A popular drug that was meant to show promise for those suffering from Alzheimer’s disease has now been marred in controversy after an investigation by the City University of New York claimed the lead researcher on the project has potentially falsified data.
Science is reporting that Hoau-Yan Wang, a CUNY faculty member and a neuroscientist, has allegedly engaged in scientific misconduct across the course of 20 scientific papers according to the investigation.
The committee’s allegations claimed Wang’s images may have been “manipulated”.
The committee asked Wang to turn over raw files of his images, but the panel claimed he did not do so, meaning it could not prove its claims the images were altered.
However, the committee claimed its findings were based on “long-standing and egregious misconduct in data management and record keeping,” according to the outlet.
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The drug in question is simufilam, and it’s being manufactured by a company called Cassava.
Simulafam allegedly works with the protein called filamin-A – and when the protein “misfolds” it triggers Alzheimer’s disease.
However, because Wang did not provide proof that he hadn’t altered the images in the report — the effectiveness of the drug is in dispute.
As a result of the ongoing investigation, Wang’s papers in the Journal of Neuroscience have been reprinted with a proviso that there is an ongoing investigation.
Other scientific journals, such as the Plos One, have retracted Wang’s papers altogether.
“[We] discovered evidence of research misconduct in his response to the concerns raised,” stated Plos One, per the outlet.
