A switch in letters leads to the "creation" of Eszett (ß)-catenin rather than beta (β)-catenin

Abstract

A simple replacement-most likely due to a linguistic error-of the Greek letter beta (β) by the German letter Eszett (ß), has led to the introduction of an error in a body of literature related to beta (β)-catenin, resulting in the "creation" of a non-existent compound and false positive, Eszett (ß)-catenin. A search on 9 December 2023 in PubMed for ß-catenin and β-catenin revealed 395 and 45,919 results, respectively. The 25 results of ß-catenin published in 2023 were examined in more detail to appreciate the location(s) in each paper where this error had occurred. While the scientific findings of these studies do not seem to be impacted by this error, authors and editors would need to weigh the need or benefit of correcting this error.

Keywords: Diseases; Errors; Indexing; Precision; Wnt signaling.