Retraction of ‘RNA-binding protein RPS3 contributes to hepatocarcinogenesis by post-transcriptionally up-regulating SIRT1’

Nucleic Acids Research, Volume 47, Issue 4, 28 February 2019, Pages 2011–2028, https://doi.org/10.1093/nar/gky1209

In April 2021, the Editors were alerted by a reader to several instances of image duplication in (1). Further detailed editorial examination uncovered several additional examples including some images that had been inverted:

1. Panels PLKO.1 in Figure 3E, PCDNA3.1 in Figure 6E, PCDNA3.1 in Supplementary Figure 2C and PLKO.1 in Supplementary Figure 8E are identical.

2. Panels sh-RPS3 in Figure 3E and sh-SIRT1 in Supplementary Figure 8E are identical.

3. Panels SIRT1 in Fig. 6E and RPS3 in Supplementary Figure 2C are identical.

4. Panels PLKO.1 48h in Supplementary Figure 3I, PCDNA3.1 48h in Supplementary Figure 3L and PCDNA3.1 48h in Supplementary Figure 7G are identical.

5. Panels PCDNA3.1 0h and RPS3 0h in Supplementary Figure 3L are identical.

6. Panels PLKO.1 72h in Supplementary Figure 3I and PCDNA3.1 72h in Supplementary Figure 3L are identical.

7. Panels RP3S 0h and RPS3+sh-SIRT1 0h in Supplementary Figure 7G are identical.

There may be additional duplications beyond the ones reported here. Collectively these duplications mean that the findings are unreliable. The Editors are therefore retracting the article from Nucleic Acids Research. According to COPE guidelines, the matter has been escalated to the institution for internal investigation.