David Batty (not the Batty of Healthiertalk * )
Wednesday May 3, 2006

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Fraudulent research regularly appears in the 30,000 scientific journals published worldwide, a former editor of the British Medical Journal (BMJ) said today.

Even when journals discover that published research is fabricated or falsified they rarely retract the findings, according to Richard Smith, who was also chief executive of the BMJ publishing group.

When journals decide not to publish studies because they suspect misconduct, they often fail to alert the researchers' employers or medical authorities, such as the Department of Health and the General Medical Council, he added.

Writing in the latest edition of the Journal of the Royal Society of Medicine, Dr Smith called on editors to blow the whistle on bad research and to use their clout to pressure universities into taking action against dodgy researchers.

"In many ways editors are privileged 'whistleblowers' with the power to publish and expose institutions who fail to investigate alleged research misconduct," he said.

But the former BMJ editor said it was likely that research fraud was "equally common" in the 30,000 plus scientific journals across the globe but was "invariably covered up".

His call for action comes in the wake of several high profile cases of fraudulent research, including the Korean scientist Hwang Woo-suk who fabricated stem cell research that it was claimed would open up new ways to treat diseases like Parkinson's.

Dr Smith criticised the failure of scientific institutions, including universities, to discipline dodgy researchers even when alerted to problems by journals.

"Few countries have measures in place to ensure research is carried out ethically," he said.

"Most cases are not publicised. They are simply not recognised, covered up altogether or the guilty researcher is urged to retrain, move to another institution or retire from research."

Dr Smith called for the UK Research Integrity Office, launched last month to develop a code of practice for researchers, to be given stronger powers to investigate allegation of fraudulent or unethical work.

The Committee on Publication Ethics, which advises scientific journals, estimates that there are about 50 cases of seriously fraudulent research in major institutions in Britain a year.


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When you have a group of individuals that consider themselves to be the elite of society it is hard for them to admit that some of their members might not have the highest standards.

Then to that you add that many are under the threat to publish or perish it is not hard to imagine that numbers will get fudged.


[When all else fails. Tell the truth and run.]

This is one of the biggest threats to "modern" science
(all disciplines) today. In the olden days, there was
much more study, experimentation and collaboration
than we have today. Now it's a quick theory, find a
co-author(s) and dump it into the system.

Finally, ask for a raise or some kind of fee split.

Even worse, Jack. They don't find just one or two co-authors, but a whole dozen of them. Did you ever notice that papers about subjects like AIDS, Bird Flu, SARS, etc always have an incredible number of authors? I counted 20 on one (lousy) bird flu paper.
In a way, this could work to our advantage. I judge a recent scientific paper by its number of authors. That number is inversely proportional to the quality of the work.

It's because of the "publish or perish" thing. So an author includes as many colleagues as possible so that s/he would also be included in the papers of those other authors. So for a group of 20 authors, that's 20 papers instantly for each of them even if each made only one.

Do you know that there are even journals where the author(s) pay to have their papers published? (J of Biochemistry is one) As such, papers are identified as advertisements All this just to have a list of publications under one's name. :x

As a university professor, I'm also in such a system. I'm a rebel, though, and just apply what I learn, without necessarily publishing. :wink:

So far, I haven't perished (was given tenure way back early '80s), but I hardly rise among the ranks.

Gerry