US grants a patent for fradulent stem cell creation method

Hwang Woo-suk was a Korean scientist who claimed to have developed a breakthrough cloning technique in 2004. But he was fired in 2006 after he admitted his results had been falsified.

But that didn’t stop the United States Patent and Trademark Office from issuing him a patent based on the fake research. The New York Times was first to report on Patent 8,647,872, which was awarded on Feb. 11.

This would already be awkward enough for the patent office, but the story actually gets worse. According to Matt Levy, an attorney at the Computer and Communications Industry Association, the patent office initially rejected Hwang’s application due to his misconduct.

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Read the full, original story: This scientist was exposed as a fraud years ago. The government gave him a patent anyway.

Additional Resources:

• A Decade After Committing Massive Fraud, A Cloning Scientist Is Back To Work, Popular Science
• US Issues Patent For A Fraudulent Human Embryonic Stem Cell Method, Forbes
• Disgraced Scientist Granted U.S. Patent for Work Found to be Fraudulent, New York Times