The Ways and Means of the Immune System: Responsibility for Scientific Fraud

Wednesday, October 31, 2007

Responsibility for Scientific Fraud

Who is responsible when a paper is declared to be the product of fraudulent research? This is a tough question to answer, and is becoming more relevant every day. Is it the first author? The PI? If you're the third author, or even the second on a paper that's found to be fraud, how responsible are you? Should it be allowed to negatively impact your career (it probably will)? Can you claim that you do not bear responsibility if you are not the "direct perpetrator" of the fraud?

Nature has an interesting proposal.

I'm not sure making one author sign such a declaration is necessarily the solution, but at least it has the advantage of holding the senior author truly accountable for the work that bears their name. I don't think one can force responsibility. I think that a really responsible PI will have checked the work in a paper, and one that is inclined to be less responsible will not be made more so easily. Perhaps enforcing accountability with a binding (although I don't know how binding this will be) signed document may lead to greater responsibility.

Thoughts?

2 comments:

Schlupp said...: I'm not sure that one responsible author always makes sense. I (a theorist) once published a paper with an experientalist, and I know for sure that I CANNOT judge whether he didn't cheat. I consider in very unlikely, but since I don't know much about his methods, I can't be sure. I just don't know which knobs he turned in his lab. And while I think that he - being half a theorist himself - understood a bit more of my calculations, it isn't hard to imagine a situation where the experimantalist would be equally unable to asess the validity of the theorist's work. Such papers do offer a real value and after all, it is the point of collaborations to bring together people with different expertise. For this reason, I think that it should also be possible to just indicate what each author is responsible for.

The problem with this scheme is, of course, that it is opposed by authors for whom the others could only write that they 'at least did not beak anything too valuable.'; November 5, 2007 at 6:50 PM
Anonymous said...: I think each and every author should be held accountable for their contribution- several journals ask to specify individual authors' contributions, so that can be used to keep track.
It's really not easy to keep check or be responsible for a collaborator's work, you just have to take it at face value.; November 7, 2007 at 5:15 AM

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I am writing here to express my interest in the wide variety of research that goes on in Immunology today. I am NOT a medical professional, and I do not offer medical advice. These are just my personal opinions, formed by the reading of published journal papers. They are not representative of anything other than my private personal opinions. I do not endorse or revile any journal or group or university or researcher. They are shaped by my background in research, and my specialties. I am not omniscient, so I do not know or understand everything. Enjoy!

The Vocabulary

An Antigen is any molecule that is recognized by the specialized cells of the immune system, usually by antigen receptors on the surfaces of these cells. Antigens are picked up and displayed by other specialized cells called antigen presenting cells. Antigens can be recognized by two broad categories of cells, T cells and B cells. T cells detect antigens through an antigen receptor called the T cell receptor, but only when these antigens are bound to antigen presenting molecules called MHC molecules. MHC proteins carrying antigens are found on the surface of antigen presenting cells. B cells make antibodies, which also recognize antigens. Once a B cell recognizes antigens through its antigen receptor, the antibody, it makes many many more of the same antibody and secretes , or spits them out, into the body so that they circulate throught the body. Naive B or T cells are cells that have never seen an antigen, and activated cells are those that have. Effector cells are those cells that have seen antigen and can do something about it, like kill that the cell carrying the antigen. Memory cells are cells that retain a memory of their encounter with an antigen, and can react faster and more effectively the next time they see the same antigen. The immune system consists of a few major lymphoid organs: the thymus, where T cells are made; the bone marrow, where all cells originate; the spleen, where many effector cells reside; and the lymph nodes, which are present at multiple sites throughout the body. Immunes cells spend their lives whizzing around between these various organs in various states of activation. A pathogen is any organism that infects a host, they can be bacteria, viruses or parasites.