Top Watch 2(2):97-98, 2007	OPEN LETTER
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© Truthfinding Cyberpress	BIAS AND DIVISION IN SCINECE

Western ‘Radars’ Should Detect Chinese ‘Airplanes’

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Shi V. Liu

Eagle Institute of Molecular Medicine

Apex, NC 27502 USA

SVL@logibio.com

(Received 2007-12-06; accepted 2007-12-10; published 2007-12-10*)

HIGHLIGHT

A method for identifying/amplifying pre-exiting adult stem cells has been characterized as a method for inducing/generating embryonic-like stem cells. The so-called “induced pluripotent stem (iPS) cells” were even equated with Wright brothers’ first airplanes. While these safe therapy-unproven stem cell ‘airplanes’ are shown up everywhere in the western publishing ‘radars’ some therapy-led discoveries of regenerative stem cell “airplanes” made in China are still undetected or, even worse, detected but intentionally ignored by the western ‘radars’.

ABSTRACT

It has often been said that science has no geographic boundary. However, the publishing world of science apparently has an eastern-western division. The modern time scientific and technology-advanced western countries including those geographically eastern but ideologically western countries have now dominated the scientific publishing industry and even developed an unhealthy attitude of looking down or even totally ignoring eastern discoveries and publications. The recent heavy spin of the Japanese and American-made stem cell ‘airplanes’ and the total neglect of the Chinese discovered regenerative stem cell ‘airplanes’ by the western publishing ‘radars’ represents a typical bias of western research community against truly eastern Chinese discoveries.

KEY WORDS

Stem cell, iPS, Induction, Cloning, Reprogramming, Regeneration, Airplane, Radar, Western, Eastern, Chinese, Rong-Xiang Xu, Pioneer, Discovery, Ignorance, Bias, Division, Publishing misconduct

SIR – While I was busy with revealing some fundamental problems in the much highlighted western iPS cell ‘airplanes’ I suddenly found some regenerative stem cell ‘airplanes’ already made and used for therapeutic purpose in China.

I first realized the existence of these Chinese therapeutic stem cell ‘airplanes’ when the inventor of these airplanes, physician Rong-Xiang Xu, was criticized for ‘cheating’ by a person dedicated to exposing scientific cheating in China. However, instead of finding ‘evidence’ for the alleged ‘cheating’, I actually collected massive convincible observations that led me to believe that Dr. Xu indeed found some therapeutic stem cells and even used them effectively for regenerative medicine.

Thus, I felt being deceived by the biased western ‘radars’ – the so-called ‘top’ scientific journals in the world because their lack of any report on Dr. Xu’s discoveries. This limitation may not be explained by a language barrier because Dr. Xu’s studies were also published in English besides Chinese. The bias of western journals against Chinese discoveries cannot be explained by their ‘higher’ scientific standard, either because Dr. Xu’s inventions were even granted with patents in US and Japan. This fact, in my view, means the passing of scientific reviews more rigorous and systematic than journals’ ad hoc peer review which fails very often in preventing frauds from being highlighted as ‘landmarks’ or ‘milestones’.

It is understandable that some western journals may have reservations to accept Dr. Xu’s discoveries simply because they would like to see more “scientific” proof or a ‘complete’ story filled with ‘mechanisms’. However, these ‘top’ journals should also apply the same rigor in accepting the far-fetched ‘induction’ claim made in the discovery of the iPS cells. My sense tells me that, once the ‘induction’ claim for iPS cells is disapproved and the carcinogenic genes introduced into the iPS stem cells are removed, the therapeutic stem cells found later in the western countries would be essentially the same as those earlier found in China.

Objectivity is a corner stone for scientific publishing. Any biased reporting will only limit the spread of useful knowledge to all human beings. Scientists are entitled to challenge the validity of any previous discovery or claim but they should not distort the research history by totally ignoring the prior findings. Dr. Xu’s pioneering status in regenerative medicine can be testified with his earlier practice of in situ activation of stem cells for various therapeutic treatments. The deficiency of western “radars” in detecting eastern discoveries must be fixed so that discoveries made at even ‘remote’ corners can become a global asset.

* This publication was submitted to Nature as a Correspondence on December 6, 2007. Nature rejected it on December 10, 2007 citing space limitation as a reason. The publication here is the same as submitted to Nature except for the added highlight, abstract and keywords.

** Nature has become an essentially dedicated ‘radar’ for following almost every move made by the Japanese iPS ‘airplane’. Thus, its’ ‘space limitation’ is apparently limited to only certain area.