PITT research integrity panel finds that Dr. Gerald Schatten committed no scientific misconduct

The University of Pittsburgh Research Integrity Panel charged on December 12 to investigate the involvement of Gerald Schatten, Ph.D., with two published articles from Dr. Woo-Suk Hwang's group at Seoul National University (SNU), has completed its work and submitted its report to Arthur S. Levine, M.D., senior vice chancellor for the health sciences and dean, University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine. The panel found that Dr. Schatten did not commit scientific misconduct and was not involved in any falsification of data. As part of its peer review, the panel identified shortcomings in Dr. Schatten's fulfillment of the responsibilities as co-author for one article. The panel also commended Dr. Schatten for his role in promptly alerting the scientific community of his suspicions of improprieties by Dr. Hwang in the conduct of the research as he discovered them.

The panel was asked specifically to determine whether Dr. Schatten committed scientific misconduct as the senior author of the now retracted article from the June 17, 2005 issue of Science by Hwang et. al. entitled, "Patient-Specific Embryonic Stem Cells Derived from Human SCNT Blastocysts," and the August 4, 2005 Nature paper, "Dogs Cloned from Adult Somatic Cells," for which he is listed as a co-author. There were six scientists on the panel who were assisted by the University's Research Integrity Officer, Jerome Rosenberg, Ph.D.

Dr. Levine has accepted the findings of the panel. As recommended by the panel, further corrective action, if any, will be at the discretion of the dean, and, like all other such personnel matters, is confidential. Dr. Schatten remains as a tenured professor at the University of Pittsburgh and an active researcher.

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Linked is the public summary of the panel's report. The document stands on its own. Therefore, no University of Pittsburgh official nor any panel member will be granting press interviews regarding this matter.

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