WITHDRAWN

Top NYC Cancer Center Probes Surgeon’s ‘Suspicious’ Research, Report Says

Dr. Sam Yoon allegedly reused pictures of tumors, inverting them, coloring them, and giving them different descriptions each time.

A top cancer surgeon at Columbia University's medical center is under scrutiny over his “suspicious” research, according to The New York Times. Dr. Sam S. Yoon was steadily climbing the ladder of academia when a paper he authored from 2021 was quietly withdrawn after it was found to have reused cancer data from his other studies, the report says. In total, 26 of his studies were reportedly flagged for containing suspicious recycled data by molecular biologist Sholto David. David said he found the same images of cancer cells, reused across a set of ten articles, even though each article detailed different experimental conditions. Dr. Yoon is said to have reused pictures of tumors, inverting them, coloring them, and giving them different descriptions each time. Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center, where much of the research was conducted, is now investigating the studies, the Times reports. Columbia was quoted telling the newspaper that it reviews “any concerns about scientific integrity brought to our attention” but did not comment specifically on the allegations against Yoon.