Chinese biologist retracts paper from Nature Biotechnology

Han Chunyu, a Chinese biologist and associate professor of Hebei University of Science and Technology in north China, has retracted his controversial paper, NgAgo-gDNA, from Nature Biotechnology, according to a statement released by the journal.

"Now, more than a year after the publication of the original report, we have learned that the independent groups that reported initial success in reproducing the results have not been able to bolster their preliminary data to a publishable level," the statement said.

Han’s paper was published in Nature Biotechnology in May 2016. The paper described a gene-editing technique, known as NgAgo, which initial data suggested might work better than its widely used counterpart, CRISPR/Cas9.

(CGTN)