Stem cell researchers at the University of Minnesota are once again under investigation for falsifying data. Earlier this year, New Scientist identified at least two potentially manipulated or duplicated images in a American Journal of Physiology paper coauthored by Jizhen Lin a researcher in the Department of Otolaryngology in the university's medical school. The paper reported that stem cells from the inner ears of mice could be differentiated to create neurons and sensory hair cells.
Based on their own investigation, New Scientist identified one photograph of a gel that appeared to have duplicated bands spliced into the image, and two other images that seemed identical, though they were meant to represent results for two different genes. Further exploration uncovered possibly duplicated images in six additional papers published by Lin between 2001 and 2007.
In April, New Scientist alerted the university to their findings, and an investigation was launched last month. ...
