Although it is painful to recount, I think it will be beneficial to share my experiences as a whistle blower—in my case, a postdoctoral fellow who had the “audacity” to commit such an act against his mentor.
I arrived at Case Western Reserve Univer sity in Cleveland in 1979 to do a postdoctoral fellowship in the laboratory of Philip W. Lambert an endocrine researcher. My first year of research went well and I was awarded a National Research Service Award from the National Institutes of Health. However, I was also becoming increasingly concerned about Lambert’s research into the synthesis of a vitamin D derivative— work that involved extensive knowledge of organic chemistry that he lacked—and the results he was reporting. I approached his superiors with my concerns, and all but one, Bernard A. Roos, ignored my warnings and were quite displeased with me. Because of these rebuffs and other ongoing ...
