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 »
As the STAP cell fiasco has evolved, there has been discussion of various possible resolutions or even penalties for those involved, both institutions like RIKEN and individuals. One of the most extreme and I believe way out of proportion potential outcomes suggested has been the dismantling of RIKEN’s entire Center for Developmental Biology (CDB) in
Don’t Penalize All of RIKEN CDB for STAP Cell Flap Read More »
A new patent has been awarded to James Sherley for a very unusual method claimed for making induced pluripotent stem (iPS) cells. The patent, No. 8,759,098, claims that a single non-genetic chemical agent, xanthine, can by itself reprogram adult stem cells (ASC) into iPS cells (aka iPSCs; see image they released at left). Surprising patent, huh? Another
Sherley patent for reprogramming method like STAP cells 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 »
What’s the biggest stem cell story of the year so far? I did a poll asking just that and the result so far overwhelmingly indicate that respondents believe the STAP cell scandal to be the top stem cell story of 2014 about half way through the year. You can see the results from the 210+
Poll indicates that STAP cells are stem cell story of the year so far 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 »
For more than 3 months I’ve been doing a tracking poll on the sentiments of the readers of this blog about STAP stem cells. The question is “Do you believe in STAP Stem Cells?” The result are summarized in the graph above. The latest poll results from period #9 are somewhat of a surprise. The
Does Europe Know Something About STAP Cells That We Don’t? Latest Poll Results 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 »