions almost never happen this fast. It’s a day of mixed feelings. This
Perspectives on STAP cell Nature paper retractions Read More »
What were people saying about STAP cells at the ISSCR 2014 meeting? It was a tale of two meetings when it came to STAP at ISSCR. Officially, bigwigs at the podiums only briefly mentioned it and they seemed to collectively argue that STAP was something unfortunate, but that the bigger danger was the overreaction to
STAP Cell Chatter From ISSCR Meeting Read More »
Now that it appears that the authors have all consented to eventually have both of their STAP cell Nature papers retracted, what’s next for STAP? Who knows, but below is my attempt at a top 10 list of STAP predictions looking ahead. I hope I’m wrong about several of them. 10. No insight will come
STAP cell predictions Read More »
Japanese news media are reporting that Haruko Obokata and other key authors have agreed to retract the Nature STAP cell letter, but not the Nature article. This is a major development and a peculiar one because to many in the field it is the Nature STAP cell article that is the more flawed of the two Nature papers on STAP. Why would
Obokata OKs Retraction of Nature STAP Cell Letter, Not Article Read More »
Two stem cell papers riddled with errors, with figures that resulted from potential misconduct, with plagiarism, and with other serious problems remain uncorrected and unretracted in the prestigious journal Nature. It is well past time for the journal to editorially retract them. It was about four months ago that Nature published the two astonishing STAP papers reporting the
Past Time for Nature to Retract STAP Cell Pubs, Open up on Review Problems Read More »
Sometimes a situation is so bad or stressful that it just calls out for some comic relief and the STAP cell mess seems to be one of those. Below are various silly attempts at STAP humor to hopefully release some of that stress. (By the way you might enjoy this 2020 piece on whatever happened to
TGIF! Some attempts at humor to release STAP cell stress Read More »
A RIKEN committee has rejected an appeal by Dr. Haruko Obokata regarding its finding of research misconduct related to two papers in Nature claiming the production of so-called STAP cells and STAP stem cells. Earlier the committee had ruled that Obokata had allegedly engaged in misconduct and that there problems with the research. Obokata appealed
RIKEN rejects Obokata appeal on alleged STAP cell misconduct Read More »