Acid Bath Stem Cells: Fact or Fiction?

      Three months ago, the scientific community was rattled by two papers published in Nature. These papers, with Haruko Obokata listed as first author, claimed that subjecting adult mouse white blood cells to acidic conditions converted them into embryonic stem-like cells. Embryonic stem cells have the ability to produce multiple cell types in an organism, and scientists have attempted to find alternative methods for their isolation since the primary method involves the destruction of fertilized embryos. Thus, the publication of these papers excited researchers with the prospect of a relatively easy protocol for creating stem-like cells.

       Unfortunately, the inability of researchers to reproduce Obokata's experiments have raised questions about the validity of her results. Several figures in the papers appeared to be modified or mislabeled, sparking an investigation for scientific misconduct by the RIKEN Center for Developmental Biology. Yesterday, the committee ruled that Obokata was indeed guilty of scientific misconduct due to several inconsistencies in her 2011 paper as well as those found in her most recent publications.

       This situation is a cautionary tale to those that fail to scrutinize sensationalist scientific reports. The results from Obokata's papers seemed reasonable upon second glance, but the idea that adult cells can be converted into stem-like cells with pH stress was outlandish. Editors of scientific journals, in the quest to publish the most novel and insightful papers, can get carried away with a provocative study that may be shown to be fraudulent or non-reproducible in the future. Therefore, the old adage still rings true: "If it seems too good to be true, it probably is."

Mouse embryo supposedly created by Obokata's stress-induced cells, which expressed green fluorescent protein (GFP).
Credit: Nature News http://www.nature.com/news/acid-bath-stem-cell-study-under-investigation-1.14738