The 2009 edition of On Being a Scientist: A Guide to Responsible Conduct in Research is now available.
Cases of clear scientific misconduct have made headlines in recent years, among them the fabrication of data by a team of stem-cell researchers at Seoul National University and the fraudulent manipulation of photos submitted to the Journal of Cell Biology. [...]

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Interesting commentary on ghostwriting:
“Ghostwriting occurs when someone makes substantial contributions to a manuscript without attribution or disclosure. It is considered bad publication practice in the medical sciences, and some argue it is scientific misconduct. This debate examines how best to tackle ghostwriting in the medical literature from the perspectives of a researcher, an editor, and [...]

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Despina G. Contopoulos-Ioannidis, George A. Alexiou, Theodore C. Gouvias, and John P. A. Ioannidis, “Life Cycle of Translational Research for Medical Interventions,” Science (5 September 2008) Vol. 321, no. 5894, 1298 – 1299.
Excellent review of the research process that discusses the long road from the initial discovery of a medical intervention to a highly cited article. [...]

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Check out this article, Searching for Clarity: A Primer on Medical Studies, from the New York Times (published September 30, 2008) by Gina Kolata. The article provides an overview of medical research and three basic principles for understanding medical findings from clinical trials.
The article also includes a link to “How to Read a Medical Study (Skeptically).”

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What is a comprehensive literature search? How to know when you’ve exhausted the literature?
Questions to ask . . .
· Do your research results provide a clear chain of evidence in demonstrating the accumulation of knowledge on a particular topic?
· Did you find the first description or research of a particular topic?
· Do scholarly books or [...]

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The American Library Association’s Office for Information Technology Policy recently created a slide-rule to help determine if a particular work is copyright protected. Pointing the red arrow to the date of first publication of the work provides information on the copyright status of the work.

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The World Intellectual Property Organization recently issued a guide titled “Understanding Copyright and Related Rights.” The guide is intended to “provide an introduction for non-specialists or newcomers to the subject of copyright and related rights.”

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The American Speech-Language-Hearing Association (ASHA) Committee on Research Integrity and Publication Practices has prepared a guidelines document, Guidelines for the Responsible Conduct of Research: Ethics and the Publication Process. 
“The responsible conduct of research – from the earliest stages of a project and onward – has a direct bearing not only on the quality of any resulting article but [...]

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One stipulation of the revised NIH Public Access Policy is that as of 25 May 2008, PIs will be required to note the PubMed Central reference number (PMCID) on any NIH applications, proposals, and progress reports when citing an article that falls under the policy. For more information: http://publicaccess.nih.gov/FAQ.htm#c6
PIs can locate the PMCID reference numbers by doing a [...]

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The revised guidelines for the NIH Public Access Policy (NOT-OD-08-033) are now available: Revised Policy on Enhancing Public Access to Archived Publications Resulting from NIH-Funded Research.
Compliance with this Policy is a statutory requirement and a term and condition of the grant award and cooperative agreement, in accordance with the NIH Grants Policy Stat
ement For Contracts.
Specifics:
 1. [...]

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