Investigating suspected research misconduct presents universities and institutes with a dilemma. To ensure a fair hearing, investigators must keep their proceedings confidential, while the integrity of the science requires public disclosure of questionable findings.
In the case of immunologist Luk Van Parijs, eight months have now passed since a confidential university panel concluded that research misconduct occurred in work first questioned by 快猫短视频 two years ago (5 November 2005, p 3). Details of the finding and the science involved have still not been published, however.
鈥淓ight months have now passed since a confidential university panel concluded that research misconduct occurred鈥�
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Suspended from his position at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 2004, Van Parijs admitted to fabricating data and was dismissed in 2005. His work prior to joining MIT was not in question in MIT鈥檚 investigation, but 快猫短视频 uncovered apparently duplicated and inconsistently captioned experimental results in earlier papers. These included two papers published while Van Parijs was a postdoctoral researcher in the lab of virologist David Baltimore at the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena.
When 快猫短视频 pointed out the apparent problem, Baltimore requested a review of Van Parijs鈥檚 work. This led to an investigation convened by Paul Jennings, former provost of Caltech, and in March this year it concluded that Van Parijs had committed research misconduct in four papers.
Jennings has since told 快猫短视频: 鈥淐o-authors on the papers appear motivated to correct the record and I have asked them to do so.鈥� He also says that the co-authors were not involved in the misconduct, and that Van Parijs disputes the review鈥檚 findings. Van Parijs did not respond to a message left at his listed number.
Jennings would not say which published papers are affected. One of Van Parijs鈥檚 co-authors on a paper published in Immunity in 1999 (vol 11, p 281) says this paper was involved.
Matthew Wilson, a neuroscientist who teaches a course in responsible conduct in science at MIT, says that the institutions鈥� response so far appears satisfactory. He adds that if Caltech has concluded its investigation, it should make its findings public. 鈥淐orrecting papers is no substitute for full public disclosure of this kind of thing by institutions,鈥� he says.
Caltech says that corrections have been sent to scientific journals.