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Nobel Prize winner Thomas Südhof: In 2016 he received the Federal Cross of Merit

Photo: Sven Simon / IMAGO

Plagiarism investigators are currently examining several studies by Thomas Südhof and his team. The German-American neuroscientist and 2013 Nobel Prize winner in medicine has now admitted errors, but denies that data was manipulated. Since 2023, the Südhof Lab has had an “integrity initiative” to address the allegations and process them transparently. The researchers write that the “small errors” had no “effect on the conclusions” in the studies.

Last year, Südhof retracted a paper in which he was involved and corrected five others. Now it is said that three other, older works that were created under his direction are incorrect. This was first reported by “The Transmitter,” a magazine that reports on neuroscientific research.

Among other things, it involves images that are said to have been reproduced illegally. Two of the incorrect papers that are currently being debated appeared in the Journal of Neuroscience

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in 2012, the other in 2018. The specialist magazine “Cell” published a third study in 2021. According to Google Scholar, they have been cited between 49 and 208 times by other groups.

Elisabeth Bik, a microbiologist known for image testing, was the first researcher to draw attention to discrepancies. In March, she is said to have asked questions on the PubPeer platform about possible image duplication in the images in the three articles. The online platform is intended to serve as a forum for researchers to review scientific publications. The Südhof Lab team writes that the posts on PubPeer “have been very helpful in identifying problems we missed and correcting mistakes we made.”

Südhof is a professor of molecular and cellular physiology and neurosurgery at Stanford University. “The Transmitter” confronted the researcher with the current allegations. He is said to have replied by email that he had contacted the magazines about the errors. However, the errors do not change the results of the work; they are “completely irrelevant to science.”

For some of his employees, however, the allegations are “devastating,” Südhof is quoted as saying. Some felt personally attacked and quit. In response to a subsequent email from the magazine asking him for evidence to support this claim, he replied: "Unfortunately I cannot do that for privacy reasons."

Both Cell Press and the Journal of Neuroscience declined to comment on the cases, according to The Transmitter.

One study withdrawn so far

According to image detective Bik, the current abnormalities appear to be a matter of oversight rather than intentional misconduct. She analyzed more than 10,000 images in articles and preprints from the Südhof Group using AI tools. The result was several copy-paste errors with images. In an email to The Transmitter, Bik added that the 23 works discussed on PubPeer represent "only a small percentage" of Südhof's more than 600 publications.

"All identified errors would not have been detectable without the artificial intelligence tools and would have escaped our attention," says the Südhof team's website. According to Südhof, the deficiencies have now been corrected.

Meanwhile, discrepancies in the data set of a study that appeared in the “Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences” in 2023 remain unresolved. After the allegations, the Südhof team re-analyzed the raw data itself, found “major irregularities” and then withdrew the work this March.

»We know that as scientists we are often hesitant to admit mistakes. Aware of this reluctance and the fact that we have made mistakes, we have tried to admit mistakes wherever we have made a mistake," writes the Südhof Group. At the same time, she criticizes the online platform's concepts: "Unfortunately, PubPeer is not transparent, censors answers and uses anonymous commenters with constantly changing pseudonyms," it says. Also, many PubPeer commenters maintain commercial websites and may act in their own self-interest when criticizing the work of others.

PubPeer's stated goal is to provide professionals with a forum for reviewing scientific publications. Researchers can post comments on scientific articles on PubPeer in which they identify potential problems such as data manipulation, image manipulation or other irregularities in the published research results.

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