Authors of a landmark Alzheimer’s disease research paper published in Nature in 2006 have agreed to retract the study in response to allegations of image manipulation. University of Minnesota (UMN) Twin Cities neuroscientist Karen Ashe, the paper’s senior author, acknowledged in a post on the journal discussion site PubPeer that the paper contains doctored images. The study has been cited nearly 2500 times, and would be the most cited paper ever to be retracted, according to Retraction Watch data.
The 2006 paper suggested an amyloid beta (Aβ) protein called Aβ*56 could cause Alzheimer’s. Aβ proteins have long been linked to the disease. The authors reported that Aβ*56 was present in mice genetically engineered to develop an Alzheimer’s-like condition, and that it built up in step with their cognitive decline. The team also reported memory deficits in rats injected with Aβ*56.
For years researchers had tried to improve Alzheimer’s outcomes by stripping amyloid proteins from the brain, but the experimental drugs all failed. Aβ*56 seemed to offer a more specific and promising therapeutic target, and many embraced the finding. Funding for related work rose sharply.
But the Science investigation revealed evidence that the Nature paper and numerous others co-authored by Lesné, some listing Ashe as senior author, appeared to use manipulated data. Lesné, who did not reply to requests for comment, remains a UMN professor and receives National Institutes of Health funding. The university has been investigating his work since June 2022.
Ashe’s most recent PubPeer post maintains that “the manipulations did not change the conclusions of the experiments.” In a recent paper in iScience, she and colleagues claim to confirm the findings of the 2006 paper. In an email to Science, Ashe said Nature “declined to publish” a requested correction to the 2006 paper, making retraction “the only other option available to us.”
Other journals that published suspect papers by Lesné have been waiting for UMN to conclude its investigation. John Foley, editor of Science Signaling, which published two of the papers, says UMN recently told him it will soon have more to say about its review.
