Pitt limiting Schatten probe
A University of Pittsburgh panel will not investigate scientist Gerald Schatten's involvement in a now-discredited paper he helped Korean colleagues publish in 2004, officials said Wednesday.
Pitt is looking into whether Schatten engaged in scientific misconduct in connection with other Korean research, but will not investigate his role in the fraudulent 2004 paper because he wasn't listed as a co-author, Pitt spokeswoman Jane Duffield said yesterday.
"Since the panel is carrying out its investigation in private, I can only surmise on the strength of each member's credentials, coupled with the university's well-defined policies, that they are doing a very thorough job," Duffield wrote in an e-mail in response to questions.
The Tribune-Review reported yesterday that Schatten acted as a liaison between Korean researcher Hwang Woo-Suk and the American scientists reviewing the paper published in Science in March 2004, according to the final report of a Seoul National University panel investigating Hwang.
Schatten helped arrange phone conversations between Hwang and the journal editors before publication, the report said. Schatten declined an offer extended by Hwang to be listed as a co-author of the paper, the report said.
Hwang soared to international fame after claiming in the 2004 paper that he extracted stem cells from a cloned human embryo. In June 2005, he claimed in another Science paper to have developed 11 embryonic stem cell lines tailored to specific patients.
The journal is retracting both papers, which the SNU panel ruled were fraudulent.
Early today, Hwang apologized for wrongdoing at his laboratory, but said he had the technology to prove the claims made in two discredited papers on embryonic stem cell research.
"I take full responsibility for the papers and offer you my apology," Hwang said at a televised news conference.
Hwang had been in seclusion since resigning from Seoul National University on Dec. 23, when the panel said in an interim report that data in the two papers was deliberately fabricated and Hwang bore major responsibility for the fraud.
Hwang said some staff should be investigated because he still believed results may have been manipulated.
Schatten was listed as senior author on the 2005 research, but until the SNU panel's report, he wasn't directly connected with the 2004 paper.
Schatten has yet to speak publicly about his role in the Korean cloning scandal, after severing ties with Hwang in November. The Pitt researcher was not available yesterday for comment, Duffield said.
The six-member Pitt investigatory panel with the university's Office of Research Integrity is expected to issue its public report in February.
The Pitt panel also is reviewing a paper published last year in the journal Nature by Schatten and Hwang that claimed to have created the first cloned dog. Those findings were upheld Tuesday by the SNU panel, although Nature is continuing its own investigation.
