March 7, 2008

Nobel-Winning Scientist Retracts Paper Published in 'Nature'

A team of researchers headed by Linda B. Buck, who shared the 2004 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine, has retracted a research paper from the influential journal Nature. The researchers said that they had failed to reproduce the findings and that they had found “inconsistencies” between the paper and the original data.

The researchers did the work while at Harvard Medical School, which is now conducting an investigation into possible misconduct, The New York Times reported today.

Ms. Buck is now at the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center; the first author on the paper, Zhihua Zou, is now an assistant professor of neuroscience and cell biology at the University of Texas Medical Branch. According to a note appended to the retraction, Mr. Zou “provided all figures and data for the paper.”

The Times reported that Mr. Zou had agreed to the retraction but had not admitted to wrongdoing and remained confident in the paper. Ms. Buck has asked the Hutchinson center to investigate two other articles for which Mr. Zou was the lead author.

The paper, which appeared in 2001, described a way to map the neurons in the brain that corresponded to smell receptors in the nose. Although the paper had been cited in other research articles many times, other researchers in the field told the Times and Nature that they did not expect its retraction to cause major waves. —Lila Guterman

Comments

1. What’s at issue is the intentions of the “research coolie” that Buck had on her team. Assuming he was a grad student from China, left to work and produce everything on his own while Buck just adds her name at the end— a common predatory behavior in academia— then she should fall as he falls, for she would gain the acalades as he would, were he and her REAL collaborators. QUANTITY is not QUALITY— it’s time Harvard acads learned that fact. Slaves from abroad will misbehave because slaves are slaves. Still, slave- masters are as responsible for the ill as for the good on their plantations. Buck’s sloppy mentoring should bring her down. Her name on the paper is a responsibility, not only a freeby reward thanks to the availability of imported “research coolies,” an importation from lands where people are treated like crap and so they will do anything not to have to go back. You can buy them real cheap, but sometimes look at what you get. Buck should have focused on mentoring a more demanding but less desperate fellow American who might have more to lose from deception because one does not defacate where one eats. Teach American next time but take responsibility for the actions of your “lab coolie” now. You can’t exploit them and expect them to love you.

   — DE Teodoru    Mar 7, 04:30 PM    #

2. Well, one need not be a slave master to have a bad apple. A good mentor can still be taken by a good crook, especially as science is about trust, and falls apart without it. It is quite possible that Buck did nothing wrong here, and is not deserving of the kind of mud-casting DET seems willing to throw without any evidence in the matter. But watching politics of late, human beings clearly are better at witch hunts than reason.

   — ABC    Mar 7, 04:44 PM    #

3. Clearly the accusations of DET are based on pure speculation. Unfortunately, they are also teeming with a very high degree of racism, ethnocentrism, and/or xenophobia.

   — Data Geek    Mar 7, 05:45 PM    #

4. It appears that everybody got what they wanted through cheating. Perhaps Dr. Zou can now join Dr. Hwang from Korea in a new venture on stem cell technology.
   I strongly disagree with the comments by ABC. Dr. Buck is just a culpable as Dr. Zou because she failed in her ethical duty as a mentor to critically examine data used to construct the manuscript. Because she willingly placed her name on this paper, she remains jointly liable for the consequences. Perhaps this attitude explains why a significant number of published research findings can’t be reproduced. This bad behavior is rampant in the scientific profession. If there is a finding of scientific misconduct, both of these individuals should be banned from receiving any type of federal funding. Those of us who chose to follow the rules and only publish reproducible results are often criticized for our low productivity. Let us hope that Harvard does not apply a sliding scale of ethics and allow Dr. Buck to buy a pass on scientific misconduct with her a nobel prize.

   — DM    Mar 7, 05:54 PM    #

5. Although this retraction may not cause “major waves” in the olfaction research field, as an educator who tries to bring the latest research into a lecture on olfaction to Neuroscience graduate students, retraction means I have conveyed possibly wrong information (and enthusiasm) to our students.

   — J    Mar 7, 06:43 PM    #

6. David Baltimore survived his propensity to add his name to studies he hadn’t fully read; Dr. Buck will probably survive this as well.

   — WEF    Mar 7, 10:22 PM    #

7. Please stop this witch hunt!
   Linda Buck is an extraordinary scientist, an outstanding mentor, and someone who is honest and dedicated to her work and to her trainees. She retracted the paper in question in a professionally sound way. All of us in scientific research have identified rare trainees who are sloppy, who cheat, or who cherry pick their data. Although there are also some rare mentors who, UNLIKE Linda Buck, do not even check the data in their own papers, even an A+ mentor can be fooled, and Linda Buck was. It happens even to the very best. Given that we are all under such pressure to raise money and publish, I believe that it is more important than ever for us to teach our trainees and mentors about acceptable scientific conduct , to strive to lower the stress levels in our laboratories, and to develop a system within our labs to check data, reproducibility, controls, stats, etc. before papers are submitted for publication Yes, it is time consuming, but there is simply no other acceptable practice. Science is about seeking the truth.We have too many journals filled with weak or incorrect studies that have wasted time, hard-earned monies, and misled our fields.
   It must stop. Whether we are mentors, trainees, contibutiors of papers or reviewers of papers, all of us must become more aware and more vigilant.

   — EV    Mar 8, 04:59 AM    #

8. Instructors (mentors in this case) are responsible for the product in relationship to the program, curriculum, and institution. By this, I mean if the program or institution is a piece of crap, then mentoring will most likely be as well—even the most talented, ethical mentors will struggle to meet goals in a chaotic environment.

   Of course it could also be that Buck was being a slacker. But at Harvard? I wouldn’t know. People like me don’t go to Harvard : )

   What’s a “research coolie” anyway?

   — kgotthardt    Mar 8, 08:00 AM    #

9. Data Geek is right. DET has opinions on issues (from other blogs) which are bordering xenophobic and racist. Lets not make this, as EV rightly pointed out, a “witch hunt”. You have to be in science and know the discipline, passion and rigor necessary to survive, to appreciate that the best will take inordinate steps to ensure the validity of their results. These are people that have spent decades at the bench doing repeat after repeat to ensure the reproducibility of their data – let us respect their dedication and not trash them when the chips are down. This is representative of the problem that plagues scientists today – billions of dollars are being routed to a useless war – but science monies are in desperate shortage. Instead, it is imperative that all scientists band together and not let trashy “sensationalists” and the media (which has been made a monster by the Freedom of Information act) propagate mass hysteria.
   Oh and by the way, DET go to Mumbai if you want to see “coolies”.

   — PP    Mar 8, 08:48 AM    #

10. EV has it right from beginning to end.

    — AG    Mar 8, 02:02 PM    #

11. I’m against punitive measures – they would only prompt cover-ups instead of honest, open disclosure. I admire the integrity of Dr. Buck, who had the courage to withdraw the paper for the sake of honest science, even knowing that doing so would trigger aspersions against her character. But I do not admire the practice of putting one’s name of a paper without having made a substantive intellectual contribution to its content. Or vouching for its content with one’s name, without actually supervising the work by at least being there. Punishment is not called for, but contrition, and commitment to change the way Dr. Buck supervises her co-authors, certainly is.

    — Adam Reed    Mar 8, 02:27 PM    #

12. Hopefully, at least two lessons will be learned from this event. First, journal reviewers must exercise extreme care in evaluating manuscripts to insure that the science is solid and second, a senior author must carefully evaluate all manuscripts where their name is attached. As in all cases of this nature, care must be taken not to ruin the careers of good scientists because of an honest mistake. This can easily happen with the current climate of severe competition and a societal tendency to question authority. At the same time, science demands integrity from researhers. This is not a time for knee-jerk reactions since the outcome is too important for the well-being of science as a discipline.

    — John T. Berg    Mar 8, 10:32 PM    #

13. The mentor is to blame. She hired/enrolled somebody to make science on the production line. How come she discovered it too late? A paper must be sent for publication after years of research, that should be the norm. Like it was in the old Zeitschrifts fur …. But the mentor was obviously doing something miniscule, something that other researchers could publish sooner, and she was in a race with others who also wanted to harvest five times in a year. This is not a matter of “integrity”, this mentor is not a scientist, she should be a stock broker on the floor showing her fingers: buy, sell, retract, buy more.

    — Michael Pyshnov    Mar 9, 11:18 AM    #

14. Linda Buck fulfilled her scientific responsibility. She discovered in her own lab with the next generation of equipment the irreproducibility of the results in this relatively minor paper a decade after the original experiments. Her lab then pursued the matter to find inconsistencies in the paper and the original data. It is simply an immutable and unfortunate fact that a suffiently clever scientist can fool the world, at least for a while, by modifying machines, data, or even photographic records to produce a sensible result. As to an assembly-line approach to science, readers should study Dr. Buck’s list of publications to see that such was not her style. In other words, she is to be commended, and the essence of her work is further substantiated.

    — HC    Mar 9, 03:08 PM    #

15. Let us be slow and careful in reviewing the data. Ample evidence from other cases suggests that lab notes can be fraudulent, and can fool the best of us. Let Harvard conduct its review, and we should await the outcome. This is likely not a situation of “casual” review of data, but a carefully constructed fraud on ther part of the post-doc.

    — Howard Sachs    Mar 9, 04:35 PM    #

16. 1. I admire Linda Buck for her courage to withdraw a high-profile paper. One individual in my field is known to publish a Nature paper (which ‘earned’ him a job at a top university) and then a Science paper a few years later to ‘correct’ the Nature paper. No retraction is offered. It is my hope that this investigator will now follow the good example of Linda Buck and to take personal and professional responsibilities. Better yet, stop producing junk papers and save some NIH money for other capable scientists!

    2. It is unfortunate that the public still does not know which part of the Buck paper is no longer reproducible. It would have been very helpful to first specify this before the announcement of the retraction was made. Confusions have already created now after the first author states that he is confident in reproducing the key results presented in the Nature paper. Was the retraction premature or was it a public display of internal fighting?

    3. As a consequence of the lack of specificity, it does give readers the impression that the first author has been singled out for potential errors. Yes, the first author should be responsible for the accuracy of the results. However, as the PI and sr. author of the paper, the buck stops at the top (i.e. Linda Buck).

    — BZ    Mar 9, 06:42 PM    #

17. To understand the extent of the damage, one, of course, should read the articles in which other people continue the “research” of the “high profile” fraudulent papers, i.e. before the fraud is exposed, which might take years and meanwhile produce considerable body of new “research”.

    The system must be changed. Instead of open access to journals at any time, scientists must be given one chance in 3-5 years to publish their work for this period. This would be a 3- or 5-year Report. In some cases, hopefully, people will take one year for doing nothing except thinking about what research needs to be done, they would form an opinion about the state of knowledge in their area, read deeper, etc. I believe that currently two days of thinking serves as a basis for a year of experiments. And this is when they are not simply told what to do. So, it’s all a production line anyway, not science, therefore, a 3- or 5-year Report is the proper solution today.

    — Michael Pyshnov    Mar 9, 11:19 PM    #

18. Apparently, certain members of the scientific community have failed to grasp the concept of ethical behavior in science. Based on certain comments, it appears that a breach of the ethical duty to report accurate and reproducible information is simply an “honest mistake”. If Dr. Buck is so easily fooled by a postdoctoral fellow, independent committee oversight of her research may be warranted.

    — DM    Mar 10, 11:49 AM    #

19. As a person with a lifelong love of the sciences, I have been disgusted by the sellout of “scientia” to the highest bidder for grants (although I must admit the “real-world” necessity of finding some source to fund expensive tools and time/work).

    But it is also sad to see, in the name of ethics, such a precipitous and unscientific rush to judgment when the investigation has not been completed to determine if there has been a breach of integrity, a careless and sloppy “honest mistake,” or some other explanation for the discrepanciy that had to the assumedly honorable retraction. Thee will be plenty of time for “after-actions” when the facts have been uncovered – I thought that facts, not emotions, were once supposed to rule in science.

    — Ole Perfesser    Mar 10, 05:29 PM    #

20. I should disclose that I am a researcher at Harvard (not Longwood/med school) so call me biased if you like…

    Everyone is right. Harvard puts a lot of pressure on people to publish and to get grant money. PIs put pressure on postdocs to get research out the door and academic institutions won’t hire you (most Harvard postdocs want academic jobs) without a substantial list of first-author pubs. The postdoc expects some guidance from the PI and often the PI just assumes that work done by a postdoc is ok because it was done by a postdoc—presumably an expert with a PhD in the very field in which they are publishing. And a (future or past) Nobel prize winner spends about 0.1% of her time in the lab, which tends to run itself once it is packed full of postdocs who are attracted to hot research (that generates lots of pubs) like I am to a cold beer after work; PIs spend their time raising money, which they throw at their postdocs along with a list of ideas. It becomes a positive feedback loop in which everyone thinks everyone else is accountable.

    You can blame the government—not enough grant money to go around. You can blame the publishers—too much profit-motive. You can blame referees (which, BTW, are usually postdocs anyway and how much time do we really have to spend fact-checking research papers )—they don’t spend enough time scrutinizing manuscripts. You can blame postdocs—anything to get a paper out and once you get hired ain’t no one gonna fire you even if the Nature paper that got you hired in the first place gets retracted. You can blame the PIs—spend less time raising money (hah!) and more time in the lab.

    Read a research paper from the 1930’s and you’ll see a research project that took two years to complete. You’ll see research that was so careful and so meticulous that reproducibility isn’t even a question. Today many (old) people still live under the delusion that the proliferation of journals (and researchers, PDFs, etc.) hasn’t changed this paradigm one bit, yet people are constantly rushing papers out the door because “another lab is working on the same project!”. In chemistry, when you can’t reproduce work from a paper the first question is “when was it published?”. If the answer is anytime in the 21st century the assumption is that it can’t be reproduced—this is how bad it has gotten.

    The solution, I’m afraid, is to let the scientific community work it out. Eventually a critical mass of useless garbage in the literature will lead to meaningful reforms… Less emphasis on quantity, better use of the Internet in the peer review process (wait until the Nintendo Generation gets tenure), more grant money to fight over, policy changes in departments and universities, etc. etc. In the mean time, quit blaming people. People cheat to get ahead and sometimes they get away with it. People also screw up once in a while. And yes, scientists are people too.

    This article got retracted, but there are thousands like it that wide-eyed students point to and proclaim “but it’s in the literature, it has to be true!”—and the students are the ones who are really getting screwed by all of this.

    — R C    Mar 10, 08:21 PM    #

21. It’s obvious what’s happening here: the chinese postdoc was okay for raising Linda Bucks Impact Factor with a Nature publication. Now that it turns out to be faked, she herself demands an investigation on his other papers so that she at least can earn the credits for being an honest researcher. The results were faked, she could have noticed that BEFORE they submitted to Nature. That’s her job as a PI and if she is unable to verify the results of a paper with her name among the authors BEFORE submission, than Linda Buck has no place in science. This is not a “witch-hunt”, scientists do have basic responsibilities and guaranteeing the validty of the results is one of them. If the results can not be validated, then the results have not been generated by the scientific method, simple as that. LB’s behaviour just shows what kind of people nowadays get a nobel prize.

    — gojira    Mar 17, 01:43 AM    #

22. This illustrates the danber of doing science without theoretical guidance. You reported x = 3 and nobody knows if it is correct or wrong. Someone then read the lab note book and noticed that x is actually 2, but again nobody know whether x = 2 is correct or wrong.

    This is what happens in the hottest area of science called neurobiology.

    — Xuhua Xia    Mar 17, 07:19 PM    #

23. This is EV again.
    1. This IS a witch hunt. So, before someone lights the match to burn her or her first author at the stake, lets consider the following:
    1. Linda Buck simply said she could not reproduce the published results. This was an honest statement and one to be commended.
    2.No fingers were pointed by or at the people involved. NONE of us knows what really happened at this point so why are WE pointing fingers??
    3. So,before we draw any conclusions, or make any more accusations, lets wait to hear the facts.
    4. Think about this:if a trainee is determiend to cheat, s/he will find a way to do so. The only things you can to catch cheaters is to shadow them 24/7,give them coded samples, or have a third party repeat the experiments. I have done all 3 and have caught 3 cheaters over the years. But it is hard, sad, and personally draining. I dont like doing it, but maybe we ALL need to consider this.
    2. Mentors can be remiss and, well, bad mentors. They can pressure students into getting the results they want. They can fail to look at primary data. They can use trainees as slave labor. I know Linda Buck well and I have never seen any of this behavior.

    So before we do any more name calling or finger pointing, lets learn the facts.
    And please, no 4 letter words or nasty accusations. It serves nobody well and it is crude.
    Thanks.

    — EV    Mar 18, 04:29 AM    #

24. I am working in one of the most prestigious institutes in Boston and the world. In the work, I could not be able to recapitulate and develop a major story in the field. I then found out that some of the important data which were published and used by the laboratory to apply for NIH（National Institutes of Health）grants were falsified and fabricated. I presented the evidences and made complaints to the principle investigator of the laboratory and the officials in the institute. However, I was retaliated against for my whistle blowing and was asked to leave my position. I have made research misconduct allegation and retaliation allegation in Office of Research Integrity in US Department of Health and Human Services.

    Unfortunately, ORI only asked the institute set up self-investigation panels for both issues. After my complaining, the institute egregiously engaged in the retaliation and threatening, attempting to intimidate me. If the research misconduct is covered up, millions dollars of taxpayers’ money could be in danger of being wasted, the public health could be in danger of unprotected, and the truth might be buried by the lies. And my scientific life will be ruined.

    Therefore, I am seeking for urgent assistance from anyone who will be able to give me a hand on this matter.

    Your kind assistance and/or information will be highly appreciated by all honest and hard-working scientists.

    Please contact me via lincbacon@yahoo.com

    — Linc    Mar 24, 06:23 PM    #

Previous: Venezuelan Government Eliminates Universities' Entrance Examinations
Next: Some Colleges Cut Tuition for Out-of-State Students