Korean team admits 'fabrications' in clone study

Key parts of a landmark paper from South Korea's most renowned stem-cell scientist were fabricated and the researcher is seeking to have the work withdrawn, a close collaborator said yesterday.

The announcement brings to a head the growing controversy over the groundbreaking work of Hwang Woo-suk, whose team at Seoul National University published the first scientific paper on the cloning of a human embryo in 2004 and the first dog earlier this year.

A US cloning and stem-cell expert who had lent his name and prestige to Prof. Hwang's work, Dr Gerald Schatten of the University of Pittsburgh Medical Centre, earlier this week alleged there may have been fabrications and asked to have his name taken off a study he co-authored with Prof. Hwang.

Yesterday, Roh Sung-il, a hospital administrator and specialist in fertility studies who worked directly with Prof. Hwang, said his colleague had admitted there were fabrications in a second study involving tailor-made human stem cells published in May of this year.

"Professor Hwang admitted to fabrication," Mr Roh said on South Korea's MBC television.

Mr Roh told media nine of the 11 stem-cell lines that were part of the tailored stem study paper were fabricated and the authenticity of the other two was questionable.

According to recent reports in South Korean media, some of the photographic images of the stem-cell lines may have been manipulated to make it appear as if there were 11 separate lines, or batches. Prof. Hwang had recently asked Science to correct some of the images used in his study.

Repeated attempts to reach Prof. Hwang and his other team members failed. Science has said it has heard nothing from Prof. Hwang.

"Science editors have asked Mr Hwang and his co-authors for clarification regarding unconfirmed news reports about requests for retraction," the journal said in a statement.

Members of Prof. Hwang's team plan to hold a news conference this morning, a team member said, adding he was not sure if Prof. Hwang would attend.

Another television network, KBS, quoted Mr Roh as saying: "I agreed with Hwang to ask for it (the paper) to be withdrawn."

In the disputed study, Prof. Hwang's team reported that they had used a cloning method called somatic cell nuclear transfer to create batches, or lines, of genetically identical stem cells from nine different patients, most with a rare neurological disease.

The study appeared to fulfil one promise of embryonic stem-cell research - the ability to tailor medicine to individual patients, and to study a patient's real disease in the laboratory.