A neuroscientist whose work paved the way for a drug candidate for Alzheimer’s disease was indicted Thursday by a federal grand jury on fraud charges.
The charges, announced Friday by the Justice Department, bring additional scrutiny to the work of Hoau-Yan Wang, who has had multiple studies dropped and was the subject of an investigation by the City University of New York, his employer, that was later dropped.
The charges in the indictment relate to Wang’s alleged fabrication of research images and data that he may have used to secure federal grants from the National Institutes of Health.
Wang, a medical professor at the City University of New York, worked with Cassava Sciences, a pharmaceutical company based in Austin, Texas, as it investigated an Alzheimer’s drug candidate called simufilam. He received approximately $16 million in grants for early drug development in collaboration with Cassava, the indictment said.
The indictment charges Wang with one count of wire fraud against the United States, two counts of wire fraud and one count of false statements. Wang is accused of manipulating or adding images from Western blots, a laboratory method researchers use to identify proteins, to strengthen evidence and secure grants.
The indictment also alleges that Wang may have lied to scientific journals to substantiate his research, which contributed to the early development of simufilam.
The drug is currently in a late-stage clinical trial, and approximately 735 patients had participated as of May 2024, according to a press release from Cassava last month.
Wang did not immediately respond to a request for comment. In 2023, he told The Wall Street Journal that a CUNY investigation “did not produce conclusive findings of data manipulation, consistent with what I have been saying for two years.”
Cassava said in a press release on Friday that Wang had not participated in the most recent lawsuit.
In a press release, the company said: “Wang’s work under these grants involved the early stages of development of the company’s drug candidates and diagnostic test and how they are expected to work.”
Cassava added that Wang “was not involved in the company’s Phase 3 clinical trials of simufilam.”
A Cassava spokesperson also pointed to a press release the company issued in September 2023, which said academic researchers outside of CUNY had found evidence the drug could affect signaling pathways thought to be involved in Alzheimer’s disease.
CUNY learned of the charges on Friday, a spokesperson said in an email, adding: “The university has and will continue to cooperate as fully as possible with the federal government’s investigation until the matter is resolved.”
The complaint does not specifically name the university, drug or company, but instead names it as “University 1,” “Drug A,” and “Company 1,” respectively.
Still, Cassava shares fell nearly 35% on Friday, a rapid decline that prompted multiple trading disruptions.
Overall, the manipulation of research images and the handling of allegations of research misconduct is a growing problem in the scientific community.
The issue came to particular attention last summer, when then-Stanford President Marc Tessier-Lavigne resigned from his post after allegations surfaced that images had been manipulated within his lab. Tessier-Lavigne said he had never submitted papers that he didn’t believe were accurate and noted that a panel that reviewed his work had not found that he knew of any misconduct within his lab.
In January, an amateur science sleuth made allegations of manipulation of research images by top scientists at the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, leading to subsequent retractions. Dana-Farber said it was taking decisive action to correct the scientific record.
Wang’s work has been under discussion for some time, reports the journal Science. The magazine obtained a report from CUNY that found evidence indicating research misconduct. The university halted its research after Science published the report.
According to the website Retraction Watch, several journal articles authored by Wang have been retracted.
This article was originally published on NBCNews.com
