Scientist Cited for ‘Misbehavior’
A U.S. scientist collaborating on now-discredited South Korean cloning and stem cell research accepted questionable payments for his work on the project and engaged in “scientific misbehavior,” according to a University of Pittsburgh review panel’s report.
Gerald P. Schatten, a reproductive and developmental scientist at the university’s Magee-Womens Research Institute, collected $40,000 in honoraria from Hwang Woo Suk, the disgraced South Korean scientist accused of fabricating cloning experiments.
The payments included a $10,000 cash gift in 2005, when Schatten attended Hwang’s international news conference to announce breakthrough results of their research.
Schatten also was cited for soliciting a $200,000 annual grant for the Pittsburgh research lab from Hwang. A university official said the funds never materialized.
The six-member review panel stopped short of citing Schatten for “scientific misconduct,” a more serious finding, and recommended the university take corrective or disciplinary action. However, no specific sanction was disclosed.
The discredited cloning study listed Hwang and Schatten as coauthors and contacts when it was submitted to the journal Science. It was published in May 2005 and was retracted last month.
Hwang also published a cloning paper in Science in 2004 that was retracted before he began his partnership with Schatten.
According to the review panel report, released Friday, Schatten ignored warning signs that the research was being fabricated. He also gave the committee conflicting testimony about his role in the cloning project, the panel said.
His explanations, the panel said, “cannot be used as an excuse for his lack of oversight and critical judgment.”
Schatten did not respond to a request for comment.
The panel reported that although Schatten signed a letter certifying that all 25 authors of the study had reviewed and approved it in advance, many had not.
“Dr. Schatten must assume responsibility for including this false statement,” the report said.
In the May article, the two scientists described a method to clone human embryos using DNA from sick and injured patients, to produce embryonic stem cells that were perfect genetic matches. Scientists believe such a development could lead to revolutionary advancements in treatment and prevention of human ailments.
Schatten, the panel stated, “obviously had high expectations of the impact the paper would have.... He was not averse to accepting honoraria totaling $40,000 within a 15-month period from Dr. Hwang
The panel noted that Schatten joined with some of his colleagues to recommend Hwang for a Nobel Prize.
Records reviewed by The Times also show that Schatten failed to obtain federally required approval for the study from an institutional review board until after the study was published in the magazine.
The records also showed that Schatten and Hwang filed competing patent applications for developing similar cloning processes, each without crediting the other.
Schatten filed two applications, one with the U.S. Patent Office and the other with the World Patent Organization. Hwang filed a single application with the international organization, several months after Schatten’s application was filed in the same office.
Disclosure of Schatten’s patent applications has provoked controversy in Seoul, where officials accused the American scientist of trying to steal Hwang’s now-discredited discovery.
Before their falling-out, Schatten expressed loyalty to the South Korean scientist. In a Public Broadcasting System interview televised last year, the American referred to Hwang and said: “I am the sherpa; I am the luggage carrier for you; and the work that you do in Korea doesn’t occur anywhere else in the world.”
Schatten publicly broke off his partnership with Hwang in November, after he said he learned of ethical problems with the way the South Koreans procured eggs for their research.
The University of Pittsburgh’s inquiry comes after a separate report from Seoul National University, which concluded that Hwang and his colleagues falsified data and reported on cell lines that were nonexistent.
Earlier this week, Hwang was suspended from his university position. He remains the subject of a criminal investigation in South Korea.
The journal Science, meanwhile, is conducting its own probe, including such issues as what disclosures Hwang and Schatten made about institutional review board approval and their patent applications. A spokesman said the journal would have no further comment on those issues until the internal review was complete.
In addition to recommending that appropriate administrative action be taken against Schatten, the Pittsburgh panel urged the university to tighten its oversight and set specific standards and responsibilities for university researchers acting as senior or corresponding authors of scientific studies.
Stating that although such responsibilities might seem routine, “this investigation has discovered how easily this responsibility can be disregarded, and the sad and unfortunate consequences that can result.”
