Radiation Oncology researcher cited for fraud by the NIH

[futureapppsy2]

NOT-OD-22-095: Findings of Research Misconduct

NIH Funding Opportunities and Notices in the NIH Guide for Grants and Contracts: Findings of Research Misconduct NOT-OD-22-095. OD

grants.nih.gov

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[elementaryschooleconomics]

Ah, yes.

So we can go a little further into the Retraction Watch post about this.

Then reading the comments:

Many of the issues in these publications have been addressed if you go down the rabbit hole and read them.

But looking at the problem figures, they often look like this (from the first link - the authors actually fixed the manuscript according to the comments):

You see this over, and over, and over, and over again. It really turned me off to staying in the basic science world, for two reasons -

1) While these garner attention because of the names (Wally Curran, for example), it's usually not the PI asking people to fake data. Their labs are so big and there's so much happening that it's easy for them to not notice it. However, even though they're not asking for it - they're indirectly encouraging it. Churning out papers gets grant money and accolades, which beget more money and accolades, etc. Students and postdocs feel that. So you have these massive labs with people doing whatever they think it takes to keep the enterprise moving...which leads to fraud.

2) I have a PhD, I have done so many Western Blots and Colony Formation Assays I can recite the protocols on my deathbed. There are SO MANY BETTER WAYS to fabricate data than doing it like this. What is this, amateur hour? Well, I guess we wouldn't catch people doing it the "good" way, but still. It's pretty crazy to me that people decide to cheat to get ahead and then pick the worst way to do it. This will get caught EVERY TIME. STOP.

 

[TheWallnerus]

Ah, yes.

So we can go a little further into the Retraction Watch post about this.

Then reading the comments:

View attachment 352092

Many of the issues in these publications have been addressed if you go down the rabbit hole and read them.

But looking at the problem figures, they often look like this (from the first link - the authors actually fixed the manuscript according to the comments):

View attachment 352093

You see this over, and over, and over, and over again. It really turned me off to staying in the basic science world, for two reasons -

1) While these garner attention because of the names (Wally Curran, for example), it's usually not the PI asking people to fake data. Their labs are so big and there's so much happening that it's easy for them to not notice it. However, even though they're not asking for it - they're indirectly encouraging it. Churning out papers gets grant money and accolades, which beget more money and accolades, etc. Students and postdocs feel that. So you have these massive labs with people doing whatever they think it takes to keep the enterprise moving...which leads to fraud.

2) I have a PhD, I have done so many Western Blots and Colony Formation Assays I can recite the protocols on my deathbed. There are SO MANY BETTER WAYS to fabricate data than doing it like this. What is this, amateur hour? Well, I guess we wouldn't catch people doing it the "good" way, but still. It's pretty crazy to me that people decide to cheat to get ahead and then pick the worst way to do it. This will get caught EVERY TIME. STOP.

Think how many "sophisticated cheats" (vs "the amateur hour") squeak by, get cited/referenced/lauded, and never get caught. The best form of peer review would be for reviewer(s) to travel to the authors' institution(s), spend a couple weeks with their processes and see how they collect their data and "do their thang," and then the reviewer would take all the authors' data and have it independently vetted and analyzed by their own statisticians. You know, in other words, the peer review would be highly believable.