Senior RIKEN Scientist Involved In Stem Cell Scandal Commits Suicide 127
sciencehabit (1205606) writes "Yoshiki Sasai, a noted stem cell scientist at the RIKEN Center for Developmental Biology (CDB) in Kobe, Japan, who co-authored two controversial and later retracted papers that reported a simple way of reprogramming mature cells, was confirmed dead this morning, an apparent suicide. Local media reported he was found hanging from a stairway railing in the RIKEN complex in Kobe. Sasai was rushed to a nearby hospital but efforts to revive him were unsuccessful. He reportedly left a suicide note, but it has not been made public."
It wasn't his fault (Score:5, Interesting)
The article makes it seem like the retracted Nature articles were why he committed suicide (or a major contributor to it).. but they weren't really his fault. Haruko Obokata was the lead researcher on those, and also the person responsible for fabricating the research results. Sure, his name was on it as a co-author, but that sounds more like the result of office politics than actually believing what she was publishing. Even his employer seemed like they held him in high regard after the scandal broke.
Sucks to see a man driven to suicide by something he didn't do.
Re:It wasn't his fault (Score:5, Interesting)
They haven't released the note, that makes assessing the motivations impractical.
Re:Case closed (Score:2, Interesting)
Oh, please. Maas Biolabs would never conduct such a sloppy wetworks. Their general operating policy is abduction and indoctrination of the talent. In extremely rare cases, termination followed by cryonic preservation of the cortex prior to neural "biosoft" imprinting is acceptable as well, but don't expect any surviving witnesses in either case. Often, they use localized airburst toxins or a satellite projectile to zero out the target area. If the situation permits, venting of a military hallucinogenic/sedative can also neutralize the crowd. Either way, it would be indistinguishable from a random act of civil unrest such as those of the notorious Panther Moderns.
Re:Case closed (Score:5, Interesting)
There was an article in the New Yorker last year - I wish I could find it - that talked about the enormous about of pressure being put on academic journals that affect big industries. It described cases where Monsanto and another big corporation set out to destroy an otherwise well-respected scientist who discovered a high health risk from one of their products.
The part of the story I found most surprising was not the online stalking, the financial pressure put on the academic departments that these researchers work, or the out-and-out physical threats (pets poisoned after phone threats, etc), but rather that there have been editors of scientific journals who have been pressured to call for retraction of papers that they themselves reviewed positively. The New Yorker writer actually got two of these peer reviewers to admit that they had gotten pressured and one had succumbed to pressure after his fellowship funding was threatened. The company that was trying to cover its ass threatened to pull funding for a new lab at a land grant university if this reviewer didn't call for the paper to be retracted. The guy so much as admitted that the only reason he had called for retraction was the pressure.
When you have billions of dollars on the line, I don't see why anyone would be surprised that there might be people willing to do some very nasty things, up to and including murder. People will kill over a pair of sneakers, I'm pretty sure they'd kill over billions.
I'm a go see if I can find that article.