Fraudulent research at Harvard and Brighaman Women's hospital

Journals stamp expressions of concern on 15 papers from Anversa’s cardiac stem cell lab

Piero Anversa

More than four and a half years after questions were first raised about work in a cardiac stem cell lab at Harvard and the Brigham and Women’s Hospital, a year and a half after the Brigham and Partners Healthcare paid $10 millionto settle allegations of fraud in the lab’s data, a month after Harvard the Brigham disclosed that they were calling for the retractions of more than 30 papers from the lab, and three weeks after the NIH paused a clinical trial based on the work, two leading journals have issued an expression of concern about 15 papers from the lab.

But expressions of concern are not retractions, of course. From the notice, in Circulation and Circulation Research, both of which are published by the American Heart Association:

We are communicating with the authors of these publications as well as Harvard Medical School. We are publishing this Expression of Concern while we await the outcome of these communications and to indicate that the data in the listed publications may not be reliable.

It’s not clear if the 15 papers are among the 31 Harvard and the Brigham called to be retracted. The institutions have so far declined to provide that list. But it seems likely, from the notice:

Harvard Medical School and Brigham and Women’s Hospital (BWH) have notified the American Heart Association that they have completed a review into concerns about the integrity of certain data generated in a former laboratory at BWH. The review concluded that there were issues with data reported…

Four of the 15 papers, which appeared between 2008 and 2014, have been cited more than 100 times, according to Clarivate Analytics’ Web of Science.

Circulation has retracted a paper by Anversa before.

Hat tip: Stéphane Burtey

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