LOS ANGELES—A number of scientists have been grumbling for weeks about a pair of breakthrough stem cell studies that seemed too good to be true. Now one of the senior researchers who worked on the papers agrees that they may be right.

The studies, which were published in January by the journal Nature, described a surprisingly simple method of transforming mature cells into pluripotent stem cells capable of regenerating any type of tissue in the body. The key was to stress them out by soaking them in an acid bath for 30 minutes, prompting genetic changes that made the cells more flexible. The researchers dubbed their technique “stimulus triggered acquisition of pluripotency,” or STAP.

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