The White House’s Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP) is taking a look at innovation and scientific research, and issues of reproducibility have made it onto its radar.
Here’s the description of the project from the Federal Register: Continue reading White House takes notice of reproducibility in science, and wants your opinion
The suicide earlier this week of Yoshiki Sasai, one of the scientists who worked on the now-discredited STAP stem cell work, was a startling and sobering reminder to the research community and the public that misconduct can take a heavy human toll – even on people like Sasai, whom by all accounts only had the misfortune of working with a dishonest colleague.
The tension surrounding this case and others was well-captured by University of California, Berkeley biologist Michael Eisen, who himself lost his father, also a scientist, to suicide in 1987 in a case that he said had haunting parallels to Sasai’s:
Obviously, fraud is a terrible thing. Nothing provides as deep an existential threat to the scientific enterprise than making up data. But as bad as it is, there is something deeply ugly about the way the scientific community responds to misconduct. We need to deal swiftly with fraud when it is identified. But time after time I have watched the way not only the accused, but everyone around them, is treated with such sanctimonious disdain it is frankly not surprising that some of them respond in tragic ways.
Some of the commenters on Eisen’s post, as well as here on Retraction Watch, have had questions like this: Continue reading On vigorous scientific debates, witch hunts, and the tragedy of suicide
A lovely birthday gift from reader Leonid Schneider, who also contributes cartoons to Lab Times, where we have a column.
Bonus: The world’s first art critic.
Yesterday was our fourth birthday. We published our first post, “Why write a blog about retractions?” on August 3, 2010, and the anniversary seems as good a time as any to review where we’ve been.
Here were some highlights of the past twelve months: Continue reading Happy fourth anniversary, Retraction Watch
As Retraction Watch readers know, it’s very rare for a scientist to face criminal charges for fraud, and it’s also very rare for the National Institutes of Health to recoup grants found to have involved misconduct. Both have happened in the case of Dong-Pyou Han, the former Iowa State University researcher who spiked rabbit blood samples with human antibodies to make it look as if an HIV vaccine was working.
We used that case as the basis of an op-ed that appears in today’s New York Times, arguing that it’s time to “crack down on scientific fraudsters.” Have a look.
Speaking of the Times, we’re also on page A3 of the paper version, in a story titled “Science Journal Pulls 60 Papers in Peer-Review Fraud,” which picked up the SAGE scandal we broke the other day. A number of other outlets have also followed up on that story, with many of them kind enough to cite and quote us. Here are several: Continue reading “Crack Down on Scientific Fraudsters” — our op-ed in today’s New York Times
In March, we asked Retraction Watch readers for some financial support. A number of you contributed and continue to, for which we’re very grateful.
One of the things we wanted to do with those funds was hire other writers, specifically an intern. So we’re pleased to introduce the first-ever Retraction Watch intern, Cat Ferguson.
Ferguson, whose first post will go live later today and who will join us in earnest next week, just graduated from the University of California, Santa Cruz’s Science Communication Program. She has already written for the New Yorker online, and for New Scientist, among other outlets.
Here’s what she had to say about writing that New Yorker piece: Continue reading Meet the first-ever Retraction Watch intern. And: Thanks, readers
Last month, we wrote about the launch of a new site, Stand Up 2 Science Bullies, whose co-founders said that they had been
covertly and cyber bullied by one scientist for nine years.
Retraction Watch readers: We need help.
As many of our loyal tipsters know, the list of retractions and related stories that we can’t get to just keeps getting longer. And as we grow, we want to groom a stable of paid freelance — and perhaps one day full-time — Retraction Watch contributors.
So with that in mind — and knowing that it can be difficult for early-career journalists to gain experience in accountability journalism — we’ve decided the an internship is the first investment we’ll make with funds our generous supporters have sent us.
Continue reading Retraction Watch is hiring an intern: Here’s how to apply
If you were gathering references to write a paper, or just keeping studies in an online library, wouldn’t it be nice to get an alert any time any of those papers was retracted?
Well, now you can. We’re very pleased to announce that PubChase, a free biomedical literature search and recommendation tool, will now feature links to Retraction Watch posts. As PubChase writes in an announcement of the new initiative: Continue reading Want alerts about retractions of papers in your library? Check out PubChase
Ivan is on a public panel in Berlin at 7 p.m. on Wednesday night, November 2: “Science 2.0 – More knowledge, more transparency, more quality? How Web 2.0 has changed science.”
Joining him in the discussion, which will be in English, are: Continue reading Come see Retraction Watch in Berlin