Correction to: Cell Research (2011) 20:1252–1262. doi:10.1038/cr.2010.111; published online 27 July 2010

The authors would like to clarify a deficiency in our paper recently published in Cell Research (CR) (2010; 20:1252–1262). We did not reference the results in the first part of our paper reporting the effect of baicalin on vascular smooth muscle cells (VSMCs) in vitro which we had previously published in the Chinese language only Chinese Journal of Cell Biology (CJCB) (2010; 32(1):91–96); the overlap includes the re-use of some western blot data from the CJCB paper (including those in upper panels of Figures 2D, 3A and 3C; and ICAM-1 and VCAM-1 of Figure 5B). These results suggest that baicalin inhibits PDGF-BB-induced expression of genes related to cell proliferation and migration, and blocks cell cycle progression.

We, the authors, understand that all previously published material should be acknowledged no matter where it was previously published; we should have referenced the CJCB article and obtained permission to re-publish the overlapping content. We sincerely apologize to the readers and both CR and CJCB for our oversight.

We remain confident that our CR paper has made a valuable addition to the literature as it brings together and integrates for the first time three major elements of research: First, the effect of baicalin on VSMCs in vitro; second, the exploration of mechanisms underlying the effect of baicalin; and third, the potential therapeutic effect of the baicalin activity in an animal model in vivo. The latter two parts of the CR paper represent novel results that were published for the first time. We would like to state that our mistake in publishing practice does not affect in any way the main conclusions of our CR paper, and we deeply apologize for any inconvenience and confusion which may have been caused by our errors.

Editor's comment

Although Cell Research now understands that parts of the paper contained material that was not properly acknowledged, the authors have clearly outlined their error above. The editors feel that this is sufficient explanation, that the novel and important conclusions of the paper are still valid and therefore the article need not be withdrawn from publication.