Notoginsenoside R1 protects human renal proximal tubular epithelial cells from lipopolysaccharide-stimulated inflammatory damage by up-regulation of miR-26a
Authors: Jinrong Liu
Xiaoyuan Chen
Cun Hou
Lin Wu
Xinyue Wang
Journal: Chemico-biological interactions (2019)
Discipline: PHARMACOLOGY & TOXICOLOGY
Keywords: Chronic kidney disease; Lipopolysaccharide; MicroRNA-26a; NF-κB pathway; Notoginsenoside R1
Affiliations: Department of Nephrology, Jining No.1 People's Hospital, Jining, 272011, China., Department of Pharmacy, Dongying People's Hospital, Dongying, 257091, China., Department of Trauma and Orthopaedic Surgery, Shengli Oilfield Central Hospital, Dongying, 257034, China., Department of Nephrology, Dongying People's Hospital, Dongying, 257091, China. Electronic address: .

Abstract:  This article has been retracted: please see Elsevier Policy on Article Withdrawal (https://www.elsevier.com/about/our-business/policies/article-withdrawal). This article has been retracted at the request of the Editor-in-Chief. There were serious questions about the validity of the data contained in these articles: "... the Western blot bands in ... papers are all very regularly spaced and have a smooth appearance in the shape of a dumbbell or tadpole, without any of the usual smudges or stains. All bands are placed on similar looking backgrounds, suggesting they were copy/pasted from other sources, or computer generated". Based on the latter findings, the Editor-in-Chief requested the authors to provide the raw data. However, the authors were not willing and/or able to fulfil this request and therefore the Editor-in-Chief decided to retract the article. As a consequence the writing in this article misled and deceived reviewers and readers of the journal and thus as a whole represents a gross misuse of the scientific publishing system. The scientific community takes a very strong view on this matter and apologies are offered to readers of the journal that this was not detected during the submission process. 

Retracted: Yes

PubPeer comments:
 This paper belongs to a set of over 400 papers (as per February 2020) that share very similar Western blots with tadpole-like shaped bands, the same background pattern, and striking similarities in title structures, paper layout, bar graph design, and - in a subset - flow cytometry panels. Despite these similarities, these papers are authored by researchers from different departments and institutes, with almost no overlap in authors. The list of these papers is available here: https: docs.google.com spreadsheets d 1KXqTAyl4j-jVorFPMD2XRpr76LcIKJ0CVyIvRj0exYQ edit?usp=sharing A more detailed description of this set of papers, suspected to all be generated by a common source, a paper mill , can be found here: * https: forbetterscience.com 2020 01 24 the-full-service-paper-mill-and-its-chinese-customers (January 2020) * https: scienceintegritydigest.com 2020 02 21 the-tadpole-paper-mill (February 2020) The same paper mill has been described in these papers: * Jana Christopher - Systematic fabrication of scientific images revealed - FEBS Letters (2018) - https: febs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com doi full 10.1002 1873-3468.13201 * Jennifer A Byrne and Jana Christopher - Digital magic, or the dark arts of the 21st centuryu2014how can journals and peer reviewers detect manuscripts and publications from paper mills? - FEBS Letters (2020) - https: febs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com doi full 10.1002 1873-3468.13747 , 
 Retracted [25 April 2022] . --------------------------- This article has been retracted at the request of the Editor-in-Chief. There were serious questions about the validity of the data contained in these articles:  ... the Western blot bands in ... papers are all very regularly spaced and have a smooth appearance in the shape of a dumbbell or tadpole, without any of the usual smudges or stains. All bands are placed on similar looking backgrounds, suggesting they were copy pasted from other sources, or computer generated . Based on the latter findings, the Editor-in-Chief requested the authors to provide the raw data. However, the authors were not willing and or able to fulfil this request and therefore the Editor-in-Chief decided to retract the article. As a consequence the writing in this article misled and deceived reviewers and readers of the journal and thus as a whole represents a gross misuse of the scientific publishing system. The scientific community takes a very strong view on this matter and apologies are offered to readers of the journal that this was not detected during the submission process. ,