Bian Q. Onco Targets Ther. 2019;12:11817–11826.
The Editor and Publisher of OncoTargets and Therapy wish to retract the published article. Concerns were raised regarding the alleged duplication of cell colony images in Figure 2C with the same images from other papers. Specifically,
Figure 2C, MDA-MB-468, sh-NC, appears to have been duplicated with the same image from Figure 2D, Si-Tcf3#1, from He et al, 2019 (https://doi.org/10.1042/BSR20180369).
Figure 2C, MDA-MB-468, sh-circPVT1, appears to have been duplicated with the same image from Figure 1C, bFGF (-), from He et al, 2019 (https://doi.org/10.1042/BSR20180369).
Figure 2C, MDA-MB-231, empty vector, appears to have been duplicated with the same image from Figure 1C, bFGF (+), from He et al, 2019 (https://doi.org/10.1042/BSR20180369).
Figure 2C, MDA-MB-231, circPVT1, appears to have been duplicated with the same image from Figure 1D, SGC-7901, 20 Wg (µM), from Hu et al, 2019 (https://doi.org/10.1002/2211-5463.12693).
The author did not respond to our queries and no explanation for the alleged image duplication was provided. The Editor determined the reported study to be unreliable and requested for the article to be retracted. The author was notified of this.
We have been informed in our decision-making by our policy on publishing ethics and integrity and the COPE guidelines on retractions.
The retracted article will remain online to maintain the scholarly record, but it will be digitally watermarked on each page as “Retracted”.