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Prosecutors are investigating whether someone maliciously contaminated stem cell tissue the disgraced cloning scientist Hwang Woo-suk claims he and his team grew from cloned embryos in January 2005. Hwang earlier alleged most of his patient-specific stem cells died of contamination while the remaining two were switched, accounting for the absence of any evidence that such cells ever existed.
A Seoul National University panel investigating Hwang¡¯s research found records that stem cell lines no. 2-7 in what Hwang in a paper that year said were cells matching patient¡¯s DNA were all contaminated in January. This makes it necessary to investigate whether someone deliberately contaminated them, an official with the Seoul Central District Public Prosecutor¡¯s Office said Wednesday.
The SNU panel¡¯s report says the contaminated stem cell lines were transferred to MizMedi Hospital, a fertility clinic and Hwang¡¯s research partner, and ended up being destroyed despite antibiotic treatment. When the panel attempted to cultivate what was labeled as stem cell lines no. 2 and 3 from MizMedi cryogenic storage, they found they were in fact grown from in-vitro fertilized embryos left over at the fertility clinic, not from embryos cloned from patients¡¯ somatic cells. Hwang has alleged that this was because someone switched them.
The prosecution says it will be able to ascertain whether, as Hwang claims, the core technology to grow stem cells from cloned embryos exists, provided their investigation clarifies the entire process by which data for Hwang¡¯s discredited 2005 article on the experiment were fabricated. That would take the probe a step further than the SNU panel, which concluded there was no evidence one way or the other.
Prosecutors summoned 10 people, three from SNU and seven from MizMedi, involved in the scandal on Wednesday, having already questioned some 20 witnesses until Tuesday. They hope to finish questioning altogether 60 junior researchers by the weekend and then start interviewing Hwang¡¯s co-authors next week.
Park Jong-hyuk and Park Eul-soon, two former researchers on Hwang¡¯s team now staying in the U.S., will return home around Lunar New Year¡¯s Day, prosecutors said.
Meanwhile, 10 hardcore supporters of Hwang petitioned the prosecution on Wednesday to start a criminal investigation of SNU scientist Yoo Young-jun, who was an early whistleblower in interview with the broadcaster MBC, and MizMedi chief Roh Sung-il, who also publicly cast aspersions on Hwang¡¯s research.
(englishnews@chosun.com )
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