Riken announced Friday that it will halt any further attempts to replicate the supposedly ground-breaking stem cell production method one of its researchers claimed to have discovered earlier this year.
The technique, dubbed stimulus-triggered acquisition of pluripotency (STAP), garnered international attention after two research papers on the subject were published in the prestigious journal Nature last January before being retracted months later.
Riken also said Friday it had accepted a resignation letter dated Dec. 21 from Haruko Obokata, the discredited 31-year-old scientist who was the lead author of the papers.