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. Though obvious violations of professional standards may be uncommon, less-dramatic ethical questions confront many scientists in the course of a career: How should credit for a discovery be allocated among a team of researchers? How should a scientist respond if he discovers errors — his own or others’ — in a published analysis? And how can a researcher recognize when a conflict of interest could bias the results of a study she hopes to undertake? This volume offers researchers — particularly early-career scientists and their mentors — guidance on how to conduct research responsibly, avoid misconduct such as fabrication and plagiarism, and think about how to respond in complex ethical situations.

On Being a Scientist is aimed primarily at graduate students and beginning researchers, but its lessons apply to all scientists at all stages of their scientific careers.

“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 the professional medical writer.”

What Should Be Done To Tackle Ghostwriting in the Medical Literature?
Gøtzsche PC, Kassirer JP, Woolley KL, Wager E, Jacobs A, et al.
PLoS Medicine Vol. 6, No. 2, e23 doi:10.1371/journal.pmed.1000023

Excellent review of the research process that discusses the long road from the initial discovery of a medical intervention to a highly cited article. Among the recommendations made by the authors:

1. Scientists should convey to funders and the public the immense difficulty of the scientific discovery process.

2. Multidisciplinary collaboration with focused targets and involving both basic and clinical sciences should be encouraged.

3. Discovery of new substances and interventions remains essential, but proper credit and incentives should be given to accelerate the testing of these applications in high-quality, unbiased clinical research and the replication of claims for effectiveness.

The article also includes a link to “How to Read a Medical Study (Skeptically).”

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 monographs verify the first description or research on your particular topic?
· Do your research results using more than one resource continually refer to the same core group of authors and papers?
· Do your research results using more than one resource refer to the same person or research group as being the first to identify or describe a particular topic?
· Have you followed up on relevant references and synonyms that you discovered in your searching?
· Have you located the most current information on the topic?
· Did you consult with recognized experts in the field to ask if they are aware of research you may have missed?
· Have you checked all your references for errata or retractions?
· Have you used a search engine to search the Web to locate materials not indexed by databases?

“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 also on ethical issues that arise during the publication process. These guidelines are intended to help researchers avoid ethical pitfalls through all phases of the research and publication process.” 

PIs can locate the PMCID reference numbers by doing a search of their publication in PubMed. The PMCID displays on the abstract page on the lower right side of the page. If the publication is not yet available for viewing in PubMed Central, the PubMed record will also display the date that the publication will be available for viewing.