NIH's Eliezer Masliah Dismissed After 132 Papers Found with Manipulated Images in Alzheimer's and Parkinson's Research

Sep 26, 2024, 02:56 PM

Eliezer Masliah, a prominent neuroscientist and former head of the neuroscience division at the National Institute on Aging (NIA) within the National Institutes of Health (NIH), has been dismissed after an investigation reported by Science Magazine found he engaged in scientific misconduct. The investigation revealed that Masliah manipulated hundreds of images, including scores of falsified Western blots, in his research on Alzheimer's and Parkinson's diseases, with 132 of his papers containing suspect images. This misconduct raises concerns about the validity of decades of research that have influenced grants, FDA approvals, and clinical trials, potentially undercutting the science behind several drugs. Notably, his work led to trials of the antibody prasinezumab, which demonstrated no effect on measures of Parkinson’s disease progression in a 2022 paper published in the New England Journal of Medicine.