Haruko Obokata

Haruko Obokata (小保方 晴子, Obokata Haruko, born 1983) is a Japanese former stem-cell biologist and the former Research Unit Leader of the Laboratory for Cellular Reprogramming at RIKEN Center for Developmental Biology.^[3][4] She claimed she had developed a radical and remarkably easy way to make cells, called Stimulus-Triggered Acquisition of Pluripotency (STAP) cells, that can grow into any tissue in the body.^[5] However, the Riken research institute started an investigation into claims of irregularities in images of her several articles including the paper associated with the discovery of STAP cells^[6] in response to the allegations made on blogs and social networking sites.^[7][8] The "STAP cells scandal" has become one of the most well-known potential frauds in science, alongside the Schön scandal and Hwang Woo-suk's cloning experiments.^{[9][10][11][12][13]}

Early life and education

Obokata was born in Matsudo, Chiba, Japan, in 1983. She attended Toho Senior High School, which is attached to Toho University, and graduated from Waseda University. At Waseda University, Obokata undertook undergraduate studies in the Department of Applied Chemistry, within the School of Science and Engineering, earning a Bachelor of Science in 2006, and graduate studies in the Graduate School of Advanced Science and Engineering, earning a Master of Science in Applied Chemistry in 2008.

After completing her master's, Obokata went on to study stem cells and regenerative medicine at the Institute of Advanced Biomedical Engineering and Science, a cooperative research and education facility operated with Tokyo Women's Medical University. She then undertook research at Harvard Medical School in Boston under Charles Vacanti for two years before returning to Waseda University to complete her Ph.D. in Engineering, again, from the Graduate School of Advanced Engineering and Science in 2011.^[14][15] According to a recent Asahi Shimbun news report, Obokata had offered to retract her doctoral dissertation following allegations that she may have copied and pasted some segments of her dissertation from publicly available documents posted in the U.S. National Institute of Health website.^[16]

Career

Obokata became a guest researcher at the Riken Center for Developmental Biology in 2011, then she was appointed as head of the Lab for Cellular Reprogramming in 2013.^[17][18]

Controversy

Within a few weeks of publication, questions were raised about the publication ethics of Obokata’s papers published in Nature. Professor Teruhiko Wakayama, a senior author of the Nature articles, proposed retracting the papers and re-submitting them if the findings could be reproduced. The Japanese government affiliated research institute RIKEN also launched an investigation into the issue. Stem cell critics also noted that the images in the published articles are very similar to those published in Obokata's doctoral thesis, which were from a quite different project than the Nature publications.^[19] On April 1, RIKEN announced that it had found Obokata guilty of scientific misconduct on two of the six charges initially brought against her.^[20] The RIKEN investigators reached the following conclusion:

In manipulating the image data of two different gels and using data from two different experiments, Dr. Obokata acted in a manner that can by no means be permitted. This cannot be explained solely by her immaturity as a researcher. Given the poor quality of her laboratory notes it has become clearly evident that it will be extremely difficult for anyone else to accurately trace or understand her experiments, and this, too, is considered a serious obstacle to healthy information exchange. Dr. Obokata’s actions and sloppy data management lead us to the conclusion that she sorely lacks, not only a sense of research ethics, but also integrity and humility as a scientific researcher.^[21]

On June 4, 2014, Obokata agreed to retract both the papers published in Nature in early 2014.^[22] Nature confirmed the retraction on July 2.^[23][24]

On August 5, 2014, Obokata's mentor and co-author Yoshiki Sasai committed suicide.^[25]

In July 2014, Obokata was allowed to join Riken’s efforts under monitoring by a third party. She tried to replicate her own study using genetically manipulated mouse spleen cells that glow green if a gene indicative of pluripotency is activated. She failed to reproduce the ‘STAP cell’ to back up her claimed discovery.^[26]

Obokata announced her resignation in December 2014.^[27][28]

Selected works

• Obokata, Haruko; Wakayama, Teruhiko; Sasai, Yoshiki et al. (2014). "Stimulus-triggered fate conversion of somatic cells into pluripotency". Nature 505 (7485): 641–647. doi:10.1038/nature12968. PMID 24476887.  CS1 maint: Explicit use of et al. (link)
• Obokata, Haruko; Sasai, Yoshiki; Niwa, Hitoshi; Vacanti, Charles; Andrabi, Munazah; Takata, Nozomu; Tokoro, Mikiko; Terashita, Yukari; Yonemura, Shigenobu; Vacanti, Charles A.; Wakayama, Teruhiko (January 30, 2014). "Bidirectional developmental potential in reprogrammed cells with acquired pluripotency". Nature (Nature) 505 (7485): 676–680. Bibcode:2014Natur.505..676O. doi:10.1038/nature12969. PMID 24476891. 

See also

• Academic dishonesty
• Scientific misconduct

References

External links

• Harvard Catalyst profile (Archived April 26, 2014 at the Wayback Machine)
• Center for Developmental Biology at RIKEN
• Laboratory for Cellular Reprogramming at RIKEN
• About concerns on Haruko Obokata's papers
• 小保方晴子が筆頭著者の論文の不適切さについて (Japanese)