The U.S. Office of Research Integrity has barred a former lab technician at Washington State University from participating in federally funded research for three years after finding he had committed misconduct.
The case dates back more than five years. Ryan Evanoff was a scientific assistant in the Department of Veterinary Microbiology and Pathology at the university’s Pullman campus. As we reported in 2020, colleagues in the department had discovered he had been fabricating gene sequence data. The falsified data led to the retraction of two papers.
A draft of the university’s investigation obtained through a public records request stated Evanoff engaged in “a repeated and measurable pattern of research material manipulation, changing of data, omission of critical research procedures and findings in lab notebooks, and making up data and results” from at least 2015 through 2019, when he left the university.
“This is an old story that was covered extensively years ago,” Robert Mealey, chair of the Department of Veterinary Clinical Sciences at WSU, told Retraction Watch. “I am glad ORI completed their investigation and published their results to finally close the book on it.”
The finding is only the second ORI has released this year. The office released six rulings in 2024 and 10 in 2023. We reported earlier this year that ORI and the National Science Foundation’s Office of Inspector General had several personnel changes as a result of mass firings of probationary employees and people taking voluntary buyouts. ORI’s staff page remains missing.
ORI also did not respond to a request for comment on this case and why it took so long to issue the decision.
Evanoff’s misconduct came to light after a postdoc in the lab noticed her results and Evanoff’s weren’t lining up, the university’s report stated.
She noticed “Mr. Evanoff was generating a significant amount of research data that was not consistent with the hours of laboratory work he was putting in,” the report stated. The postdoc, whose name was redacted in the report, took these and other concerns to supervisors in the department, who were able to confirm Evanoff fabricated sequencing results for a specific study.
But the committee’s investigation found evidence of fabrication that went far beyond that one instance, finding “Mr. Evanoff’s deception was systematic and over several years and several projects.”
The investigation found Evanoff fabricated plasmid sequencing data, peptide sequences, T-cell response data, data related to metabolic pathways for maladaptation to training syndrome in horses, and more. The committee also found his lab notebooks were “almost useless.” The report stated: “His lack of stewardship in keeping useful and reliable lab notebooks and documenting his daily research efforts … is a form of misconduct that lies outside the realm of proper lab practices.”
After leaving the university, Evanoff received a master’s degree in teaching, according to his LinkedIn profile. He is now a teacher at Clarkston High School, according to the district’s website. Evanoff did not reply to an emailed request for comment or a message sent via LinkedIn.
The university’s report had a pointed conclusion about the consequences of Evanoff’s misconduct: “Falsification and fabrication of data and materials especially negatively impacted the career of [the postdoc] and her work related to hepacivirus,” the report stated. The postdoc “will leave the … lab after four years of research effort without a single publication in this area as a postdoctoral fellow.”
Mealey told us he has stayed in contact with the postdoc, and was able to share some good news. “She recently obtained a full-time assistant professor faculty position, so she has definitely landed on her feet and has been very successful despite the setback,” Mealey said.
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