Harikumar KB, Kunnumakkara AB, Ahn KS, Anand P, Krishnan S, Guha S, Aggarwal BB. Modification of the cysteine residues in IκBα kinase and NF-κB (p65) by xanthohumol leads to suppression of NF-κB–regulated gene products and potentiation of apoptosis in leukemia cells. Blood. 2009;113(9):2003-2013.

The Editors wish to express their concern about the 26 February 2009 article cited above, regarding the reliability and/or veracity of the data and the study outcomes while awaiting the conclusions of the institutional investigation, specifically for the results shown in Figure 5A. Four of the panels show cell and nuclei images that are identical to panels from Figure 2D of Ajaikumar B. Kunnumakkara, Haruyo Ichikawa, Preetha Anand, Chiramel J. Mohankumar, Padmanabhan S. Hema, Mangalam S. Nair, and Bharat B. Aggarwal, “Coronarin D, a labdane diterpene, inhibits both constitutive and inducible nuclear factor-κB pathway activation, leading to potentiation of apoptosis, inhibition of invasion, and suppression of osteoclastogenesis” [Mol Cancer Ther. 2008;7(10):3306-3317], and the authors now purport that they represent the experiments published in that article and not those described in the Blood article. In Figure 5B, the TNG and TNF+XN actin blot bands appear to be identical, which cannot be correct, because the cells were harvested under different conditions. The primary data for these experiments have not been located. Should additional information become available about the conduct of this study, the Journal will evaluate that information carefully and determine whether additional notifications will be necessary.