Biochem. J. (2006) 394: 617–626. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1042/BJ20051417
The authors of the original article ‘Human acyl-CoA:cholesterol acyltransferase 2 gene expression in intestinal Caco-2 cells and in hepatocellular carcinoma’ (Biochemical Journal [2006] 394[3], DOI:10.1042/BJ20051417) would like to address concerns raised by a reader regarding the duplication of loading controls in Figures 4D, 5A–F and 6C in their published paper. The authors have addressed these concerns with the explanations provided below, clarifying that the same controls have been used across all analysis and taking into consideration that the figures published in the original research paper had been prepared according to generally accepted standards at that time.
In Fig 4D, the same set of protein samples was used for ACAT2 (45 kDa), Cdx2 (37 kDa), HNF1α (90 kDa) and β-actin (42 kDa) blotting. The Cdx2 blot corresponded to lanes 1 and 2 of the left panel and the HNF1α blot corresponded to lanes 1 and 3 of the left panel. The β-actin blot in the left panel was the loading control used for the ACAT2, Cdx2, and HNF1α blots for quantitation purposes. The irrelevant β-actin blots on top of Cdx2 and HNF1α were accidentally placed and should have been deleted. We apologize for the mistake that might have caused confusion.
In Fig 5, the Caco-2 cells were differentiated for 0(d0), 2(d2), 4(d4) and 8(d8) days, respectively. The expressions of Cdx2, HNF1α, and ACAT2 were measured by RT-PCR (A–C) and by Western blotting (D–F). In A–C, the same set of RNA samples was used for RT-PCR analyses of GAPDH, ACAT2, Cdx2 and HNF1α. In D–F, the same set of protein samples was used for Western blotting of β-actin (42 kDa), Cdx2 (37 kDa), HNF1α (90 kDa) and ACAT2 (45 kDa). We put the same GAPDH photo in (A–C) and the same β-actin blot in (D–F) for quantitation purposes because we thought this arrangement would be easy to read. Based on the updated figure preparation standards, the GAPDH and β-actin images shown in (Fig 5B, C, E, F) should be deleted.
In Fig 6C, the same set of protein samples was used for Western blotting of ACAT2 (45 kDa), Cdx2 (37 kDa), HNF1α (90 kDa), and β-actin (42 kDa). We placed the same β-actin blot on top of the ACAT2, Cdx2 and HNF1α blots because we thought this arrangement would be easy to read. Based on the updated figure preparation standards, the β-actin image on top of Cdx2 and HNF1α should be deleted.
We have no intention to use the same result and publish it as result of different experiments. We do apologize for using a format to organize the data that might have caused confusion among some readers. We hope this correction helps to clarify these points.
